1. The Humanistic Approach
Key people: Abraham Maslow & Carl Rogers
Humanistic psychology describes understanding human experience from the position of the individual.
It focuses on the idea of free will and the belief that we are all capable of making choices.
What does this mean? That all individuals are different. That we have to seek to empathise with individuals. What is empathy? What is sympathy? What is self-esteem.

2. What is the Humanistic Approach About?
The Individual
That everyone is DIFFERENT
Unconditional Positive Regard
Non-judgemental
Active Listening
Individual – and individual differences. Humanistic – we see people as individual humans who we might not understand but we ACCEPT. We have unconditional positive regard… there are no conditions to the positive regard we have for a human. Eg we don't say, well I’m not talking to that person because they are a paedophile, we accept that person and they in turn learn to open up because they can talk about themselves without being judged. Non judgemental is very important. We separate out someone’s behaviour from the fact that they are a human being. Every human being deservers to be listened to without judgement. So if someone said to you “ I was unfaithful to my husband” you would not judge them on this, but ask questions to find out why and then when they have worked out why, they might change that kind of behaviour anyway.
So the humanistic approach means actively listening to the individual and experiencing empathy for them. If you actively listen to someone you will understand human behaviour and experience (the humanists say).
Empathy
Self-Concept
Self-Esteem

3. How easy do you find it to accept these people?
The Individual
The humanistic approach sees people as individual humans who we might not understand but we ACCEPT.
We accept that everyone is different
How easy do you find it to accept these people?
The Queen
Christopher Paul Neil
Paedophile
Katie Price

4. Unconditional Positive Regard
Unconditional means ‘without conditions’.
If you have unconditional positive regard for someone this means it is without conditions on their behaviour – you have a positive regard for ALL humans no matter what they have done.
How difficult is it for you to have unconditional positive regard for Hitler?

5. Non-judgemental
Christopher Paul Neil
Paedophile
The Humanistic approach says we should separate out someone’s behaviour from the fact that they are a human being. It says that every human being deservers to be listened to without judgement.
Why do you think the humanistic approach says we should be non-judgemental towards all humans? It tries to find out why people are like they are and to get them to talk to find out why they are behaving in a certain way. Therefore, they think that behaviour might change. In the case of a paedophile this is very difficult, especially because there is a school of thought that says paedophilia is a condition that they ‘can’t help’. What other behaviour is it hard to be non-judgemental about? Eg unfaithfulness, violence etc. if someone is violent then it is easy to judge them. It’s easy to be judgemental, it’s hard to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and not be judgemental.
How easy do you find it to be non-judgemental towards Christopher Neil?

6. How easy would you find it to actively listen to this woman?
Active Listening
The humanistic approach is dependent on ACTIVE LISTENING.
When is it hard to listen to people?
Get distracted
Don’t agree with what they are saying
Prejudiced about their clothes/accent etc
Not interested in what they are saying
Other reasons?
Active Listening do an ACTIVITY where they have activity listen to each other. EG they are in pairs, sit back to back. One person to describe a picture they have been given to their partner and their partner must draw it from what they say only. Then look to see what the pictures look like. Q&A to see how difficult it was. Apply this to listening to people- it’s hard to listen. Do board blaster to explain all the reasons it’s hard to listen to people (eg get distracted, don’t agree with what they are saying, prejudiced about their clothes/accent etc, not interested in what they are saying).
Do active listening activity
How easy would you find it to actively listen to this woman?

7. Empathy requires you to put yourself in someone else’s shoes
The humanistic approach says that we have to seek to empathise with individuals. What is empathy? What is sympathy?
Use handout PP11 and PP12 to explore empathy
Empathy requires you to put yourself in someone else’s shoes

8. Self-Concept
How do we see ourselves?
List how you see yourself in terms of your appearance and different roles in life

9. Self-Concept & Ideal Self
How we see ourselves and is made from:
What we are told as children which is then internalised
How we judge ourselves according to what we succeed and fail in
Physical attributes – am I fat, thin, blonde etc
The Ideal Self represents a view of ourselves as we feel we should be & would like to be. If there is a mismatch between our actual self & the ideal self Rogers says we become troubled and unhappy
What happens if we are praised as children? What happens if we are ignored and told we are useless. What sort of self-concept do we get. How does this affect behaviour? If you are told you are boring you will deem yourself unlovable and not important. This could affect your relationships in the future.
The humanistic approach is interested in self-concept because it believes it helps us to understand behaviour

10. Self-Esteem Bad Good This refers to how much we feel we are valuable.
Someone with high self-esteem will believe they are loved and lovable, important and valued.
Someone with low self-esteem may feel worthless, of no value, unloved and unlovable.
The humanistic approach believes everyone has the propensity to be loved and wishes to help improve a person’s self-esteem.
Bad
How can you improve someone’s self esteem?
Good