THE PERSON-CENTRED THEORY:

• The Person-centred approach to counselling is rooted

in the humanistic theory or philosophy.
• Carl Rogers earned recognition around the world for
originating and developing the humanistic
movement in psychotherapy.
• The humanistic philosophy influenced all fields
related to
psychology.
• It follows a relationship approach to counselling and
places emphasis on the
attitudes of the counsellor or therapist and maintains
that the quality of the relationship between counsellor
and client/learner is the most important aspect of the
counselling process.
• This model assumes that clients (learners) have the inherent
capacity and strength to deal constructively and successfully
with his/her problems given the right
emotional environment (a special helping relationship) without
direct intervention of the counsellor (Corey,1996; Gillis, 1994).

• Disturbed behaviour results when people perceive themselves

to be behaving differently to the way they believe they should
behave and this may have a negative influence on their self-
concept.
• The way they believe they should behave is often based on
the opinions and values of others and thus not necessarily the
only appropriate
way to behave.
• Every individual has the inherent capacity to deal
constructively and successfully with his/her
problems, and will do so given the right emotional
environment.
• -The counselor facilitates this by establishing a
special helping relationship with the individual.
• The person-centered approach is strongly optimistic,
assuming that the client has the innate potential to
grow in a healthy way and to reach his/her full
potential as a human.
• -Individuals behave in ways that will enhance their
self-concept, i.e. the way they perceive themselves as
human beings.
• Disturbed behavior results when people perceive
themselves to be behaving differently to the way they
believe they should behave, this believe being
founded, often falsely, on the opinions and values of
others.
• -Emotional problems arise when there is an
inconsistency between a person’s self-concept and
his /her actual life experiences.
• For example, a child’s self-concept formulated and
sustained by the opinions and expectations of
parents, teachers’ etc. may be such that he/she
falsely believes he/she is capable of achieving certain
tasks.
• -If his/her own life experiences indicate otherwise, the
inconsistency between his/her self-concept and
his/her real life experiences increase, and feelings of
inadequacy and internal confusion are experienced.
• In order to alleviate this situation the child may
attempt to deny or distort the reality he/she is
experiencing, either by employing one or more
defense mechanisms, or alternatively behaving in a
disturbed , or even neurotic manner.
• The person-centered approach is not, in itself, a
technique based on doing something for the person
seeking help.
THE PROCESS OF HELPING
• How is such an individual help to raise this concept
of self in a way that is consistent with his/her real and
his/her valuing process?
• For Rogers this is possible only if the counselor to
whom the individual goes to for help is able to
demonstrate certain attitudes towards the client to
the extent that the latter “only minimally” feels that
these attitudes are communicated.
• These are the attitudes of congruence, unconditional
positive regard, empathic understanding.
• -Rogers believes that if these conditions are
demonstrated, the clients inherent potential can be
released to move into characteristically positive
directions.
• -Once the inherent power of the individual is
released , behavioral changes reflecting the new
individual occur.
THE CONDITIONS FOR COUNSELLING
• •Two persons are in psychological contact:
• -A minimal relationship should exist whereby both
helper and helpee perceive each makes a positive
difference.
• •The client is in a state of incongruence; being
vulnerable:
• -The process is more likely to start and succeed if the
client is uneasy, not knowing the cause of the tension
he/she is experiencing.
• The therapist is congruent in the relationship:
• -The helper has to be a genuine person, one who is
accurately aware and accepting of his/her own
experience, be it positive or negative, at any given
moment in the relationship with the client.
• -This means that he/she must be himself/herself,
without pretence or façade.
• -It means not only knowing how he/she is feeling at
that moment, but accepting it, living it without fear
and if appropriate, communicating it to the client.
• Therapist experiences unconditional positive regard
toward the client:
• -This attitude means prizing the individual totally
rather than conditionally.
• -It means accepting all the client’s feelings without
exception.
• -It is unreserved acceptance of the individual without
evaluation.
• Therapist experiences an empathic understanding of
the client’s internal frame of reference:
• -“To sense the client’s inner world of private ,
personal meanings as if it were your own, but without
ever losing the “as if” quality.
• -Empathy is to sense the hurt or pleasure as another
senses it, to perceive the causes of his/her problems
as he/she perceives them.
• The client perceives at least to a minimal degree, the
therapist’s congruence and empathic understanding
of his/her internal frame of reference and
unconditional positive regard:
• It is only when the client perceives to a minimal
degree the genuineness, acceptance and empathy
that the counselor experiences for him/her, that
development in personality and change in behavior is
predicted.
CHANGES IN BEHAVIOR:

• -Rogers believes that if these three significant

attitudes of congruence, empathy and unconditional
positive regard are continuously perceived by the
client who has a problem, the following begins to
happen:
• -The client becomes more open to his/her experience,
more realistic and objective in his/her perceptions
and less defensive so that he/she is more effective in
problem solving.
• The client perceives other people more realistically
and accurately.
• Perceive himself or herself more realistically and now
set a more achievable goal for his/her ideal self.
• The individual becomes more confident, perceiving
the locus of choice residing within him/herself.