Humanistic psychology arose in the 1950s-1960s as a deliberate third force reacting against the determinism of psychoanalysis and the reductionism of behaviorism, insisting on understanding people holistically, as wholes greater than the sum of their parts, with attention to self-actualization, meaning and creativity. Clinically it favors approaches built on self-awareness, empathy and unconditional positive regard.
Facts
Central QuestionWhat accounts for uniquely human concerns and positive potential, self, self-actualization, meaning, creativity, growth, that reductionist psychoanalysis and behaviorism leave out? 1 Founded Year Still Active FAQs
Why is humanistic psychology called psychology's "third force"?
Humanistic psychology positioned itself as a third alternative to psychoanalysis and behaviorism, the two schools that came before it.
Humanistic psychology arose in the 1950s and 1960s as a deliberate third force, positioned against the two schools that dominated psychology at the time: psychoanalysis, which it criticized for reducing people to unconscious drives and pathology, and behaviorism, which it criticized for reducing people to conditioned responses with no place for consciousness, choice or growth. Founded by Carl Rogers and closely associated with Abraham Maslow, humanistic psychology instead centered on self-actualization, meaning and each person's capacity for positive growth.
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Source Humanistic psychology
A founding figure of humanistic psychology, co-founder of the Association for Humanistic Psychology and pioneer of life-span developmental theory within it.
Existential and humanistic psychology are closely allied, both part of what is often called the third force in psychology alongside behaviorism and psychoanalysis, and their leading figures overlapped and collaborated.
Source Wikipedia: Existential Therapy
Critiqued Here
Maslow named behaviorism psychology's 'first force' and argued it systematically excluded the subjective data of consciousness and the complexity of human personality, one of the two schools humanistic psychology positioned itself as a 'third force' against.
Source Humanistic psychology
Maslow argued psychoanalysis addressed only human pathology, framing humanistic psychology's 'third force' as the healthy complement Freud's system left out.
Source Humanistic psychology
Founded By
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In Branch
Opposes
Source Humanistic psychology (Wikipedia)
Source Humanistic psychology (Wikipedia)
School Theories
Source OpenStax: Psychology 2e: 11.5 Humanistic Approaches
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1. Humanistic psychology
Wikimedia FoundationOrigins section
the self, self-actualization, health, hope, love, creativity, nature, being, becoming, individuality, and meaning
Lead section
Abraham Maslow built on their work establishing a "third force" in psychology in the 1950s.
Associated With: Behaviorism, History section
Maslow believed the first force systematically excluded the subjective data of consciousness and much information bearing on the complexity of the human personality and its development.
Associated With: Psychoanalysis, History section
it is as if Freud supplied us the sick half of psychology and we must now fill it out with the healthy half.
2. OpenStax: Psychology 2e: 1.2 History of Psychology
OpenStaxSection 1.2
Humanistic psychologists rejected, on principle, the research approach based on reductionist experimentation in the tradition of the physical and biological sciences, because it missed the “whole” human being.
Section: Humanism
This program has been largely qualitative (not measurement-based), but there exist a number of quantitative research strains within humanistic psychology, including research on happiness, self-concept, meditation, and the outcomes of humanistic psychotherapy (Friedman, 2008).
View the Source Humanistic psychology (Wikipedia)
Lead
to understand people, ourselves and others holistically (as wholes greater than the sums of their parts)
Opposes: Psychoanalysis, Article text
Humanistic psychology is a psychological perspective that arose in the early- to mid-20th century in response to Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic theory and B. F. Skinner's behaviorism.
Opposes: Behaviorism, Article text
Humanistic psychology is a psychological perspective that arose in the early- to mid-20th century in response to Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic theory and B. F. Skinner's behaviorism.
View the SourceWikipedia: Existential Therapy
Wikimedia FoundationAssociated With: Existential Psychology
OpenStax: Psychology 2e: 11.5 Humanistic Approaches
OpenStaxSchool Theories: Hierarchy of Needs, Page textQuote, School Theories: Hierarchy of Needs, Page text
When you studied motivation, you learned about one of the best-known humanistic theories, Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory, in which Maslow proposes that human beings have certain needs in common and that these needs must be met in a certain order.
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