The Humanistic Approach: Historical Background and Core Principles

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The Humanistic Approach: Historical Background and Core Principles

Psychology of Personality · Chapter 11: Humanistic Theories and Their Key FiguresSection 11.1 · lesson 67 of 83video coming soon

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In this lesson

A movement defined first by what it refused to accept.

  • Explain why humanism is called a third force
  • State what it criticised in the two dominant schools
  • List the core principles of the approach
  • Define self-actualization and its central role

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Humanistic Theories and Their Key Figures

The Humanistic Approach: Historical Background and Core Principles

By the middle of the twentieth century, psychology had two dominant answers to what a person is. One said we are driven by hidden unconscious forces. The other said we are shaped by environmental conditioning. Both accounts explain the person by something the person does not control. A group of psychologists found that unacceptable, and said so. This section covers where the humanistic approach came from. And the principles it built in place of what it rejected.

The Reaction

Two Dominant Forces, and the Objection

The humanistic approach emerged in the mid-twentieth century. And it emerged as a deliberate alternative, rather than as a fresh start. Psychoanalysis focused on unconscious conflict. On that account the person is driven by hidden forces. Behaviourism focused on observable responses to the environment. On that account the person is shaped by conditioning. Humanistic thinkers reacted against both, and the objection was specific. They saw both as overly deterministic, and overly reductive. Notice the shared structure they were objecting to. In each case the person is explained by something outside the person's control.

Third Force

Putting the Whole, Conscious Person at the Centre

Because they opposed both schools, humanistic thinkers became known as a third force. A third force that placed the whole, conscious person at the centre. The movement drew on existential and phenomenological ideas. Those emphasising subjective experience, freedom, and meaning. Maslow and Rogers also made a complaint about method. They argued that psychology had concentrated too heavily on dysfunction. And too heavily on animal models. So they called for something different. A science that studied healthy growth, creativity, and the human capacity to choose. And the capacity to flourish. The underlying criticism is worth spelling out. You cannot infer human nature from what goes wrong in it.

Principle One

People Are Basically Good

The approach rests on several core principles. Take them one at a time. The first is that people are basically good, and oriented toward growth. It is important to be clear about what kind of claim that is. It is a starting assumption, not a finding. It is the premise the rest of the framework rests on. Which matters, because it is also where much later criticism lands. That premise sets the direction of everything else. An optimistic stance, emphasising strengths, and meaning. And the conditions that allow human beings to thrive.

Principle Two

Free Will and Responsibility

The second principle is that each person has free will. And responsibility for their own choices. That claim is the direct break with the deterministic accounts. If choice is real, then the person is not simply an output of prior causes. But notice what comes attached to it. The approach does not offer freedom as a comfort. Responsibility travels with it. Accountability for what one does with the freedom.

Principle Three

Subjective Experience Is the Unit of Study

The third principle concerns what psychology should actually study. Humanistic psychology treats subjective experience as the most meaningful unit of study. That is, how the world appears to the individual. So behaviour is read from the inside out. It is understood from the person's own frame of reference. Rather than reduced to drives, or to conditioning. This is a methodological commitment with real consequences. What matters most, on this view, is precisely what is hardest to observe from outside. That tension shows up again and again in this chapter.

The Core Concept

Self-Actualization

Central to the whole approach is the concept of self-actualization. Self-actualization is the innate tendency to develop one's potential. And to become a fully functioning person. It supplies the direction the theory needs. Because if growth is innate, the task of psychology changes. It becomes identifying what blocks growth, rather than what drives it. Pay attention to one word in that definition. Innate. The tendency is assumed to be already present, not built. That assumption does a great deal of work throughout humanistic theory.

Principle Four

Holism

The fourth principle is holism. The approach treats the person as an integrated whole. Rather than as a sum of parts. And that follows from what came before. If subjective experience is the unit of study, it cannot be sensibly decomposed. Break it into drives, reflexes, or traits, and you lose the thing you were studying. But holism carries a cost that shows up later in this chapter. A whole person is much harder to measure than a component. The commitment that gives the approach depth also complicates its evidence base.

The Model

Five Commitments That Hold Together

Those principles are not a checklist. They support one another. Basic goodness gives the approach its direction. Free will and responsibility make the person an agent rather than an output. Subjective experience sets what gets studied. Self-actualization supplies the innate motive. And holism refuses to break any of it into parts. That mutual support is a strength, in one respect. The framework is coherent. Each piece implies the others. It is also a weakness, because the pieces cannot easily be tested separately.

Side By Side

Five Perspectives on What a Person Is

Set five perspectives side by side to see where the disagreement really lies. Psychoanalysis focuses on unconscious conflict. The person is driven by hidden forces. Behaviourism focuses on observable responses. The person is shaped by environment. Humanistic psychology focuses on conscious growth. The person is free and growth-oriented. Phenomenology focuses on subjective experience. The person is an interpreter of meaning. And existential psychology focuses on freedom and meaning. The person is a responsible chooser. Read the last column, not the first. Each school studies something different because each assumes something different. About what a person fundamentally is.

Consolidate

What It Looks Like in a Room

What does this look like in an actual room? Consider a counsellor who focuses on a client's strengths, values, and goals for the future. Rather than only diagnosing problems. That is the humanistic emphasis in practice. And the tell is whose frame of reference is being used. Diagnosis works from the clinician's categories. Humanistic work starts from how the world appears to this particular person. So, why did humanism arise? As a reaction against deterministic psychoanalysis and behaviourism. And how does it study people? Through their subjective experience, and their capacity for growth. Treating the person as a whole, rather than as a set of parts.

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About The Humanistic Approach: Historical Background and Core Principles

Why is humanistic psychology called the third force?
Humanistic psychology is called the third force because it emerged in the mid-twentieth century as an alternative to the two dominant schools, psychoanalysis and behaviorism. Thinkers such as Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers saw both as overly deterministic and reductive, since one explained people by unconscious conflict and the other by environmental conditioning. They placed the whole, conscious, choosing person at the center and called for studying healthy growth, not only dysfunction.
What are the core principles of humanistic psychology?
The core principles of humanistic psychology are that people are basically good and growth-oriented, that each person has free will and responsibility for their choices, that subjective experience is the most meaningful thing to study, and that the person should be understood as a whole. Self-actualization, the innate tendency to develop one's potential, supplies the motive. The principles support one another, which makes the framework coherent but hard to test piece by piece.
Why does humanistic psychology focus on subjective experience?
Humanistic psychology focuses on subjective experience because it treats how the world appears to the individual as the most meaningful unit of study. Drawing on phenomenology, it reads behavior from the person's own frame of reference rather than reducing it to drives or conditioning. A humanistic counselor therefore starts from a client's strengths, values, and goals, not only from diagnostic categories. The trade-off is that inner experience is hard to observe from outside.
What does holism mean in humanistic psychology?
Holism in humanistic psychology means treating the person as an integrated whole rather than a sum of parts. Humanistic thinkers argued that breaking experience into drives, reflexes, or traits loses the very thing being studied. Holism gives the approach depth, but it carries a cost: a whole person is much harder to measure than a single component, which complicates the scientific evidence for humanistic claims.

About the Psychology of Personality course

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Psychology of Personality (Psychology 300) carries a NCCRS credit recommendation for 3 semester credits. ACE and NCCRS have over 2,100 cooperating colleges that will consider accepting credits; the final decision is with the universities.
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