Organismic Theory

Organismic theories in psychology are a family of holistic psychological theories that stress the organization, unity and integration of human beings, expressed through each individual's inherent tendency toward growth or development. The idea of an explicitly organismic theory dates at least to Kurt Goldstein's 1934 book The Organism, a holistic approach to biology grounded in pathological case data, and organismic theories together with the organic metaphor more broadly were inspired by organicist approaches within biology. Within psychology, the most direct influence on organismic theory comes from Gestalt psychology, and organismic approaches are typically contrasted with mechanistic and reductionist perspectives in the field.