MODULE 5

Chapter 5

A Phenomenological Theory: The Personality Theory of Rogers Questions to be Addressed in this Chapter Carl R. Rogers (1902–1987): A View of the Theorist Rogers's View of the Person Rogers's View of the Science of Personality The Personality Theory of Carl Rogers Major Concepts Review Chapter Focus You are really nervous before a first date, so your mother gives you some advice: “Just be yourself. Your true self.” But that advice doesn't seem too helpful. Well intentioned though she may be, Mom raises two problems. First, you want to impress your date and get him or her to like you. What if your date does not like your “true self”? Even if you do like Mom's plan, there is a second problem: What exactly is your “true” self? The nature of the self, and the tension between being yourself versus wanting to be liked by other people, are central concerns in the personality theory developed by Carl Rogers. Rogers first addressed these concerns in his work as a clinical psychologist. He combined his clinical insights with systematic empirical research to develop a theory of the totality of the individual that highlighted the person's efforts to develop a meaningful sense of self. In addition to being a self‐theory, Rogers's work also can be categorized as a phenomenological theory. A phenomenological theory is one that emphasizes the individual's subjective experience of his or her world—in other words, his or her phenomenological experience. As a therapist, Rogers's overarching goal was to understand the client's phenomenological experience of the self and the world in order to assist the client in personal growth. As a theorist, his overarching goal was to develop a framework to explain the nature and development of the self as the core element of personality. Rogers's phenomenological self‐theory can also be described by another term: humanistic. Rogers's work is part of a humanistic movement in psychology whose core feature was to emphasize people's inherent potential for growth. This chapter, then, introduces you to the theory—the phenomenological, humanistic, self‐theory—that is the enduring legacy of one of the great American psychologists of the 20th century, Carl Rogers. Questions to be Addressed in this Chapter What is the self, and why might one not act in a manner consistent with one's true self? Freud viewed motivation in terms of tension reduction, the pursuit of pleasure, and intrapsychic conflict. Is it possible to view human motivation, instead, in terms of personal growth, self‐actualization, and feelings of congruence? How important is it for us to have a stable self‐concept? How important is it for our internal feelings to match our self‐concept? What do we do when feelings are in conflict with our self‐beliefs? What are the childhood conditions that produce a positive sense of self‐worth? In the previous chapters, you learned about Freud's psychoanalytic theory of personality and related psychodynamic positions. We now introduce a second, entirely different perspective. It is that of the American psychologist Carl Rogers. His work exemplifies a phenomenological approach to the study of persons. At the outset, you should consider how these conceptions, Freud's and Rogers's, are related. Rogers did not disagree with everything Freud said about persons. He recognized that Freud provided some insights about the workings of the mind that are of enduring value. Also, Rogers worked in a style that was similar in some ways to that of Freud. Rogers, like Freud, began his career as a therapist and based his general theory of personality primarily on his therapeutic experiences. However, these affinities are less important than are some deep differences. Rogers disagreed sharply with major emphases of Freudian theory: its depiction of humans as controlled by unconscious forces; its assertion that personality is determined, in a fixed manner, by experiences early in life; its associated belief that adult psychological experience is a repeating of the repressed conflicts of the past. To Rogers, these psychodynamic views did not adequately portray human existence or human potential. Rogers thus provided a new theory of the person. It emphasized conscious perceptions of the present rather than merely unconscious residues of the past, interpersonal experiences encountered across the course of life rather than merely parental relations in childhood, and people's capacity to grow toward psychological maturity rather than merely their tendency to repeat childhood conflicts. Rogers expands our conception of human nature, and in a very positive direction. To many contemporary psychologists, his positive conception of the person, developed during the mid‐20th century, is of enduring importance. “Half a century on from when Rogers first developed his theory, it still has profound consequences for the person and their ability to maintain and enhance themselves” (McMillan, 2004, p. ix). Carl R. Rogers (1902–1987): A View of the Theorist “I speak as a person, from a context of personal experience and personal learning.” This is how Rogers describes himself, in a chapter entitled “This Is Me,” in his 1961 book On Becoming a Person. The chapter is a personal, very moving account by Rogers of the development of his professional thinking and personal philosophy. Rogers states what he does and how he feels about it: This book is about the suffering and the hope, the anxiety and the satisfaction, with which each therapist's counseling room is filled… It is about me as I try to perceive his (the client's) experience, and the meaning and the feeling and the taste and flavor that it has for him. It is about me as I rejoice at the privilege of being a midwife to a new personality as I stand by with awe at the emergence of a self, a person, as I see a birth process in which I have had an important and facilitating part. Source: Rogers (1961, pp. 4–5). Carl R. Rogers was born on January 8, 1902, in Oak Park, Illinois. He was reared in a strict and uncompromising religious and ethical atmosphere. His parents had the welfare of their children constantly in mind and inculcated in them a worship of hard work. Rogers's description of his early life reveals two main trends that are reflected in his later work. The first is the concern with moral and ethical matters. The second is the respect for the methods of science. The latter appears to have developed out of exposure to his father's efforts to operate their farm on a scientific basis and Rogers's own reading of books on scientific agriculture. Rogers started his college education at the University of Wisconsin, majoring in agriculture, but after two years, he changed his professional goals and decided to enter the ministry. During a trip to Asia in 1922, he had a chance to observe commitments to other religious doctrines as well as the bitter mutual hatreds of French and German people, who otherwise seemed to be likable individuals. Experiences like these influenced his decision to go to a liberal theological seminary, the Union Theological Seminary in New York. Although he was concerned about questions regarding the meaning of life for individuals, Rogers had doubts about specific religious doctrines. Therefore, he chose to leave the seminary, to work in the field of child guidance, and to think of himself as a clinical psychologist.

Carl R. Rogers. Rogers obtained his graduate training at Teachers College, Columbia University, receiving his Ph.D. in 1931. His education included exposure to both the dynamic views of Freud and the rigorous experimental methods then prevalent at Teachers College. Again, there were the pulls in different directions, the development of two somewhat divergent trends. In his later life, Rogers attempted to bring these trends into harmony. Indeed, these later years represent an effort to integrate the religious with the scientific, the intuitive with the objective, and the clinical with the statistical. Throughout his career, Rogers tried continually to apply the objective methods of science to what is most basically human. In 1968, Rogers and his more humanistically oriented colleagues formed the Center for the Studies of the Person. The development of the center expressed a number of shifts in emphasis in Rogers's studies from work within a formal academic structure to work with a collection of individuals who shared a perspective, from work with disturbed individuals to work with normal individuals, from individual therapy to intensive group workshops, and from conventional empirical research to the phenomenological study of people. Rogers believed that most of psychology was sterile and generally felt alienated from the field. Yet the field continued to value his contributions. He was president of the American Psychological Association in 1946–1947, was one of the first three psychologists to receive the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award (1956) from the profession, and in 1972 was the recipient of the Distinguished Professional Contribution Award. With Rogers, the theory, the man, and the life are interwoven. In his chapter “This Is Me,” Rogers lists 14 principles that he learned from thousands of hours of therapy and research. Here are some illustrations: In my relationships with persons I have found that it does not help, in the long run, to act as though I were something that I am not. Experience is, for me, the highest authority. It has been my experience that persons have a basically positive direction. Source: Rogers (1961a, pp. 16–17). Rogers's View of the Person The Subjectivity of Experience Rogers's theory is built on a deeply significant insight into the human condition. In our daily living, we believe we experience an objective world of reality. When we see something occur, we believe it exists as we saw it. When we tell people about the events of our day, we believe we are telling them what really happened. We are so confident in our objective knowledge of an objective reality that we rarely question it. But Rogers does. He explains: “I do not react to some absolute reality, but to my perception of this reality” (Rogers, 1951, 1977, p. 206, emphasis added). The “reality” we observe is really a “private world of experience … , the phenomenal field” (Rogers, 1951, 1977, p. 206). This phenomenal field—the space of perceptions that makes up our experience—is a subjective construction. The individual constructs this inner world of experience, and the construction reflects not only the outer world of reality but also the inner world of personal needs, goals, and beliefs. Inner psychological needs shape the subjective experiences that we interpret as objectively real. Consider some simple examples. If a child sees an angry look from its mother, or you detect a disappointed look from a dating partner, these emotions—anger, disappointment—are the reality that is experienced. But this so‐called reality could be wrong. Personal needs (to be accepted by the mother, to be attractive to the dating partner) may contribute to our perceiving the other as angry or disappointed. Yet people commonly fail to recognize this influence of inner needs on perceptions of the outer world. Failing to recognize this, the individual “perceives his experience as reality. His experience is his reality” (Rogers, 1959, 1977, p. 207). We are sure things really exist as we saw them. Yet our seeing is not an objective recording of the world of reality but a subjective construction that reflects our personal needs. Feelings of Authenticity Two additional aspects of Rogers's analysis of the subjectivity of experience define his core view of the person. The first is that people are prone to a distinctive form of psychological distress. It is a feeling of alienation or detachment—the feeling that one's experiences and daily activities do not stem from one's true, authentic self. Why do these feelings arise? Because we need the approval of others, we tell ourselves that their desires and values are our own. The child tries to convince himself that it really is bad to hit his baby sister, just as his parents say, even though it feels good to do so. The adult tries to convince herself that it really is good to settle down into a traditional career and family lifestyle, as valued relatives instruct, even though she really prefers a life of independence. When this happens, the individual thinks but does not feel an attachment to his or her own values. “Primary sensory and visceral reactions are ignored” and “the individual begins on a pathway that he later describes as ‘I really don't know myself’” (Rogers, 1951, 1977, p. 213). Rogers relates the case of a client who described her experiences as follows: “I've always tried to be what the others thought I should be, but now I'm wondering whether I shouldn't just see that I am what I am” (Rogers, 1951, 1977, p. 218). Maybe you've got the wrong job? Rogers's theory of personality stressed that people can get caught up in activities that do not feel right, or “authentic,” for them. A lack of authenticity creates distress. Note how Rogers's conception of the deliberate/thoughtful and the instinctive/visceral aspects of the organism differs from Freud's. To Freud, visceral reactions were animalistic impulses that needed to be curbed by the civilized ego and superego. Distorting and denying these impulses was part of normal, healthy personality functioning. But to Rogers, these instinctive visceral reactions are a potential source of wisdom. Individuals who openly experience the full range of their emotions, who are “accepting and assimilating [of] all the sensory evidence experienced by the organism” (Rogers, 1951, 1977, p. 219), are psychologically well adjusted. Conflict between instinctive and rational elements of mind thus is not an immutable feature of the human condition in Rogers's view. Rather than conflict, persons can experience congruence. They can realize a state in which their conscious experiences and goals are consistent with their inner, viscerally felt values. The Positivity of Human Motivation The final key aspect of Rogers's view of persons is his conception of human motivation. Rogers's clinical experiences convinced him that the core of our nature is essentially positive. Our most fundamental motivation is toward positive growth. Rogers recognized that some institutions may teach us otherwise. Some religions, for example, teach that we are basically sinful. The institution of psychoanalysis teaches that our basic instincts are sexual and aggressive. Rogers did recognize that people can, and often do, act in ways that are destructive and evil. But his basic contention is that, when we are functioning freely, we are able to move toward our potential as positive, mature beings. contention is that, when we are functioning freely, we are able to move toward our potential as positive, mature beings. To those who called him a naive optimist, Rogers was quick to point out that his conclusions were based on decades of experience in psychotherapy: I do not have a Pollyanna view of human nature … individuals can and do behave in ways which are incredibly … [yet I] work with such individuals … to discover the strongly positive directional tendencies which exist in them. Source: Rogers (1961, p. 27). Here is a profound respect for people, a respect that is reflected in Rogers's theory of personality and his person‐centered approach to psychotherapy. A Phenomenological Perspective Rogers takes a phenomenological approach to the study of persons. Here at the outset of our coverage of his work, then, we should explain what is meant by this lengthy term. In psychology or other disciplines, such as philosophy, a phenomenological approach is one that investigates people's conscious experiences. The investigation, in other words, does not try to characterize the world of reality as it exists independent of the human observer. Instead, one is interested in the experiences of the observer: how the person experiences the world. A bit of reflection on the material of the previous two chapters should reveal why Rogers's position was so noteworthy within personality psychology. The psychodynamic tradition was not particularly interested in phenomenology. To Freud, conscious phenomenological experience is not the core of personality. Indeed, conscious experience may be related in only the most indirect ways to that core, which involves unconscious drives and defenses. As you will see in subsequent chapters, some other theories that initially were developed at around the same time as Rogers's (e.g., trait theory, behaviorism) devote relatively little attention to the textures and dynamics of everyday phenomenological experience. Rogers, then, was an important voice in promoting the psychological study of phenomenology. Rogers's View of the Science of Personality What does Rogers's concern with phenomenological experience have to do with his view of the science of personality? Are these two independent things: a phenomenological perspective on psychology on the one hand and a viewpoint on science on the other? Or might one have an implication for the other? A bit of reflection suggests that a marriage between a traditional conception of science and a concern with phenomenological experience may be difficult. Science, as usually conceived, rests on clear‐cut data: Laboratory instruments inform us about entities' objective physical features (size, mass, electrical charge, etc.). Rogers, however, argues that personality psychology must address subjective internal experiences. These experiences cannot be measured in the manner of objective physical qualities. Instead, they have a subjective quality; their meaning rests on the interpretations of the individual having the experience (the subject who is experiencing things). Rogers's work can be understood as an attempt to draw on the best of two worlds, that of traditional science and that of the clinical understanding of subjective experience. In therapy, his main goal was not to classify his client within a scientific taxonomy or to identify some past causal factor that was a key determinant of his client's behavior. Instead, his goal was to gain a deep understanding of how his clients experienced their world. His efforts in this regard were similar to a reader's efforts to understand the world as experienced by the narrator of a first‐person novel or the author of an autobiography. On the other hand, Rogers had great respect for the scientific method and felt that psychology could eventually establish itself as a lawful science. He was particularly careful to subject his ideas about the effective forms of therapy to scientific testing. Rogers made a valiant effort to wed the scientific and the human sides of personality science. The Personality Theory of Carl Rogers Having introduced Rogers, his overall view of human nature, and his conception of personality science, we now turn to the details: the specifics of Rogers's theory of personality. Structure The Self In Chapter 1, we distinguished between the structure and process aspects of personality theories. This distinction, useful in understanding the work of Freud, is valuable again in learning about the theory of Carl Rogers. Let's first examine the structure aspects of Rogerian theory, whose key structural concept is the self. According to Rogers, the self is an aspect of phenomenological experience. It is one aspect of our experience of the world, that is, one of the things that fill our conscious experience is our experience of ourselves, or of “a self.” Phrased more formally, according to Rogers, the individual perceives external objects and experiences and attaches meanings to them. The total system of perceptions and meanings make up the individual's phenomenal field. That subset of the phenomenal field that is recognized by the individual as “me,” or “I” is the self. The self, or self‐concept, represents an organized and consistent pattern of perceptions. Although the self changes, it always retains this patterned, integrated, organized quality. Because the organized quality endures over time and characterizes the individual, the self is a personality structure. To Rogers, the self is not a little person inside of us. The self does not independently control behavior. Rather, the self is an organized set of perceptions possessed by the individual, who is ultimately responsible for his or her actions.

The pattern of experiences and perceptions known as the self is, in general, available to awareness. That is, people are consciously aware that it includes conscious self‐perceptions. Although individuals do have experiences of which they are unaware, the self‐concept is primarily conscious. (Note that Rogers's use of the term self differs from that of Carl Jung, whose views were discussed in the previous chapter. Jung thought of the self as an unconscious archetypal force, whereas Rogers uses the term self to refer to our conscious self‐concept.) Rogers did recognize two different aspects to the self: an actual self and an ideal self. Rogers recognized that people naturally think about not only themselves in the present but also their potential selves in the future. They thus generate an organized pattern of perceptions not only of their current self but also of an ideal self that they would like to be. The ideal self, then, is the self‐concept that an individual would most like to possess. It includes the perceptions and meanings that potentially are relevant to the self and that are valued highly by the individual. Rogers thus recognizes that our views of ourselves contain two distinct components: the self that we believe we are now and the self that we ideally see ourselves becoming in the future. Rogers maintained that he did not begin his theoretical work by deciding that it was important to study the self. In fact, he first thought that self was a vague, scientifically meaningless term. However, he listened carefully to his clients, who commonly expressed their psychological experience in terms of a self; clients would report that they “did not feel like themselves”, “were disappointed in themselves”, and so forth. It became clear to Rogers, then, that the self was a psychological structure through which people were interpreting their world. Personality and the Brain The Intuitive Self There are different ways of thinking about oneself. Some require a lot of “figuring out”; that is, considerable thought is required to determine an answer to a question about yourself, even though the question involves a familiar topic: you. If someone asks you how you'd react if you were caught up in a natural disaster, how you'd differ if you were raised in a different culture, or what your personality will be like in old age, you don't know the answers for sure; you don't have firm “intuitions”. You have to give the questions considerable thought to figure out answers. The personality theorist Carl Rogers was particularly interested in cases in which people do have intuitions. He thought that people possess a core, true self that they can experience at a deep, intuitive level. Rogers's reasoning, combined with the cases of nonintuitive thinking about the self (above), yields an interesting prediction about personality and the brain. If intuitive and nonintuitive thinking about the self differ, then different regions of the brain should be active during intuitive versus nonintuitive thinking about the self. Brain‐imaging methods have addressed this question. One study (Lieberman, Jarcho, & Satpute, 2004) was conducted with two groups of participants: 11 college soccer players and 11 improvisational actors. Members of both groups were shown words relevant either to (1) soccer (e.g., agile, fit) or to (2) acting (e.g., creative, quick‐witted); the researchers reasoned that participants would think intuitively only about words relevant to their own group. When each word was presented, participants judged whether the word “describes me”. Brain scans were taken while participants performed the task. By analyzing the resulting brain images, the researchers could determine if different parts of the brain are active during intuitive and nonintuitive thinking. Indeed they are. Unlike what was found when participants were thinking nonintuitively (e.g., soccer players thinking about acting), when people were thinking intuitively about themselves, the active brain regions were ones that were “more affective at their core” (Lieberman et al., 2004, p. 431), that is, more connected to emotional life. These included the amygdala, a brain system central to emotional processing; an area in the temporal lobe (the large mass of brain matter on each side of the brain) that is thought to contribute to the rapid processing of information; and the posterior cingulate cortex, an area in the central, rear (i.e., toward the back of the head) portion of the brain. More recent neuroscience findings bear on another distinction drawn by Rogers, namely, the difference between the actual and ideal self. The actual self concerns the self in the present. The ideal self refers to possibilities that lie in the future. Rogers' psychological distinction between present‐ and future‐oriented thinking about the self implies that different brain regions may be active during these different forms of thinking. To explore this question, in one recent study researchers (D'Argembeau et al., 2010) showed participants a series of adjectives. In two different experimental conditions, participants judged whether the words described (1) their present, actual self, or (2) their future self, specifically, personality attributes they might possess five years from the present. Brain scans revealed different patterns of activation during these tasks. Specifically, an area near the front of the brain, the medial prefrontal cortex, was more active when people thought about their present self than their self in the future. The researchers suggest that this region in the prefrontal cortex is particularly active when people think about material to which they are psychologically “connected,” and people naturally feel more connected to their present, actual self than to thoughts about themselves five years in the future. Consistent with this interpretation, the medial prefrontal cortex was also less active when people thought about themselves as they were five years in the past (D'Argembeau et al., 2008, 2010). Carl Rogers's theory of personality was psychological, not biological. He did not theorize about brain systems that underlie the capacity to think intuitively about the self, and to contemplate the self in the present and future. The results reviewed here thus cannot be viewed as directly supporting Rogers's theory (since, when it comes to the brain, he had no specific theory). Nonetheless, contemporary findings in neuroscience are consistent with Rogers's contention that intuitive, deeply felt conceptions of the self are a distinctive aspect of human mental life. Measuring Self‐Concept

The Q‐Sort Technique Once he recognized the centrality of self‐concept, Rogers knew that he needed an objective way to measure it. To this end, he primarily used the Q‐sort technique, which had been developed by Stephenson (1953). In the Q‐sort, the psychologist administering the test gives the test‐taker a set of cards, each of which contains a statement describing a personality characteristic: “Makes friends easily”, “Has trouble expressing anger”, and so forth. Test‐takers sort these cards according to the degree to which each statement is seen as descriptive of themselves. This is done on a scale labeled Most characteristic of me on one end and Least characteristic of me on the other. People are asked to sort the cards according to a forced distribution, with most of the cards going in the middle and relatively few being sorted at either extreme end; this ensures that the individual carefully considers the content of each personality attribute in comparison to the others. Two features of the Q‐sort are particularly noteworthy. One is that it strikes an interesting balance between fixed and flexible measures (see Chapter 2). The same statements are given to all test‐takers; in this respect, the measure is fixed. But the tester does not merely give a person a score by adding up test responses in a fixed manner that is the same for all persons. Instead, the test is flexible in that test‐takers indicate which subset of items is most characteristic of themselves, from their own point of view. Different subsets of items are characterized as “most like me” and “not like me” by different individuals. The test, then, yields a more flexible portrait of the individual than is obtained by other measures, whose content is entirely fixed (as you will see in subsequent chapters). Yet it is not entirely flexible. People must use statements provided by the experimenter, instead of their own self‐descriptions, and must sort the statements in a manner prescribed by the psychologist rather than according to a distribution that makes the most sense to them. The second feature is that the Q‐sort can be administered to individuals more than once in order to assess both the actual self and the ideal self. In the latter assessment, people are asked to categorize the statements according to the degree to which they describe the self that they ideally would like to be. By comparing the two Q‐sorts, ideal and actual self, one can obtain a quantitative measure of the difference, or discrepancy, between the two aspects of self‐concept. As you will see in Chapter 6, these discrepancies are important to psychopathology and therapeutic change. The Semantic Differential A classic method for assessing self‐concept is the semantic differential (Osgood, Suci, & Tannenbaum, 1957). In the semantic differential, the individual rates a concept on a number of seven‐point scales defined by polar adjectives such as good–bad, strong–weak, or active–passive. Or example, a person may rate a concept “My Self” or “My Ideal Self” using these scales. A rating on any one scale would indicate whether the subject felt that one of the adjectives was very descriptive of the concept or somewhat descriptive or whether neither adjective was applicable to the concept. The ratings are made in terms of the meaning of the concept for the individual. Like the Q‐sort, the semantic differential incorporates a structure that is valuable for data analysis while also being flexible regarding the exact concepts and scales that are used. There is no single standardized semantic differential. A variety of scales can be used in relation to concepts such as father, mother, and doctor to determine the meanings of phenomena for the individual. For example, consider rating the concepts “My Self” and “My College” on scales such as liberal–conservative, scholarly–fun loving, and formal–informal. To what extent do you see yourself and your college as similar? How does this relate to your satisfaction as a student at this college? Research indicates that students who view themselves as dissimilar from their college environment are more likely to become dissatisfied with college life and to drop out (Pervin, 1967a, 1967b). A classic illustration of how the semantic differential can be employed involves a case of multiple personality. In the 1950s, two psychiatrists, Corbett Thigpen and Harvey Cleckley, made famous the case of “the three faces of Eve”. This was the case of a woman who possessed three personalities, each of which predominated for a period of time, with frequent shifts back and forth. The three personalities were called Eve White, Eve Black, and Jane. As part of a research endeavor, the psychiatrists were able to have each of the three personalities rate a variety of concepts on the semantic differential. The ratings were then analyzed both quantitatively and qualitatively by two psychologists (C. Osgood and Z. Luria) who did not know the subject. Their analysis included both descriptive comments and interpretations of the personalities that went beyond the objective data. For example, Eve White was described as being in contact with social reality but under great emotional stress, Eve Black was described as out of contact with social reality but quite self‐assured, and Jane was described as superficially very healthy but quite restricted and undiversified. A more detailed, though still incomplete, description of the three personalities based on the semantic differential ratings is presented in Figure 5.1. The analysis on the basis of these ratings turned out to fit quite well with the descriptions offered by the two psychiatrists (Osgood & Luria, 1954). Eve White Perceives the world in an essentially normal fashion, is well socialized, but has an unsatisfactory attitude toward herself. The chief evidence of disturbance in the personality is the fact that ME (the self‐concept) is considered a little bad, a little passive, and definitely weak. Eve Black Eve Black has achieved a violent kind of adjustment in which she perceives herself as literally perfect, but, to accomplish this break, her way of perceiving the world becomes completely disoriented from the norm. If Eve Black perceives herself as good, then she also has to accept HATRED and FRAUD as positive values. Jane Jane displays the most “healthy” meaning pattern, in which she accepts the usual evaluations of concepts by her society yet still maintains a satisfactory evaluation of herself. The self concept, ME, while not strong (but not weak, either) is nearer the good and active directions of the semantic space. FIGURE 5.1 Brief personality descriptions, based on semantic differential ratings, in a case of multiple personality. Adapted from Osgood and Luria (1954). Process As you have just seen, unlike Freud, Rogers did not present a highly elaborate model of personality structure, with personality divided into a number of parts. He instead presented a simple model that highlighted what he felt was the central structure in personality, namely, the self. A similar intellectual style is seen in his discussion of personality process. Rogers posited a single overarching motivational principle—one that, again, involves the self.

Self‐Actualization Rogers did not think that behavior was primarily determined by animalistic drive states, as did Freud. Rogers felt that, instead, the most fundamental personality process is a forward‐looking tendency toward personality growth. He labeled this a tendency toward self‐actualization. “The organism has one basic tendency and striving—to actualize, maintain, and enhance the experiencing organism” (Rogers, 1951, p. 487). In a poetic passage, Rogers described life as an active process, comparing it to the trunk of a tree on the shore of the ocean as it remains erect, tough, and resilient, maintaining and enhancing itself in the growth process: “Here in this palm‐like seaweed was the tenacity of life, the forward thrust of life, the ability to push into an incredibly hostile environment and not only to hold its own, but to adapt, develop, become itself” (Rogers, 1963, p. 2). CURRENT QUESTIONS Self‐Ideal Congruence: Gender Differences Over Time? Rogers's notion of the ideal self, and the Q‐sort method he espoused, influenced later research on self‐concept. For example, Block and Robins (1993) examined change in self‐esteem from adolescence into young adulthood. Has your self‐esteem changed from your early teens to your early twenties? According to Block and Robins, the answer to this question may depend on your gender: On average, self‐esteem increases for males and decreases for females over these formative years of life. Level of self‐esteem was defined as the degree of similarity between the perceived self and the ideal self. Both of these constructs were measured by an adjective Q‐sort, which includes such self‐descriptive items as “competitive,” “affectionate,” “responsible,” and “creative”. Subjects whose perceived self was highly similar to their ideal self were high in self‐esteem. In contrast, subjects whose perceived self was highly dissimilar to their ideal self were low in self‐esteem. Between the ages of 14 and 23, males became more self‐confident and females became less self‐confident. Whereas at age 14 males scored similarly in self‐esteem, by age 23 they scored much higher. Apparently, males and females differ in how they experience the adolescent years and how they negotiate the transition into adulthood. For men, the news is good: This phase of life is associated with coming closer to one's ideal. Unfortunately, the opposite is true for women: They move further away from their ideal as they enter adulthood. What personality attributes characterize men and women with high self‐esteem? Block and Robins used extensive interview data collected at age 23 and found that the high self‐esteem women valued close relationships with others. High self‐esteem men, in contrast, were more emotionally distant and controlled in their relationships with others. These sex differences in relationships reflect the very different expectations society holds for what it means to be a man or a woman. Not surprisingly, those young adults whose personalities fit these cultural expectations well are more likely to feel good about themselves and have a self‐concept that is close to their ideal self. Left unanswered by this study is a phenomenological question that would have been of interest to Rogers: What is the content of the ideal self? Do males and females differ in their perceptions of what constitutes the ideal? The ideal self seems particularly susceptible to external influence—what we perceive as valued in society. The content of the ideal self tells us something about the attributes a person values and thus uses to derive self‐esteem. An interesting question for future research is how the content of the ideal self influences psychological adjustment. Does the person's ideal self capture characteristics of a self‐actualized human being or society's definition of what constitutes the ideal man or woman? Rogers proposed that people are motivated toward self‐actualization ‐ a motive toward personal growth, independence, and freedom of expression The concept of actualization refers to an organism's tendency to grow from a simple entity to a complex one, to move from dependence toward independence, from fixity and rigidity to a process of change and freedom of expression. The concept includes the tendency of each person to reduce needs or tension, but it emphasizes the pleasures and satisfactions that are derived from activities that enhance the organism. Rogers himself never developed a measure of the self‐actualizing motive. Over the years, however, others have done so. One such effort involves a 15‐item scale that measures the ability to act independently, self‐acceptance or self‐esteem, acceptance of one's emotional life, and trust in interpersonal relations (Figure 5.2). Scores on this questionnaire measure of self‐actualization have been found to be related to other questionnaire measures of self‐esteem and health, as well as to independent ratings of individuals as self‐actualizing persons (Jones & Crandall, 1986).

It is always necessary that others approve of what I do. (F) I am bothered by fears of being inadequate. (F) I do not feel ashamed of any of my emotions. (T) I believe that people are essentially good and can be trusted. (T) FIGURE 5.2 Illustrative items from an index of self‐actualization. Adapted from Jones and Crandall (1986). Similarly, Ryff (1995; Ryff & Singer, 1998, 2000) has postulated a multifaceted conception of positive mental health that includes self‐acceptance, positive relations with others, autonomy, environmental mastery, purpose in life, and personal growth. The personal growth component is conceptually close to Rogers's view of the growth process and self‐actualization. Her questionnaire, the Personal Growth Scale, defines someone high on personal growth as someone who has a feeling of continued development, has a sense of realizing their potential, is open to new experiences, and is changing in ways that reflect more self‐knowledge and effectiveness. In addition, there is evidence that people are happiest when they are pursuing goals congruent with the self (Little, 1999; McGregor & Little, 1998). Self‐Consistency and Congruence The principle of self‐actualization, by itself, clearly is not sufficient to account for the dynamics of personality functioning. Much of psychological life consists of conflicts, doubts, and psychological distress, rather than a continual march toward personal actualization. The theoretical challenge for Rogers, then, is to account for a more complete range of personality dynamics within his overall self‐based theory of the person. One way Rogers accomplishes this is by positing that people seek self‐consistency and a sense of congruence between their sense of self and their everyday experience. According to Rogers, the organism functions to maintain consistency (an absence of conflict) among self‐perceptions and to achieve congruence between perceptions of the self and experiences: “Most of the ways of behaving which are adopted by the organism are those which are consistent with the concept of the self” (Rogers, 1951, p. 507). The concept of self‐consistency originally was developed by Lecky (1945). According to Lecky, the organism does not seek to gain pleasure and to avoid pain but, instead, seeks to maintain its own self‐structure. The individual develops a value system, the center of which is the individual's valuation of the self. Individuals organize their values and functions to preserve the self‐system. Individuals behave in ways that are consistent with their self‐concept, even if this behavior is otherwise unrewarding to them. If you, for example, see yourself as a poor speller, you may try to behave in a manner consistent with this self‐perception. In addition to self‐consistency, Rogers emphasized the importance to personality functioning of congruence between the self and experience, that is, between what people feel and how they view themselves. For example, if you view yourself as a kind person who expresses empathy toward others but have an experience in which you think you were cold and unempathic, you confront an incongruence between your sense of self and your experience. If you think of yourself as a quiet person but suddenly find yourself acting in a highly outgoing manner (e.g., at a party), you may experience a distressing sense of having acted in a way that is “not me”. States of Incongruence and Defensive Processes Sometimes, people do experience an incongruence between self and experience that suggests a basic inconsistency in the self. When this occurs, what happens? Rogers posits that anxiety is the result of a discrepancy between experience and the perception of the self. The person who, for example, believes that he or she never hates anyone but suddenly experiences hateful feelings will be anxious after becoming aware of this incongruence. Once this happens, the person will be motivated to defend the self; he or she will engage in defensive processes. In this regard, Rogers's work is similar to Freud's. To Rogers, however, defensive processes are not centered on a defense against recognition of basic biological impulses in the id. They involve defense against a loss of a consistent, integrated sense of self. To Rogers, then, when we perceive an experience as threatening because it conflicts with our self‐concept, we may not allow the experience to be conscious. Through a process called subception, we can be aware of an experience that is discrepant with the self‐concept before it reaches consciousness. The response to the threat presented by recognition of experiences that are in conflict with the self is that of defense. Thus, we react defensively and attempt to deny awareness to experiences that are dimly perceived to be incongruent with the self‐structure. Two defensive processes are distortion of the meaning of experience and denial of the existence of the experience. Denial serves to preserve the self‐structure from threat by denying it conscious expression. Distortion, a more common phenomenon, allows the experience into awareness but in a form that makes it consistent with the self: “Thus, if the concept of self includes the characteristic ‘I am a poor student’, the experience of receiving a high grade can be easily distorted to make it congruent with the self by perceiving in it such meanings as, ‘That professor is a fool’; ‘It was just luck’” (Rogers, 1956, p. 205). What is striking about this last example is the emphasis it places on self‐consistency. What is otherwise likely to be a positive experience, receiving a high grade, now becomes a source of anxiety and a stimulus for defensive processes to be set in operation. In other words, it is the relation of the experience to the self‐concept that is key. Research on Self‐Consistency and Congruence The emphasis on self‐consistency might lead one to wonder whether it is healthier to see oneself as essentially the same person across situations or to see oneself as quite different in various social roles. In a relevant study, subjects were asked to rate themselves on various personality characteristics in various social roles (e.g., son or daughter, friend, student). Measures of variability (consistency) across the roles then were related to self‐reports of psychological well‐being. The results indicated that individuals with highly variable role identities were more likely to be anxious, depressed, and low in self‐esteem (Donohue, Robins, Roberts, & John, 1993). In other words, in accord with Rogers, high variability in the self‐concept can be bad for mental health because it can be indicative of an unintegrated “core” self. Early research by followers of Rogers confirmed the hypothesis that individuals would be slower to perceive words that were personally threatening than they would be to perceive neutral words (Chodorkoff, 1954). This tendency was particularly characteristic of defensive, poorly adjusted individuals. Poorly adjusted individuals, in particular, attempt to deny awareness to threatening stimuli. Similar processes were found in the area of recall of stimuli that are consistent versus inconsistent with the self. Here, it was found that generally subjects were better able to recall adjectives they felt were descriptive of themselves than they were of adjectives they felt were most unlike themselves. Here too, poorly adjusted individuals, in particular, showed as greater difference in ability to recall adjectives consistent versus inconsistent with the self (Cartwright, 1956). In sum, the accuracy of perception and recall of self‐related stimuli appears to be a function of the degree to which the stimuli are consistent with the self‐concept. The studies just discussed relate to perception and recall. What of overt behavior? Aronson and Mettee (1968) found results that were consistent with Rogers's view that individuals behave in ways that are congruent with their self‐concepts. In a study of dishonest behavior, they reasoned that if people are tempted to cheat, they will be more likely to do so if their self‐esteem is low than if it is high; that is, whereas cheating is not inconsistent with generally low self‐esteem, it is inconsistent with generally high self‐esteem. The data gathered indeed suggested that whether or not an individual cheats is influenced by the nature of the self‐concept. People who have a high opinion of themselves are likely to behave in ways they can respect, whereas people with a low opinion of themselves are likely to behave in ways that are consistent with that self‐image. Other research supports the view that the self‐concept influences behavior in varied ways (Markus, 1983). For example, people often behave in ways that lead others to confirm the perception they have of themselves—a self‐fulfilling prophecy (Darley & Fazio, 1980; Swann, 1992). People who believe they are likable may behave in ways that lead others to like them, whereas those who believe they are unlikable may behave in ways that lead others to dislike them (Curtis & Miller, 1986). For better or for worse, your self‐concept may be maintained by behaviors of others that were influenced in the first place by your own self‐concept. Similarly, people with low self‐esteem are so prone to maintain a consistent self‐concept that they sometimes fail to take even simple actions that might put them in a better mood. They seem resigned to maintaining a poor self‐image and the experience of negative emotions. Heimpel, Wood, Marshall, and Brown (2002) conducted a series of studies designed to test the hypothesis that people who report having low self‐esteem are less motivated to change their negative moods, as compared to high self‐esteem persons. In one study, an experimental mood induction was used to put people into a sad mood. Participants then chose a videotape to watch. The choices included a video of a comedy routine—which, as people knew, could put them into a better mood. You might expect that everyone would choose to watch a comedy routine. The large majority of high self‐esteem persons do so. But only a minority of low self‐esteem persons chose to watch it. Most of the low self‐esteem persons, in other words, failed to make a choice that would change their negative mood. Their choice produced consistency—a consistent negative mood even when they could have made themselves feel better. The tendency to maintain consistency in psychological experience, then, may sometimes override a simple hedonistic tendency to feel better. The Need for Positive Regard Since those years, I have come to believe that in order to thrive, a child must have at least one adult in her life who shows her unconditional love, respect, and confidence. Source: Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor (2013, p.16). We have seen, then, that individuals commonly try to act in accordance with their self‐concept and that experiences inconsistent with the self‐concept are often ignored or denied. But why? Why, in Rogerian theory, would the individual be distressed by a rift between experience and self and, therefore, be in need of defense? Why couldn't people accept all experiences, good and bad, as steps toward self‐actualization? Rogers answered this question by proposing that all persons possess a basic psychological need. It is a need for positive regard. The idea is that people need not only the obvious biological facts of life—food, water, shelter, and so on—but also something psychological. They need to be accepted and respected by others, that is, to receive others' positive regard. Rogers sees the need for positive regard as a powerful force in the workings of personality. Indeed, it is so powerful that it can draw one's attention away from experiences of personal value. “The expression of positive regard by a significant social other can become [so] compelling” that a person becomes more attuned to “the positive regard of such others than toward experiences which are of positive value in actualizing the organism” (Rogers, 1959, 1977, p. 225). People, then, can lose touch with their own true feelings and values in their pursuit of positive regard from others. This is how individuals can develop the feelings of detachment from their true self that we discussed at the outset of this chapter (see the subsection “Feelings of Authenticity”). In pursuing positive regard from others, people may disregard or distort their experiences of their own inner feelings and desires. This need for positive regard is particularly central to child development. The infant needs the parents' love, affection, and protection. The parents, throughout childhood, provide information on what is good, that is, what is regarded positively. A primary question is whether parents give the child positive regard unconditionally—that is, whether they show that they respect and prize the child no matter what. An alternative possibility is that the parents will show greater respect and love for the child only if the child adheres to some forms of behavior and not others. This alternative Rogers describes as conditions of worth; the child is made to feel like a worthy individual only if he/she has some thoughts and feelings but not others. If the child receives positive regard unconditionally, then there is no need to deny experiences. However, if children experience conditions of worth, then they need to balance their own natural tendencies with their need for positive regard from the parents. The child then may cope by denying an aspect of his or her own experience—essentially denying, or distorting, a feature of his or her true self. For example, suppose a male child shows interest in the arts but the parents discourage this interest, perhaps judging that their child should pursue activities that are more gender stereotypical for males (e.g., sports). To attain the parents' regard, the child then may deny an interest in the arts. In so doing, the parents have created an interpersonal setting that causes the child to deny, and lose touch with, an aspect of his own self. To summarize, Rogers did not feel a need to use the concepts of motives and drives to account for the activity and goal‐directedness of the organism. For him, the person is basically active and self‐actualizing. As part of the self‐actualizing process, we seek to maintain a congruence between self and experience. However, because of past experiences with conditional positive regard, we may deny or distort experiences that threaten the self‐system. Growth and Development Early in his career, prior to writing a formal theory of personality, Rogers spent much time working with children. In the city of Rochester, New York, he worked as a clinical psychologist in an office of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children and then as director of a guidance center that oversaw social agencies that served children in the local community (Kirschenbaum, 1979). Although Rogers did not do formal scientific research on personality development, he did gain much firsthand experience with the development of children and wrote extensively on the psychological treatment of children and youth. These early career experiences are reflected in his later writings, which explore the development of personality from a phenomenological perspective. To Rogers, development is not confined to the early years of life, as Freud suggested. People grow toward self‐actualization throughout the life course, experiencing ever greater complexity, autonomy, socialization, and maturity. The self, after becoming a separate part of the phenomenal field early in life, continues to grow in complexity throughout life. Rogers's work suggested that developmental factors must be considered at two levels of analysis. At the level of parent–child interactions, the question is whether the parents provide an environment that is optimal for psychological growth; to Rogers, this would be an environment that provides unconditional positive regard. At the level of internal psychological structures, the question is whether individuals experience congruence between self and daily experience or, conversely, distort aspects of their experience in order to attain others' regard and a consistent self‐concept. The major developmental concern for Rogers, then, is whether the child is free to grow, to be self‐actualizing, or whether conditions of worth cause the child to become defensive and operate out of a state of incongruence. Research associated with attachment theory (Chapter 4) supports the view that a parenting environment that provides for unconditional positive regard is associated with later secure attachment style and the characteristics of a fully functioning, self‐actualizing person (Fraley & Shaver, 2008). Healthy development of the self takes place in a climate in which the child can experience fully, can accept him‐ or herself, and can be accepted by the parents, even if they disapprove of particular types of behavior. This point is emphasized by most child psychiatrists and psychologists. It is the difference between a parent saying to a child “I don't like what you are doing” and saying “I don't like you.” In saying “I don't like what you are doing,” the parent is accepting the child while not approving of the behavior. This contrasts with situations in which a parent tells a child, verbally or in more subtle ways, that his or her behavior is bad and that he or she is bad. The child then feels that recognition of certain feelings would be inconsistent with the picture of him‐ or herself as loved or lovable, leading to denial and distortion of these feelings. Positive Regard: Healthy personality development is fostered through the communication of unconditional positive regard to the child. Research on Parent–Child Relationships A variety of studies suggest that acceptant, democratic parental attitudes facilitate the most growth. Whereas children of parents with these attitudes show accelerated intellectual development, originality, emotional security, and control, the children of rejecting, authoritarian parents are unstable, rebellious, aggressive, and quarrelsome (Baldwin, 1949; Pomerantz & Thompson, 2008). Most critical are children's perceptions of their parents' appraisals. If they feel that these appraisals are positive, they will find pleasure in their bodies and in their selves. If they feel that these appraisals are negative, they will develop insecurity and negative appraisals of their bodies (Jourard & Remy, 1955). Apparently, the kinds of appraisals that parents make of their children largely reflect the parents' own degree of self‐acceptance. Mothers who are self‐accepting also tend to accept their children (Medinnus & Curtis, 1963). A classic study of the origins of self‐esteem by Coopersmith (1967) further supported the importance of the dimensions suggested by Rogers. Coopersmith defined self‐esteem as the evaluation an individual typically makes with regard to the self. Self‐esteem, then, is an enduring personal judgment of worthiness, not a momentary good or bad feeling resulting from a particular situation. Children in the study completed a simple self‐report measure of self‐esteem, with most items coming from scales previously used by Rogers. Some findings involved the relation of self‐esteem to other personality characteristics. For example, compared to children low in self‐esteem, those high in self‐esteem were found to be more assertive, independent, and creative in solving problems.

A more important aspect of Coopersmith's study is that it provided evidence on the critical question, What are the origins of self‐esteem? Coopersmith obtained not only child self‐esteem scores, but information about the children's perceptions of their parents and information about parental child‐rearing attitudes, practices, and lifestyles (obtained via interviews with mothers). Interestingly, indicators of social prestige that one might think would be influential—such as wealth, degree of education, job title—were not strongly related to children's self‐esteem scores. Instead, children's self‐esteem was related more strongly to interpersonal conditions in the home and the immediate environment. Children appeared to develop self‐views through a process of reflected appraisal in which they used opinions of themselves that were expressed by others as a basis for their own self‐judgments. What specific parental attitudes and behaviors were important to the formation of self‐esteem? Three were shown to be particularly influential. The first was the degree of acceptance, interest, affection, and warmth expressed by parents toward the child. Mothers who were more loving and developed closer relationships with their children had children with higher self‐esteem. Children appeared to interpret the mother's interest as signifying that they were worthy persons deserving of others' attention and affection. The second important feature of parent–child interaction involved permissiveness and punishment. Parents of children with high self‐esteem established, and firmly enforced, clear demands for appropriate behavior. They generally tried to affect behavior by using rewards. In contrast, the parents of low self‐esteem children did not establish clear guidelines for behavior, were harsh and disrespectful toward children, tended to use punishment rather than reward, and stressed force and loss of love. The third feature was whether parent–child relations were democratic or dictatorial. Parents of children with high self‐esteem had established and enforced extensive rules for conduct, yet, in so doing, they treated children fairly within these defined limits and recognized the rights and opinions of the child. Parents of children low in self‐esteem set few and poorly defined limits and were autocratic, dictatorial, rejecting, and uncompromising in their methods of control. Coopersmith summarized his findings as follows: “The most general statement about the origins of self‐esteem can be given in terms of three conditions: total or nearly total acceptance of the children by their parents, clearly defined and enforced limits, and the respect and latitude for individual actions that exist within the defined limits” (1967, p. 236). Coopersmith further suggested that the important factor is the children's perception of the parents, not necessarily the specific actions the parents display. The total family climate influences the child's perception of the parents and their motives. Another study further supports Rogers's contention that child‐rearing conditions that provide children with psychological safety and psychological freedom will foster children's creative potential (Harrington, Block, & Block, 1987). Conditions of psychological safety are provided by parental expressions of unconditional positive regard for the child and empathic understanding. Psychological freedom is expressed in permission to engage in unrestrained expression of ideas. In a test of this view, child‐rearing practices and parent–child interaction patterns were measured for children between the ages of three and five years (Figure 5.3). Remarkably, the researchers were able to obtain independent ratings (that is, ratings not made by the parent) of creative potential in the children not during early childhood but years later, in adolescence. They found a significant positive association between childhood (preschool) environmental conditions of psychological safety and freedom and creative potential assessed both in preschool and, years later, in adolescence. The degree to which parent–child interactions were “Rogerian”, then, appeared to be an important environmental factor contributing to personality development. Finally, recent evidence of the influence of child reading on self‐esteem comes from an exceptionally large‐scale research project (Orth, 2018). The participants were a nationally representative (U.S.) sample of more than 8,000 people. They were studied longitudinally; specifically, beginning in 1979, they were studied as they grew from age 8 to age 27. Throughout this period, the researcher obtained measures not only of individuals' self‐esteem, but also of the child‐rearing environments that they experienced. These methods enabled the researcher to relate child‐rearing practices to self‐esteem development convincingly. The results? Environmental influences did, in fact, affect self‐esteem. Specifically, children who grew up in a physically safe environment and whose parents were highly affectionate, interpersonally responsive, and not overly harsh and restrictive – in other words, who were “Rogerian” – developed high levels of self‐esteem. Remarkably, good parenting affected self‐esteem not only during the childhood and teenage years; the effects were evident even into adulthood. Other factors, such as maternal depression and the presence of the father in the home, also influenced self‐esteem; however, these factors exerted their influence partly by affecting the quality of parenting that children experienced in the home (Orth, 2018). Creativity‐Fostering Environment Parents respect the child's opinions and encourage expression of them. Parents and child have warm, intimate time together. Children are allowed to spend time with other children or families who have different ideas or values. Parents are encouraging and supportive of the child. Parents encourage the child to proceed independently.

The Creativity Personality Tends to be proud of accomplishments. Is resourceful in initiating activities; becomes strongly involved in activities. Has a wide range of interests. Is comfortable with uncertainties and complexities. Perseveres in the face of adversity. FIGURE 5.3 Illustrative characteristics of creativity‐fostering environments and the creative personality. Adapted from Harrington, Block, & Block, 1987. Despite such findings, some psychologists question whether the concept of self‐esteem is sufficient for a science of personality. Critics generally think the term is too global. Most people experience times in their lives when they think well of themselves and others in which they are self‐critical, and the self‐esteem construct masks these cross‐situational variations. Nonetheless, others feel that the concept of global self‐esteem has merit and that self‐esteem has implications for many aspects of psychological functioning (Dutton & Brown, 1997). This present chapter is devoted primarily to presentation of Rogers's theory. In our next chapter, we turn in more detail to contemporary research that bears on these questions about self‐esteem processes and about the utility of the construct of self‐esteem for personality science. Social Relations, Self‐Actualization, and Well‐Being Later in Life According to Rogerian theory, the relation between social acceptance and positive self‐regard is important not only to child development but also to personality functioning throughout life. Research bears on this hypothesis. Roberts and Chapman (2000) analyzed data from a long‐term longitudinal study of the psychological development of adult women. In this data set, women were studied over a 30‐year period extending from young adulthood into midlife. Although the study was not organized according to the personality theory of Carl Rogers, it did contain two measures that bear on Rogerian hypotheses. One was an index of psychological well‐being; participants indicated their sense of well‐being, including feelings of self‐esteem, at four time points across the 30‐year time period of the study. The second was an index of role quality, that is, whether people experienced supportive social relations in life roles including both marriage and work. Rogerian theory of course would predict that positive, supportive social relations would increase psychological well‐being. The supportive relations should provide people with a sense of positive regard and make them less likely to engage in defensive processing that might contribute to psychological distress and a lower sense of self. A key feature of this longitudinal research is that, by studying people at different points in their lives, the researchers could examine the impact of role quality on changes in well‐being. These analyses generally were in accord with predictions that one would make from Rogerian theory. People who experienced a high degree of distress in their marriage and work roles experienced lower levels of well‐being, whereas people who experienced more satisfying social roles showed positive changes in their well‐being and personal maturity (Roberts & Chapman, 2000). Although it is difficult to establish causality in this type of research (i.e., to determine whether social relations actually exerted a causal influence on well‐being), the results are consistent with the Rogerian hypothesis that views of self and psychological well‐being can change across the course of life and that the degree of positive regard one receives from significant individuals in one's life can contribute directly to these changes. As you can see, Rogers's ideas continue to be of relevance to the contemporary field. In our next chapter, we look more closely at contemporary research that bears on Rogers's theorizing while also considering clinical applications of his principles and alternative theoretical conceptions that relate strongly to Rogers's phenomenological perspective. MAJOR CONCEPTS Conditions of worth Congruence Denial Distortion Ideal self Incongruence Need for positive regard Phenomenal field Phenomenology Q‐sort technique Self‐actualization Self‐concept (or the "Self") Self‐consistency Self‐esteem Subception REVIEW The phenomenological approach emphasizes an understanding of how people experience themselves and the world around them. The person‐centered theory of Carl Rogers is illustrative of this approach. Throughout his life, Rogers attempted to integrate the intuitive with the objective, combining a sensitivity to the nuances of experience with an appreciation for the rigors of science. Rogers emphasized the positive, self‐actualizing qualities of the person. In his research, he emphasized a disciplined effort to understand subjective experience, or the phenomenal field, of the person. The key structural concept for Rogers was the self—the organization of perceptions and experiences associated with the “self,” “me,” or “I.” Also important is the concept of the ideal self, or the self‐concept the person would most like to possess. The Q‐sort is one method used to study these concepts and the relation between them. Rogers deemphasized the tension‐reducing aspects of behavior and, instead, emphasized self‐actualization as the central human motive. Self‐actualization involves continuous openness to experience and the ability to integrate experiences into an expanded, more differentiated sense of self. Rogers also suggested that people function to perceive self‐consistency and to maintain congruence between perceptions of the self and experience. However, experiences perceived as threatening to the self‐concept may, through defensive processes such as distortion and denial, be prevented from reaching consciousness. A variety of studies support the view that people will behave in ways to maintain and confirm the perception they have of themselves. People have a need for positive regard. Under conditions of unconditional positive regard, children and adults are able to grow within a state of congruence and be self‐actualizing. On the other hand, where positive regard is conditional, people may screen experiences out of awareness and limit their potential for self‐actualization. Children are influenced in their self‐judgments through the process of reflected appraisal. Parents of children with high self‐esteem are warm and accepting but also are clear and consistent in their enforcement of demands and standards.

Chapter 6

Rogers's Phenomenological Theory: Applications, Related Theoretical Conceptions, and Contemporary Research

Questions to be Addressed in this Chapter

Clinical Applications

The Case of Jim

Related Conceptions: Human Potential, Positive Psychology, and Existentialism

Developments in Research: The Self and Authenticity

Contemporary Developments in Personality Theory: Personality Systems Interaction Theory and the Integrated Self

Personality Systems Interaction Theory

Illustrative Research

Implications for Rogers's Self Theory of Personality

Critical Evaluation

Major Concepts

Review

Chapter Focus

A good friendship has qualities that are both wonderful and mysterious. If you're stressed out, if life is giving you too much to handle, talking to a friend—simply discussing your problems and having the person listen carefully—can make you feel better. It's hard to know why. Even if your friend doesn't have any specific advice, even if he or she doesn't offer any solutions to life's problems, the mere fact that the person is there for you, ready to listen, can make things feel better.

And what does your friend make you feel better about? School? Relationships? Maybe. But if you're lucky, your friend makes you feel better about that most important of things: you. By letting you explore and express your feelings, your friend somehow improves your sense of self. You end up accepting your limitations and appreciating your strengths.

Providing this type of relationship, and accomplishing this sort of change in self‐concept, was Carl Rogers's goal in his client‐centered therapy. His therapeutic approach, which was a foundation on which he built his theory of personality ( Chapter 5 ), is one focus of this chapter. As you will learn, in therapy, Rogers tried to discover how his clients denied and distorted aspects of their everyday experience. He then created a therapeutic relationship—a kind of trusting friendship in a therapeutic setting—within which clients could abandon these distortions, explore their true self, and thereby experience personal growth.

In addition to learning about this clinical application of Rogers's theory of personality, a second goal of this chapter is to review theoretical conceptions that are closely related to that of Rogers. We consider three conceptions that address aspects of Rogers's thinking, namely, the: (1) the human potential movement; (2) the positive psychology movement; and (3) existentialism, a school of thought in philosophy. We also review, in detail, a comprehensive contemporary development in personality theory that addresses Rogers's concern with the integrative self: Personality Systems Interaction Theory.

Finally, this chapter devotes greater attention to questions of culture than did  Chapter 5 . As you will see, some cross‐cultural studies question whether the psychological dynamics studied by Rogers in the United States are a universal feature of human psychological experience.

Questions to be Addressed in this Chapter

1. According to Rogers, how do psychological distress and pathology develop, and what factors are necessary to bring about psychological change in therapy?

2. How did writers in the human potential movement add to Rogers's understanding of human personality?

3. What does the contemporary positive psychology movement say about human personality and potentials?

4. What is existentialism, how do existentialist ideas relate to personality theory and research, and how do they relate, specifically, to Rogers's work?

5. What are the implications of contemporary research—including cross‐cultural research on self‐concept, motivation, and personality—for Rogers's phenomenological theory?

Clinical Applications

We begin this chapter where Rogers began his own professional career: in the psychological clinic, facing the challenges of psychopathology and personality change. These clinical applications were integral to Rogers's development of his personality theory and remained a major focus of Rogers's work throughout his career.

Rogers's work in therapy involved more than just a set of techniques; it included a worldview—that is, a broad perspective on the nature of the therapeutic setting. Rogers's thinking can be understood by contrasting it to Freud's. Freud, trained as a physician, treated his clients as patients. The client was a person with problems that had to be diagnosed and cured. The therapist was the person with diagnostic and curative expertise. Rogers, in contrast, emphasized the expertise and curative power of the client. In developing his therapeutic approach, “a person seeking help was not treated as a dependent patient but rather as a responsible client” (Rogers,  1977 , p. 5). To Rogers, the client possesses an inherent drive toward psychological health. The therapist's task is merely to help the client to identify conditions that may interfere with personal growth, thereby allowing the person to overcome these obstacles and to move toward self‐actualization.

Psychopathology

Self‐Experience Discrepancy

Before we consider Rogers's approach to treating psychological distress, we should address a logically prior question: From where does psychological distress come? If people have such a strong capacity for self‐actualization, then why are they experiencing psychological distress in the first place? The core elements of Rogers's answer to this question were introduced in the previous chapter. They involve the self and whether the person experiences a congruence between self and experience.

To Rogers, healthy persons are individuals who can assimilate experiences into their self‐structure. They are open to experiencing rather than interpreting events in a defensive manner. It is such persons who experience a  congruence  between self and experience.

In contrast, the neurotic person's self‐concept has become structured in ways that do not fit organismic experience. They deny awareness of significant sensory and emotional experiences. Experiences that are incongruent with the self‐structure are subceived; that is, threatening events are detected below levels of conscious awareness and then are either denied or distorted. This distortion results in a discrepancy between actual psychological experiences and the self's awareness of experience, or a  self‐experience discrepancy . Such discrepancies involve a rigid defense of the self against experiences that might threaten the self‐concept. Rogers ( 1961 ) gives the immediately recognizable example of “the intellectualizing person who talks about himself and his feelings in abstractions, leaving you wondering what is actually going on within him” (p. 64). Rogers's point, of course, is that you, the observer, are not the only person who is unaware of what is actually going on within. By distorting his experiences, the person has lost an accurate sense of his or her true self.

Consistent with his rejection of a medical model, Rogers did not differentiate among types of pathology. He did not want a diagnostic scheme within which individual persons were classified and then treated merely as examples of one versus another type of psychological disorder. He did, however, differentiate among forms of defensive behaviors. For example, one such defensive behavior is rationalization. In rationalization, a person distorts behavior in such a way as to make it consistent with the self. If you view yourself as a person who never makes mistakes and then a mistake seems to occur, you may rationalize it by blaming the error on another person. Another defensive behavior is fantasy. A man who defensively believes himself to be an adequate person may fantasize that he is a prince and that all women adore him, and he may deny any experiences that are inconsistent with this image. A third example of defense behavior is projection. Here, an individual expresses a need but in such a form that the need is denied to awareness and the behavior is viewed as consistent with the self. People whose self‐concept involves no “bad” sexual thoughts may feel that others are making them have these thoughts.

The descriptions of these defensive behaviors are quite similar to the ones given by Freud. For Rogers, however, the important aspect of these behaviors is their handling of an incongruence between self and experience by denial in awareness or distortion of perception: “It should be noted that perceptions are excluded because they are contradictory, not because they are derogatory” (Rogers,  1951 , p. 506). Furthermore, classification of the defenses is not as critical to Rogerian theory as it is to Freudian theory.

Psychological Change In the preceding chapter, you learned about Rogers's most important contribution to personality science: his theory of personality. This theory, however, was not Rogers's own highest priority. His main professional focus was the process of psychotherapy. Rogers committed himself to understanding how personality change can come about. Thus, the process of change, or of becoming, was his greatest concern. His most enduring contribution to understanding change was work in which he outlined necessary conditions of therapy; he described, in other words, types of circumstances and events that need to occur in the relationship between client and therapist in order for personality change to occur. To many people, this therapeutic approach remains as vibrant and relevant today as it was when Rogers first formulated it a half‐century ago (McMillan, 2004). Therapeutic Conditions Necessary for Change In his early work, Rogers emphasized the therapeutic technique of reflection. In this nondirective approach, therapists do not guide the flow of events in therapy. Instead, they merely summarize, or reflect back to, the client their understanding of what the client has just said. Reflection, though simple, is effective. It conveys to the client a feeling of having been thoroughly, deeply understood by the therapist. Rogerian therapists are attentive to their clients. By showing that they understand their client's feelings and support the client unconditionally, the Rogerian therapist provides a setting in which the client can experience personal growth. Because some nondirective counselors were perceived as passive and uninterested, Rogers changed his focus to emphasize client‐centeredness. In his client‐centered therapy, the therapist not only uses the technique of reflection but also plays a more active role in understanding the experiences of the client. Ultimately, Rogers believed that the critical variable in client‐centered therapy is the nature of the interpersonal encounter that develops between the therapist and client, or what is referred to as the therapeutic climate (Rogers, 1966). Rogers described the ideal therapeutic climate in terms of a set of conditions, three of which are core conditions that he saw as necessary for therapeutic change to occur (McMillan, 2004). If therapists provide these conditions in a way that is phenomenologically meaningful to the clients, then therapeutic change should occur. Rogers hypothesized three conditions as critical to the therapeutic movement: congruence (or “genuineness”), unconditional positive regard, and empathic understanding. The first of the three conditions is congruence or genuineness. Congruent or genuine therapists display to clients their true thoughts and feelings. The congruent therapist does not present a scientific or medical façade but instead is interpersonally open and transparent. He or she experiences events in the therapeutic encounter in a natural manner and shares with the client his or her genuine feelings—even when feelings toward the client are negative. “Even with such negative attitudes, which seem so potentially damaging but which all therapists have from time to time, I am suggesting that it is preferable for the therapist to be real than to put on a false posture of interest, concern, and liking that the client is likely to sense as false” (Rogers, 1966, p. 188). The client thus experiences a real interpersonal relationship with the therapist rather than the stilted, formal relationship that one might usually experience with a health care or mental health‐care provider. The second condition essential for therapeutic movement is unconditional positive regard. This means that the therapist communicates a deep and genuine caring for the client as a person. The client is prized in a total, unconditional way. The experience of respect and unconditional positive regard enables clients to explore their inner self with confidence. Finally, the third therapeutic condition is empathic understanding. This refers to the therapist's ability to perceive the client's experiences as they are experienced by the client. The therapist strives to achieve empathy with the client during the moment‐to‐moment encounter of psychotherapy. The therapist, then, does not intellectually detach himself or herself from the encounter in order to provide a technical diagnosis of the client's problems. Nor does the client receive a reformulation of his or her life in technical psychological jargon. Instead, through active listening, the therapist strives to understand the meaning and subjective feeling of the events experienced by the client and to make it clear to the client that he or she is in fact being understood empathically by the therapist. In Rogers's view, these three therapeutic conditions are of fundamental importance, independent of the theoretical orientation of the therapist. The theory behind client‐centered therapy thus has an “if–then” quality: If certain therapeutic conditions exist, then processes inherently will occur that lead to personality change. Outcomes of Client‐Centered Therapy What the hell is wrong with me? I'm not who I want to be. Source: The Clash. Having presented the core elements of Rogers's therapeutic approach, we now ask, Does it work? Does client‐centered therapy benefit the client? To determine whether a therapy works, one must first determine what it means, in principle, for a therapy to “work.” What is the core aspect of psychological distress that should be relieved by therapy? Rogers's answer to this question is the one suggested—in more blunt terms than Rogers's—by the British punk rock band The Clash. Deep psychological distress does not arise merely from objective events in the world. It results from an internal sense of personal inadequacy, from a sense that one is not “who I want to be”—or, in Rogerian terms, from a lack of congruence between one's actual self and ideal self. For therapy to “work,” then, the client should achieve greater actual–ideal self‐congruence. Having said that, the research challenge is to devise scientifically objective and reliable methods of testing the hypothesis that one's therapy improves this core aspect of personality, the self‐concept. Rogers contributed greatly to the development of research methods for meeting this challenge. He was part of a movement important to the profession of psychology, namely, the process of opening up the field of psychotherapy for systematic investigation. Rogers's main goal was to evaluate therapy through methods that were objective. He recognized that a big limitation in the methods of evaluating therapy provided by Freud and his followers was that their methods were too subjective. In psychoanalytic therapy, the only way for an outsider (i.e., someone other than the therapist and client) to evaluate the success of therapy was to read a case study written by the therapist. The problem here should be obvious to you. The case study may be biased. The therapist—the psychoanalyst whose professional success is supposed to be evaluated—is writing the case study that is the basis of the evaluation. In principle, the therapist might unwittingly overestimate the degree of beneficial therapeutic change that occurred when writing his or her case report. In his client‐centered therapy, then, Rogers wanted a means of evaluating therapeutic success that was superior to the subjective reports of a therapist. Rogers took a number of steps designed to allow the scientific community and the public at large to evaluate his therapeutic efforts. He allowed himself and his colleagues to be taped, and sometimes even filmed, while engaging in therapy. He and his colleagues employed objective measures of self‐concept, such as the Q‐sort (Chapter 5), so that therapy outcomes could be evaluated objectively. Such steps may seem obvious in retrospect—yet they were not taken by psychoanalysts.

A classic study that illustrates the efforts of Rogers and his students to meet the challenge of evaluating Rogerian therapy through objective procedures was conducted by Butler and Haigh (1954), two of Rogers's students. First consider their research hypothesis at a conceptual level: It was that Rogerian therapy would bring about, in clients, a greater congruence between the ideal and actual self. Now consider the challenge of moving from the abstract conceptual level to the concrete level of actually doing research. How would you test this idea about relations among different aspects of a person's self‐concept? This is the hard part of personality psychology—moving smoothly and convincingly from the theoretical formulation to the research details. Butler and Haigh made this move by using the Q‐sort. Specifically, they used it twice. They asked research participants to complete one Q‐sort procedure in which they rated their actual self (i.e., participants sorted items according to how they currently see themselves) and a second one in which participants rated their ideal self (i.e., they sorted items according to whether the attributes described features they ideally would like to possess). With two measures, it is possible to compute a correlation, for any given person, between the actual and ideal self Q‐sortings. This correlation is, then, a numerical index of the degree of congruence between the actual and ideal self; a higher positive correlation indicates a greater congruence between the actual and ideal self. With this index of actual–ideal self congruence in hand, then, Butler and Haigh (1954) looked at the effects of Rogerian therapy. They examined a group of people both before and after the individuals experienced an average of 31 sessions of Rogerian therapy. What did they find? Before therapy, the relation between people's actual and ideal self was quite low: The average correlation was zero. But after therapy, the congruence between these two aspects of self increased significantly. The average post‐therapy correlation between the actual and ideal self Q‐sorts was +.34. Rogers's therapy worked, as evaluated by an objective measurement procedure, the Q‐sort. Having read that conclusion, you might ask yourself at least two other questions. First, were the effects of therapy long lasting? Fortunately, Butler and Haigh (1954) tested for this by conducting a follow‐up measurement six months after therapy ended. At the time of follow‐up, the actual–ideal correlation remained about the same, .31. This suggests that therapeutic changes indeed do last. A second question is, Are psychologically distressed people who experience therapy as well off, after therapy, as people who were never distressed in the first place? This question does not have quite as happy an answer. Butler and Haigh (1954) also asked a group of persons who were not seeking counseling to complete the Q‐sort measures, and in this group the ideal–actual self correlation was .58; this group, in other words, displayed considerably higher congruence between the actual and ideal self than did the therapy group after counseling. Nonetheless, Rogerian therapy was shown to produce significant gains. In the years since the pioneering work of Butler and Haigh (1954), much work has evaluated the popularity and effectiveness of Rogerian therapy. A recent appraisal of the status of client‐centered therapy indicates that the approach flourished not only during Rogers's lifetime but also after his death. Therapeutic applications and scientific evaluations of the effectiveness of Rogerian therapy frequently were conducted in both the United States and Europe (Kirschenbaum & Jourdan, 2005). A clear majority of studies indicates that a combination of the three conditions identified by Rogers in fact do foster therapeutic change. Therapy changes include a decrease in defensiveness and an increase in openness to experience among clients, the development of a more positive and more congruent self, the promotion of more positive feelings toward others, and a shift away from using the values of others to asserting one's own evaluations. These results underscore the conclusion that Rogers's identification of conditions that foster success in psychotherapy is one of his most enduring contributions to psychology. Presence Rogers's view of the conditions necessary for therapeutic improvement changed relatively little over the years after he first formulated them. However, one addition is noteworthy. It is the notion of presence (see Bozarth, 1992; McMillan, 2004). Rogers gradually came to believe that “perhaps I have stressed too much the three basic conditions (congruence, unconditional positive regard, and empathic understanding)” (quoted in Bozarth, 1992) and that, in addition to these three relative objective features of the therapeutic setting, another feature was more elusive, difficult to describe, almost mystical, yet of much importance. “When I am intensely focused on a client,” Rogers came to believe, “just my presence seems to be healing” (quoted in Bozarth, 1992). Rogers became aware that, in particularly successful therapeutic encounters, he himself experienced his own core self in interaction with his clients and responded to them in a deeply intuitive way that they sometimes were able to share with him. “I may behave in strange and impulsive ways in the relationship, ways which I cannot justify rationally … but these strange behaviors turn out to be right … my inner spirit has reached out and touched the inner spirit of the other” (Rogers, quoted in McMillan, 2004). To the client‐centered therapist, these deeply intuitive, almost spiritual encounters can be highly transformative. Interpersonal experiences between client and therapist that seem “beyond words and logic” (McMillan, 2004, p. 65) are thought to foster deep psychological change. The Dalai Lama, spiritual leader of Tibet. The Dalai Lama's consistently empathic focus in interpersonal interaction creates a powerful psychological climate that contributes to his being called Kundun, which in Tibetan means “presence” (or “The Presence”)—precisely the term that Rogers eventually came to use to capture the psychological effects of empathic focus that he observed occurring in his client‐centered therapy. The notion of presence, and its potential therapeutic benefits, has received little scientific attention. Yet, the concept of presence, as used by Rogerians, is recognized in other intellectual circles and other cultures, which suggests that it may have a reality that is deserving of scientific study. For example, Tibetans refer to their social and political leader, the Dalai Lama, as Kundun, which, in Tibetan, literally means “presence” (or “The Presence”). They use the term to refer to the same psychological qualities recognized by Rogers: the powerful feeling of interpersonal connection created by the exceptional awareness and emotional openness of their spiritual leader.

A Case Example Mrs. Oak Statistical summaries of the overall effectiveness of Rogers's therapy, such as those cited, are critical to evaluating the effectiveness of Rogers's therapy. Yet, they fail to capture its spirit. The experience of a therapeutic encounter with Rogers is much better conveyed by a case study. Let us consider, then, one of Rogers's well‐known cases, that of Mrs. Oak. This case is available to us because, as part of his process of opening up clinical psychology for objective investigation, Rogers (with this client's permission, of course) taped therapy sessions and made transcripts available to the public. As Rogers described in a 1954 book, Mrs. Oak was a housewife in her late thirties when she came to the University of Chicago Counseling Center. She reported having great difficulty in her relationships with her husband and her adolescent daughter. Mrs. Oak blamed herself for her daughter's psychosomatic illness. Mrs. Oak was described by her therapist as a sensitive person who was eager to be honest with herself and deal with her problems. She had little formal education but was intelligent and had read widely. Mrs. Oak was interviewed 40 times over a period of five‐and‐one‐half months, at which point she terminated treatment. In early interviews, Mrs. Oak spent much of her time talking about specific problems she had with her daughter and her husband. Gradually, though, the conversation shifted. She increasingly talked about her feelings. At first, the therapist thought Mrs. Oak was a shy, almost nondescript person. He quickly sensed, however, that she was a sensitive and interesting person. His respect for her grew, and he described himself as experiencing a sense of respect for—and awe of—her capacity to struggle ahead through turmoil and pain. He did not try to direct or guide her; instead, he found satisfaction in trying to understand her, in trying to appreciate her world, in expressing the acceptance he felt toward her. Given the supportive therapeutic climate, Mrs. Oak began to become aware of feelings she had previously denied to awareness. In the 24th interview, she became aware of conflicts with her daughter that related to her own adolescent development. She felt a sense of shock at becoming aware of her own competitiveness. In a later interview, she became aware of the deep sense of hurt inside of her. The therapist gently and supportively reflected back to Mrs. Oak her past efforts to cover up her hurt and her new efforts to absorb this hurt, describing it as a new discovery of the poem that was her self. At first, this increased awareness led to a sense of disorganization. Mrs. Oak began to feel more troubled and neurotic, as if she were going to pieces. She also felt resentful that her therapist was not being very helpful and would not take responsibility for the sessions. She felt very strongly at times that the therapist didn't “add a damn thing.” But in the course of therapy, she eventually developed exactly what Rogers was striving for in his client‐centered approach: a sense of relationship with the therapist that, she came to recognize, was the basis of her therapeutic improvement. Although progress did not occur in all areas, by the end of therapy Mrs. Oak exhibited significant gains in many areas. She began to feel free to be her self, to listen to herself, and to make independent evaluations. She began to accept herself as a worthwhile human being. She decided that she could not continue in her marriage, arrived at a mutually agreeable divorce with her husband, and obtained and held a challenging job. Through the conditions created within the therapeutic environment, Mrs. Oak was able to break down defenses that had been maintaining a marked incongruence between her self and her experience. With this increase in self‐awareness, she was able to make positive changes in her life and become a more self‐actualized human being.

The Case of Jim Semantic Differential: Phenomenological Theory Jim completed ratings of the concepts self, ideal self, father, and mother using the semantic differential (Chapter 5), a simple rating scale. Although the semantic differential is not the exact measure recommended by Rogers, its results can be related to Rogerian theory since its procedures have a phenomenological quality and assess perceptions of self and ideal self. First, consider how Jim perceives his self. Based on the semantic differential, Jim sees himself as intelligent, friendly, sincere, kind, and basically good—as a wise person who is humane and interested in people. At the same time, other ratings suggest that he does not feel free to be expressive and uninhibited. Thus, he rates himself as reserved, introverted, inhibited, tense, moral, and conforming. There is a curious mixture of perceptions: being involved, deep, sensitive, and kind while also being competitive, selfish, and disapproving. There is also the interesting combination of perceiving himself as being good and masculine but simultaneously weak and insecure. One gets the impression of an individual who would like to believe that he is basically good and capable of genuine interpersonal relationships at the same time that he is bothered by serious inhibitions and high standards for himself and others. This impression comes into sharper focus when we consider the self‐ratings in relation to those for the ideal self. In general, Jim did not see an extremely large gap between his self and his ideal self. However, large gaps did occur on a number of specific scale items. For example, Jim rated his actual self as low on a weak–strong scale and his ideal self as high on the same scale; in other words, Jim would like to be much stronger than he feels he is. Assessing his ratings on the other scales in a similar way, we find that Jim would like to be more of each of the following than he currently perceives himself to be: warm, active, egalitarian, flexible, lustful, approving, industrious, relaxed, friendly, and bold. Basically, two themes appear. One has to do with warmth: Jim is not as warm, relaxed, and friendly as he would like to be. The other theme has to do with strength: Jim is not as strong, active, and industrious as he would like to be. Jim's ratings of his parents give some indication of where he sees them in relation to himself in general and to these qualities in particular. First, if we compare the way Jim perceives his self with his perception of his mother and father, he clearly perceives himself to be much more like his father than his mother. Also, he perceives his father to be closer to his ideal self than his mother, although he perceives himself to be closer to his ideal self than either his mother or his father. However, in the critical areas of warmth and strength, the parents tend to be closer to the ideal self than Jim is. Thus, his mother is perceived to be warmer, more approving, more relaxed, and friendlier than Jim, while his father is perceived to be stronger, more industrious, and more active than Jim. The mother is perceived as having an interesting combination of personality characteristics. On the one hand, she is perceived as affectionate, friendly, spontaneous, sensitive, and good. On the other, she is perceived as authoritarian, superficial, selfish, unintelligent, intolerant, and uncreative. Comments on the Data Compared to the earlier data, involving the Rorschach (Chapter 4), we begin here to get another picture of Jim. We learn of his popularity and success through high school and of his good relationship with his father. We find support for the suggestions from the projective tests of anxiety and difficulties with women. Indeed, we learn of Jim's fears of ejaculating too quickly and not being able to satisfy women. However, we also find an individual who believes himself to be basically good and interested in doing humane things. We become aware of an individual who has a view of his self and a view of his ideal self, and of an individual who is frustrated because of the feelings that leave a gap between the two. Given the opportunity to talk about himself and what he would like to be, Jim talks about his desire to be warmer, more relaxed, and stronger. We feel no need here to disguise our purposes, for we are interested in Jim's perceptions, meanings, and experiences as he reports them. We are interested in what is real for Jim—in how he interprets phenomena within his own frame of reference. We want to know all about Jim, but all about Jim as he perceives himself and the world about him. When using the data from the semantic differential, we are not tempted to focus on drives, and we do not need to come to grips with the world of the irrational. In Rogers's terms, we see an individual who is struggling to move toward self‐actualization, from dependence toward independence, from fixity and rigidity to freedom and spontaneity. We find an individual who has a gap between his intellectual and emotional estimates of himself. As Rogers would put it, we observe an individual who is without self‐consistency, who lacks a sense of congruence between self and experience. Related Conceptions: Human Potential, Positive Psychology, and Existentialism You now have seen the fundamentals of Rogers's phenomenological theory of personality. The remainder of this chapter presents two related topics. First, we consider theoretical conceptions that are related to Rogers's work. Specifically, we will consider three of them: (1) the human potential movement, (2) the positive psychology movement, and (3) existentialism. Next, we present contemporary research that bears on Rogerian theory. This research often is conducted by people who may not call themselves “Rogerians,” yet their work addresses topics that are at the heart of Rogers's conception of human nature. The Human Potential Movement Rogers is not the only theorist to have emphasized people's capacity for self‐actualization. Others recognized that personality functioning involves more than a mere repetition of past motives and conflicts, as suggested by Freud. Instead people have potentialities; that is, a basic feature of personality functioning is that people have a capacity to move forward to realize their inherent potentials. This theme was developed in the middle of the 20th century by writers such as Gardner Murphy (1958), who placed the study of potentialities at the center of personality psychology, and Kurt Goldstein, who felt that, despite its merits, Freudian theory “fails to do justice to the positive aspect of life … to recognize that the basic phenomenon of life is an incessant process of coming to terms with the environment” (1939, p. 333). Such theoretical contributions to the human potential movement came to be known as a “third force” in psychology (Goble, 1970) because they offered an alternative to psychoanalysis (Chapter 3) and to behaviorism (Chapter 10). We will consider one major theorist in the human potential movement, Abraham H. Maslow. Abraham H. Maslow (1908–1970) Abraham Maslow (1968, 1971), like Rogers, emphasized the positive aspects of human experience. He proposed that people are basically good or neutral rather than evil, with everyone possessing an impulse toward growth and the fulfillment of potentials. Psychopathology results from a twisting and frustration of this essential nature of the human organism. To Maslow, social structures that restrict the individual from realizing his or her potential are a root cause of this frustration. Thanks in part to Maslow, the human potential movement became popular among individuals who felt excessively restricted and inhibited by their environment. Maslow speaks to these concerns and encourages the belief that things can be better if people are free to express themselves and be themselves.

Abraham H. Maslow. In addition to this overall spirit, Maslow's views have been important in two ways. First, he suggested a view of human motivation that distinguishes between such biological needs as hunger, sleep, and thirst and such psychological needs as self‐esteem, affection, and belonging. One cannot survive as a biological organism without food and water; likewise, one cannot develop fully as a psychological organism without the satisfaction of other needs as well. Thus, these needs can be arranged in a hierarchy from basic physiological needs to important psychological needs (Figure 6.1). Maslow suggested that, in their research and theorizing, psychologists have been overly concerned with basic biological needs, especially the organism's response to tension caused by biological deficits. While accepting that such motivation exists, Maslow highlighted higher‐level motivational processes of the sort that are expressed when people are creative and are fulfilling their potential. FIGURE 6.1 Schematic representation of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. A second major contribution by Maslow (1954) was his intensive study of healthy, self‐fulfilling, self‐actualizing individuals. Maslow basically reasoned that, if one wants to learn about personality, there is no need to restrict one's study merely to either (1) everyday, normal personality functioning or (2) breakdowns in normal functioning that result in psychopathology. Instead, the psychologist should attend to the other end of the spectrum: people who are “abnormal” in that they are exceptionally positive, unusually highly functioning, self‐actualized individuals. Who are these people? Maslow considered individuals from history as well as from his own historical period (e.g., Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein, Eleanor Roosevelt; a more contemporary writer might consider figures such as Mother Teresa or Nelson Mandela). The point is that these exceptional figures possessed qualities that are informative to the personality psychologist because they tell us about human potentials. Maslow concluded that these people's features included the following characteristics: They accept themselves and others for what they are; they can be concerned with themselves but also are free to recognize the needs and desires of others; they are capable of responding to the uniqueness of people and situations rather than responding in mechanical or stereotyped ways; they can form intimate relationships with at least a few special people; they can be spontaneous and creative; and they can resist conformity and assert themselves while responding to the demands of reality. Maslow suggested that all of us have the potential to move increasingly in the direction of these qualities. The Positive Psychology Movement Maslow's focus on the positive aspects of human nature anticipated a contemporary movement in psychology. It is known as the positive psychology movement (Gable & Haidt, 2005; Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2000) or sometimes called the human strengths movement (Aspinwall & Staudinger, 2002). The writings of psychologists in the 21st‐century positive psychology movement echo themes sounded a half‐century earlier by Rogers and writers in the human potential movement. Contemporary positive psychologists believe that, in the past, human frailty and psychopathology have been overemphasized (i.e., except in the words of people such as Rogers and Maslow). Psychologists have tended to examine individuals suffering from distress, to use those experiences as their foundation for theorizing about people in general, and as a result to end up with theories that emphasize the negative. Recall what you have learned about Freud. He was trying to build a model of personality that applied to all persons. Yet his database for the theory—the experiences on which he built his conception of the individual—almost entirely involved persons who were suffering from high levels of psychological distress. What is the cost of focusing on distress and pathology? The positive psychologist argues that this focus causes the psychologist to overlook human strengths. One ends up with a distorted picture of personality that underemphasizes the positive. In an effort to rectify this situation, contemporary psychologists have tried to portray the nature of human strengths and virtues. The psychologist Martin Seligman, who has been key in promoting the positive psychology movement, has contributed much to this work (Seligman & Peterson, 2003; Seligman, Rashid, & Parks, 2006).

Classifying Human Strengths Seligman and colleagues (Seligman & Peterson, 2003) have tried to classify human strengths. In other words, they have attempted to bring the positive side of human nature to the attention of psychological scientists and thereby to foster systematic research, they have tried to take an initial step that often is critical to scientific progress: the development of a comprehensive classification scheme. This effort has two objectives: (1) to identify criteria that would cause a psychological characteristic to be called a strength and (2) to use these criteria to identify a list of strengths. Seligman and colleagues identified a set of criteria that are defining of human strengths. They include the following. For a characteristic to be a strength, it should be an enduring characteristic of the person that is beneficial in a variety of life domains. (Thus, “creativity” would be classified as a strength, whereas a narrow‐focused skill such as “good at poker” would not.) It should be something that both parents and the larger society try to foster in children and that is celebrated by one's community when it is developed. (Qualities such as perseverance and honesty, and institutions that try to foster these qualities such as Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts, illustrate what Seligman and colleagues have in mind.) Finally, these researchers suggest that a strength is something that is valued in all or almost all cultures of the world. This set of features, then, serves as the criteria for calling something a human strength. What, then, are the qualities that meet these criteria? Seligman and Peterson (2003) provide a preliminary list that groups strengths into six categories: wisdom, courage, love, justice, temperance (e.g., forgiveness), and transcendence (e.g., appreciation of beauty). These are qualities that we, today, immediately recognize as positive features of the human personality. Importantly, they also are qualities that would be recognized as positive across cultures and across historical time periods. The point of listing these qualities—obvious as any such list may seem in retrospect—is that the process serves as a corrective to theories that emphasized the negative side of human experience. In psychoanalytic theory, many of these qualities would have been seen as secondary to human experience. They would be classified merely as products of the superego, which is ultimately weaker than the impulsive id. Positive psychology gives us a different view of the human condition. It suggests that these virtues are central to human experience and can be enhanced by parenting and by social institutions. Seligman's early research was on learned helplessness and depression. Although he more recently switched to an interest in the positive aspects of personality functioning, he has retained an interest in the treatment of depression, developing a positive psychotherapy approach to lowering depression and raising well‐being (Seligman, Rashid, & Parks, 2006). In contrast with standard approaches to the treatment of depression that target depressive symptoms, positive psychotherapy focuses on increasing positive emotion and meaning. Exercises such as listing one's strengths and how to apply them in daily life, each day writing down three good things that happened, and writing a letter to someone expressing gratitude illustrate the focus fundamental to positive psychotherapy. Seligman reports preliminary positive results, but the approach to treatment is in need of further independent research. The Virtues of Positive Emotions In addition to its identification of human virtues, another notable quality of research associated with the positive psychology movement is its study of positive emotions. Psychologists commonly have studied emotions such as fear, anxiety, and anger. However, they have devoted less attention to the role of positive emotions—pride, love, happiness—in personality development and functioning. A very positive step toward understanding these emotions has been taken by the psychologist Barbara Fredrickson, who has proposed a broaden‐and‐build theory of positive emotions (Fredrickson, 2001, 2009). This theory posits that positive emotions have a specific effect on thoughts and action. Positive emotions broaden thought and action tendencies. They widen the range of ideas that come to mind and the range of actions that individuals pursue. The positive emotion of interest, for example, leads people to pursue novel activities. The emotion of pride motivates one to continue the creative or achievement activities that caused one to feel proud of oneself. In this way, positive emotions contribute directly to the further building of human competencies and achievements. Research has supported the predictions of Fredrickson's broaden‐and‐build theory. For example, in one study (Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004), research participants were presented with a stressful experience; they were told they were to give a public speech that would be videotaped. (If you picture yourself suddenly being asked to give a videotaped speech in front of strangers, you'll recognize that this is a stressor for most persons.) The investigators measured three qualities of interest: (1) how resilient people were, that is, individual differences in people's general tendency to recover from stress and deal effectively with novel situations; (2) physiological indications of stress, such as heart rate, as people prepared their speech; and (3) positive emotions, that is, the extent to which people reported feeling positive emotions during the experiment, despite the fact that it was stressful. As expected, people who scored high on resilience (i.e., people who generally tend to cope well with things) experienced lesser degrees of cardiovascular activity indicating stress. However, the key result of interest involved the third measure, positive emotions. People who experienced positive emotions during the study—people who were able to look on the bright side of things, remaining interested and amused during the experience of giving a speech—experienced less stress. This means that the primary reason that some people were resiliently calm is that they were able to experience positive emotions. As predicted by Fredrickson's theory, these people's positive emotions seemed to cancel out some of the effects of stress. They thus were able to remain in greater control of their thoughts and actions and to feel less stressful arousal than others. People who experience more positive emotions, then, could be said to be more resilient. Positive emotions act as “coping resources that help buffer (psychologically and physiologically) against negative emotional life experiences” (Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004, p. 331). Flow A third notable area of investigation in positive psychology is Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's (1990) work on the concept of flow. Flow describes a feature of conscious experiences. It refers specifically to positive states of consciousness with the following characteristics: a perceived match between personal skills and environmental challenge, a high level of focused attention, involvement in an activity such that time seems to fly by and irrelevant thoughts and distractions do not enter into consciousness, a sense of intrinsic enjoyment in the activity, and a temporary loss of self‐consciousness such that the self is not aware of functioning or regulating activity. Flow experiences can take place in activities as diverse as work, hobbies, sports, dancing, and social interactions. It is expressed in statements such as “When I am involved, everything just seems to come to me. I just float along, feeling both excited and calm and want it to continue endlessly. It's not rewards that count but just the pleasure in the activity itself.” Csikszentmihalyi's interest in the positive aspects of human functioning began with his observation during World War II that, although many people lost their decency, others expressed the best of what people can be. Subsequently, he was influenced by the work of Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow, leading to an emphasis on the study of strength and virtue as opposed to weakness and pathology. These three areas of study—Seligman's classification of human strengths, Fredrickson's broad‐and‐build theory of positive emotions, and Csikszentmihalyi's work on flow—illustrate the promise and achievements of the positive psychology movement. Yet more work remains. A primary challenge is not only to show that some people have superior virtues and relatively positive emotional experiences but also to show how these qualities can be developed in everybody. Commentators have noted that this remains a limitation of the field. Researchers have yet to identify social practices and community institutions that are best for building personal strengths (Gable & Haidt, 2005). Existentialism The approach known as existentialism is not new to psychology, but one could hardly say that it has an established or secure place in mainstream academic psychology. Existentialism is an approach that many people are deeply moved by, yet, there is no single representative figure, nor is there agreement about its basic theoretical concepts. There are religious existentialists, atheistic existentialists, and antireligion existentialists. There are those existentialists who emphasize hope and optimism, as well as those who emphasize despair and nothingness. There are those who emphasize the philosophical roots of existentialism and those who emphasize the phenomena of clinical cases. Granted all this diversity, what is it that establishes a common ground among those who would define themselves as existentialists? What is it about this approach that captivates some and leads others to reject it? Perhaps the most defining element of existentialism is the concern with existence, the concern with the person in the human condition. The existentialist is concerned with phenomena that are inherent in the nature of being alive, human, existing. What constitutes the essence of existence varies for different existentialists; however, all agree that certain concerns are fundamental to the very nature of our being and cannot be ignored, dismissed, explained away, or trivialized. Perhaps most of all, for the existentialist, people and experience are to be taken seriously.

Another major aspect of the existential view is the significance of the individual. The existentialist sees the person as singular, unique, and irreplaceable. Related to this is an emphasis on freedom, consciousness, and self‐reflection. Freedom distinguishes humans from other animals. Freedom also involves responsibility for choices, for action, for being authentic, or for acting in “bad faith” and being inauthentic. In addition, there is the existential concern with death, for it is here as nowhere else that the individual is alone and completely irreplaceable. Finally, there is an emphasis on phenomenology and an understanding of the unique experience of each person rather than in terms of some standardized definition or the confirmation of some hypothesis: “Existentialism works at the personal meaning in contrast to general theory” (Marino, 2004, p. xii). In many ways Rogers represented an existential emphasis. For example, consider his discussion of loneliness (Rogers, 1980). What is it that constitutes the existential experience of loneliness? Rogers suggested a number of contributing factors: the impersonality of our culture, its transient quality, the fear of a close relationship. However, what most defines loneliness is the effort to share something very personal with someone and to find that it is not received or is rejected. In contrast, there is the feeling of being understood. Here the person has the sense that another individual can empathize in an understanding, accepting way. The feeling of being understood is associated with safety and relief from existential loneliness. Another illustration involves the search for meaning in human existence. The existential psychiatrist Viktor Frankl (1955, 1958) struggled to find meaning while imprisoned in a concentration camp during World War II. Frankl suggests that the will to find meaning is the most human phenomenon of all, since other animals never worry about the meaning of their existence. Existential frustration and existential neurosis involve frustration and lack of fulfillment of the will to find meaning. Such a neurosis does not involve the instincts or biological drives but rather is spiritually rooted in the person's escape from freedom and responsibility. In such cases, the person blames destiny, childhood, the environment, or fate for what is. The treatment for such a condition, logotherapy, involves helping patients to become what they are capable of being, helping them to realize and accept the challenges of the opportunities that are open to them. Contemporary Experimental Existentialism Can one study issues raised by existentialists, such as fear of death, with experimental methods? A particularly compelling example of such research is work on people's awareness and fear of death. Existentialists have long conjectured that thoughts of death are a central feature of human experience. Experimental existential psychologists have advanced beyond the earlier philosophical analyses by taking this general idea—people's awareness of, and fear of, death—and turning it into specific, testable hypotheses. A significant step forward in this regard is terror management theory (Greenberg, Solomon, & Arndt, 2008; Solomon, Greenberg, & Pyszczynski, 2004). Terror management theory (TMT) examines the consequences of combining two factors: people's desire to live (which people share with all other animals) and people's awareness of the inevitability of death (an awareness that is uniquely human). TMT posits that people's awareness of death makes them vulnerable to being completely overwhelmed by terrifying death anxiety. The question that arises then is how people manage to avoid terror. How do people obtain meaning in life once they recognize that death is inevitable and (in principle) could occur at any time? Terror management theorists suggest that part of the answer lies in social and cultural institutions or worldviews. These institutions and worldviews serve a psychological function: They buffer against the fear of death. The idea of TMT is that cultural institutions furnish meaning in life—even if one does dwell on the inevitability of death. How does this work? Well, the exact answer depends on where in the world you live; different cultures furnish different types of meaning systems. But two examples make the TMT point clear. In many cultures, religious institutions teach that there is an afterlife (e.g., a heaven and a hell). The belief in an afterlife buffers against the terror of death. Even if one starts to feel terrified at the prospect of the death of the body, one can find comfort in the belief in the afterlife of the soul. Other cultures emphasize that the individual is one component of a larger circle of persons: the family, the community, and so forth (see Chapter 14). Even though one may die as an individual, there is a sense in which one lives on in the life of one's offspring. The idea of TMT, then, is that these social practices are resources that help people to cope with the fear of death. A specific hypothesis follows from TMT: Increasing death anxiety, what is known as mortality salience, should lead to greater commitment to one's cultural beliefs and greater rejection of cultural beliefs that might threaten one's worldview. Along similar lines, increased mortality salience should lead to greater agreement with and affection for those who share one's beliefs and greater hostility and disdain for those who do not share or challenge one's beliefs. To study this hypothesis experimentally, one must be able to manipulate mortality salience and observe the effects on commitment to one's own cultural beliefs relative to those of others. Research on mortality salience indicates that a reminder of the inevitability of death, such as the sight of a cemetery, will increase people's sense of commitment to aspect of their own culture, such as their nation and its flag. In various studies, mortality salience has been increased in the following ways: Subjects are asked to respond to tasks such as “Describe the emotions that the thought of your own death arouse in you” or “Write down what you think will happen to you as you physically die.” Subjects view a film of a gory automobile accident; subjects respond to death anxiety scales; and subjects are exposed to subliminal death primes. In support of the hypothesis, such increases in mortality salience have been found to produce effects such as the following: greater fondness for members of one's own group and rejection of members of different groups; greater anxiety about a blasphemous attitude toward cultural icons such as the American flag or symbols of one's own religion; greater physical aggression toward those who attack one's political orientation; and increased donations to charities that benefit one's in group. Increasing mortality salience has also been found to decrease interest in sex when sex is viewed as more of an animal act but to increase interest in sex when sex is viewed as an act of human love. Finally, high self‐esteem has been found to serve an anxiety‐buffering effect in relation to death anxiety; that is, increased mortality salience has more of an effect on individuals low in self‐esteem than on people high in self‐esteem. In summary, existentialism is a philosophical movement that is defined by its topics of primary interest. As we have seen, four features of existentialism stand out. First, existentialists are concerned with understanding existence—the person in the human condition. Second, existentialists are concerned with the individual. Rather than trying to understand human existence by searching for abstract theoretical principles, by studying broad political or social systems, or by engaging in metaphysical speculations about the universe and where it came from, the existentialist addresses the experiences of the individual person. Third, existentialists emphasize the human capacity for free choice, a capacity that comes from people's unique ability to reflect consciously on alternative possibilities. Finally, existentialists devote much attention to the phenomenological experiences of anguish and despair—the feelings of “existential crisis”—that result when people reflect on their alienation from the world, a loss of meaning in life, or the inevitability of death. Developments in Research: The Self and Authenticity Discrepancies among Parts of the Self According to Rogers, then, psychological pathology results from discrepancies between self‐concept and actual experience. Much contemporary research similarly focuses on the role of discrepancies in psychological distress. However, this work differs somewhat from that of Rogers. It tends to focus less on discrepancies between self and experience, and more on an internal psychological discrepancy: discrepancies between different parts of the self. A particularly influential theory of discrepancies among parts of the self has been proposed by the psychologist Higgins (1999; Higgins & Scholer, 2008). Higgins's work addresses the relation between aspects of self‐concept and emotional experience. His work extends Rogers's thinking by differentiating between two aspects of one's future self. In addition to the ideal self, which was recognized by Rogers, Higgins suggests that everyone possesses an ought self—that is, an aspect of self‐concept that is concerned with duties, responsibilities, and obligations. The ideal self, in contrast, centers on personal hopes, ambitions, and desires.

According to Higgins's theory, discrepancies between actual self and ideal self lead to dejection‐related emotions. For example, if someone has an ideal self of being an A student but receives a C in a class, he or she will likely feel disappointed, sad, or even depressed. In contrast, discrepancies between self and ought self should lead to agitation‐related emotions. For example, if someone has an ought self of being an A student but receives a C, he or she will likely feel fearful, threatened, or anxious. Thus, the distinction between ideal self and ought self is important because it helps separate two kinds of self‐relevant emotions: those related to dejection (e.g., disappointment, sadness, depression) and those related to agitation (e.g., fear, threat, anxiety). In research related to this theory, people are asked to describe how they actually are (their actual self) and how they ideally would like to be (their ideal self). Researchers determine the degree to which these different descriptions are discrepant. (For example, if you say “I actually am lazy” and “Ideally, I would be hardworking,” that is coded as a self‐discrepancy.) It is predicted that people with larger self‐discrepancies will be more vulnerable to negative emotional experiences. In a key piece of research, Higgins, Bond, Klein, and Strauman (1986) found that people with large discrepancies between the actual self and ideal self were more likely to be depressed, whereas people with actual–ought discrepancies were more likely to be anxious. Because Higgins's theory and research methods are closely related to a personality theory, you will learn about later in the text, social‐cognitive theory, we will return to his work in Chapter 13. More recent findings by other investigators suggest that the relation between self‐discrepancies and emotional experience is not fixed but, instead, can vary. An important factor is the degree to which people are aware of their self‐discrepancies at any given time. If some feature of the social environment causes people to dwell on themselves, then discrepancies among aspects of the self‐concept may influence emotional experience more strongly. Phillips and Silvia (2005) tested this idea using a simple experimental manipulation employed frequently in research on the self: a mirror. Looking at a mirror has the effect of drawing one's attention to oneself. In their research, some people completed measures of self‐concept and of emotional experience while sitting at a table that faced a large mirror. Other people, in a different experimental condition, could not see themselves in a mirror. (The experimenters simply turned the mirror around so that its nonreflective back side faced the research participants.) The researchers found that self‐discrepancies were linked more strongly to emotional experience in conditions of high self‐awareness, that is, when people faced the mirror (Phillips & Silvia, 2005). The results indicate that, to understand the role of self‐concept in psychological experience, one must consider situational factors with the power to draw attention to features of the self. Fluctuations in Self‐Esteem and Contingencies of Worth Rogers's ideas about the self‐implied that people possess a relatively stable sense of self‐worth, or self‐esteem. To bring about changes in people's sense of self, it appeared that systematic efforts, such as client‐centered therapy, were required. There is evidence that children as young as four years of age begin to develop a sense of self‐worth and that between the ages of six and nine they develop a sense of global self‐esteem (Robins, Tracy, & Trzesniewski, 2008). At the same time, some contemporary research suggests that self‐esteem may fluctuate to a greater extent than Rogers had anticipated. Particularly informative work on this topic comes from Jennifer Crocker and colleagues (Crocker & Knight, 2005; Crocker & Wolfe, 2001). Crocker and Wolfe (2001) are interested in “contingencies of self‐worth.” Their idea is that a person's self‐esteem depends on—or is “contingent on”—positive and negative events. Self‐esteem rises when we get an A1 in a class and falls when we get an F−. We feel better about ourselves when someone asks us out on a date and worse when we ask someone out and they laugh at us and hang up the phone. It is these successes and failures that are the contingencies of self‐worth on which self‐esteem depends. Although a person's typical, average level of self‐esteem may be relatively stable, one's day‐to‐day sense of self‐worth may fluctuate considerably as one experiences these positive and negative contingent events. In addition to the possibility of fluctuations in self‐esteem, Crocker and Wolfe's theoretical framework highlights another point: People may differ in the degree to which any given event is, for them, a contingency of self‐worth. One person might not care much about his or her grades in classes because he or she is basically interested in getting dates. Another might not be concerned with acceptance/rejection by dating partners because his or her only big concern is academic grades. Such people should experience fluctuating self‐esteem in different situations. “The impact of events” on one's self‐esteem should depend “on the perceived relevance of those events to one's contingencies of self‐worth” (Crocker & Wolfe, 2001, p. 594). Crocker and colleagues have applied their theoretical ideas to a topic of particular relevance to those readers of this book who might be considering going to graduate school: fluctuations in self‐esteem among college students as they receive acceptances and rejections from graduate programs (Crocker, Sommers, & Luhtanen, 2002). Participants in this study completed a measure of self‐esteem, as well as measures of positive and negative effects, twice a week on a regular schedule, as well as on any days on which they received a notification of admission (or not) from a graduate program. This enabled the investigators to study fluctuations in self‐esteem. At the outset of the study, the degree to which each participant's self‐worth was contingent on academic success was measured; this was done by asking people to report the degree to which they get a self‐esteem boost from events such as getting good grades. This procedure enabled the investigators to test the hypothesis that self‐esteem would fluctuate as a result of acceptances/rejections, but only for students for whom academic success was an important contingency of self‐worth. This hypothesis was confirmed. Among students who based their self‐esteem on academic performance, self‐esteem went up and down as a result of acceptances and rejections (respectively). However, among students for whom academic success was not a central element of self‐worth, the same objective events—graduate school acceptances and rejections—had little impact on self‐esteem. The analyses of Crocker and colleagues are a valuable extension of Rogers's analyses of self‐concept. They extend the work by identifying particular social contexts that contribute not only to typical, average levels of self‐esteem but also to those day‐to‐day fluctuations in people's sense of self that are so much a part of everyday life. Before leaving discussion of the concept of self‐esteem, it is worthwhile to note that although high self‐esteem would appear to be a good thing, surprisingly it is not necessarily related to measures of objective outcome. For example, self‐reported self‐esteem has not been found to be related to objective measures of outcome such as school achievement, social popularity, and job performance (Baumeister, Campbell, Krueger, & Vons, 2003). Rather than a global self‐esteem that is related to all aspects of performance, self‐esteem may have many components to it, each of which is related to a specific area. Authenticity and Internally Motivated Goals Another research trend that is in accord with Rogers's views is recent work on the concept of authenticity, defined as the extent to which people behave in accord with their self as opposed to behaving in terms of roles that foster false self‐presentations (Ryan, 1993; Sheldon, Ryan, Rawsthorne, & Ilardi, 1997). A key idea in work on authenticity is that, to understand human experience, one cannot look merely at people's observable behaviors. One must explore inner feelings as well. Specifically, one must ask whether people feel that their activities are consistent with their true self—that is, are authentic—rather than being phony actions that express a false self. Certainly, we all are aware of times when we have felt we were being more “authentic” and other times when we felt we were being “inauthentic” or “phony.” Is the degree to which an individual feels authentic in situations in daily life related to measures of satisfaction and well‐being? Indeed, this has been found to be the case. That is, in accord with the prior theorizing of humanistic and phenomenologically oriented psychologists, authenticity was found to be associated with being a more fully functioning person. In addition to this overall relationship with psychological being, it was found that the more genuine and self‐expressive people feel they are in a specific situation, the more extraverted, agreeable, conscientious, and open to experience they are likely to be in that situation (Sheldon et al., 1997). In other words, individuals may vary in their behavior from situation to situation, but the critical question is whether they feel they are being authentic and true to their self overall as well as in specific situations. Self‐Determination Theory Self‐determination theory (Deci & Ryan, 2012a, b), suggests that all human beings have fundamental psychological needs to be competent, autonomous, and related to others (CAR). In other words, these are viewed as the basic, universal human needs. The need for competence refers to feeling effective in one's actions. The need to be autonomous refers to the need to act in autonomous, self‐directed ways and to engage in tasks that are intrinsically motivated (motivated by intrinsic rewards) as opposed to engaging in tasks that are coerced, forced, or compelled (motivated by external rewards and punishments). The need for relatedness refers to feeling connected with others and having a sense of belonging in one's community. Satisfaction of these basic psychological needs is associated with healthy psychological functioning, just as Rogers would suggest. It is also associated with greater satisfaction in interpersonal relationships. In a spirit very much in tune with Rogers and existential psychologists, Ryan and Deci suggest that “existentially, what defines a person's life is the way in which it is experienced. Well‐being, mental health, and a life well lived are all about experiencing love, freedom, efficacy, and meaningful goals and values” (2008, p. 654). Of particular importance to self‐determination theory is the emphasis on autonomous motivation as opposed to controlled motivation. There are at least two critical elements to this difference. First, there is the question of whether action is autonomous, or self‐initiated, as opposed to controlled by others, or externally regulated. In addition, there is the question of whether action is freely chosen as opposed to compelled. Action conducted out of feelings of guilt and anxiety would emanate from within the person but would have a compelled as opposed to a freely chosen quality, and it would not qualify as self‐determined action. In sum, self‐determined action takes place because of its intrinsic interest to the person and its quality of being freely chosen. Does it make a difference whether action is reflective of self‐determined motivation? Recent research suggests that people show greater effort and persistence in relation to autonomous goals than in relation to goals that are pursued only because of external pushes or internal sanctions such as anxiety or guilt (Koestner, Lekes, Powers, & Chicoine, 2002; Sheldon & Elliot, 1999). In addition, there is evidence that the pursuit of self‐determined, intrinsic, approach goals is associated with physical health and psychological well‐being in contrast with the deleterious effects of the pursuit of forced, extrinsic, avoidance goals (Dykman, 1998; Elliot & Sheldon, 1998; Elliot, Sheldon, & Church, 1997; Kasser & Ryan, 1996). Thus, it is suggested that “to the extent that goal self‐concepts do not represent or are not concordant with the true self, people may not be able to meet their psychological needs” (Sheldon & Elliot, 1999, p. 485). More generally, studies confirm the hypothesis that people make particularly good progress on personal goals when the goals are “self‐concordant,” that is, consistent with one's own personal values rather than being imposed by someone else (Koestner et al., 2002). Of particular interest to college students may be the finding that when students are intrinsically motivated to learn, their learning tends to be deeper and more conceptual, and remembered better than when it is extrinsically motivated by grades or rewards (Benware & Deci, 1984). CURRENT QUESTIONS What Is the Nature of Effective Motivation? Is Internal Motivation or External Motivation Better? What about a Combination of the Two? In a study conducted independent of self‐determination theory and the earlier discussion of authenticity, but that fits within these frameworks, investigators asked whether internal motives (intrinsic motives, internal rewards) or universal motives (extrinsic motives, external rewards) produce better outcomes, and whether a combination of the two might be best: What mix of motives—internal, instrumental, or both—is most conducive to success? Over the course of nine classes, over ten thousand cadets at the West Point Military Academy rated how much each motive influenced their decision to attend the Academy. Illustrative contrasting motives were “A desire to be trained as a leader in the US Army” (internal) and “A desire to get a good job later in life.” (instrumental). Scores for these motives were then related to later military performance. As expected, those with strong internal motives were more likely to graduate and to receive early promotion recommendations relative to those with strong instrumental motives. However, what was unexpected was the finding that cadets with strong motives of both kinds performed worse than did those with strong internal motives but weak instrumental motives. In other words, the instrumental motives appeared to weaken the positive effects of the internal motives that are essential to success. Drawing a parallel to the college world and consistent with Deci & Ryan, the authors suggest that motives to learn (internal) are much more conducive to success than are motives to get good grades (extrinsic). They concluded that holding instrumental (extrinsic) motives may damage persistence and performance in educational and occupational contexts over long periods of time. Sources: Wrzesniewski and Schwartz (2014), Wrzesniewski, Schwartz, Cong, Kane, and Kolditz (2014). From a humanistic standpoint, these results make perfectly good sense. Yet, two caveats are worthy of note. First, it is important to keep in mind that it is not the goal per se that is important but why the goal is being pursued. The same goal can be pursued for intrinsic or extrinsic reasons, suggesting that goals such as financial success and community involvement can express either motivation. This is important in reminding us that we cannot assume that we know the motivation for a goal just from awareness of the content of the goal. The second caveat is the following: It is easy to assume that these principles of motivation apply to all people. However, recent research suggests that they may be culturally specific rather than universal features of human psychology. In this work, Anglo‐American and Asian‐American children were compared in terms of their relative intrinsic motivation when choices were (a) made for them versus (b) made by authority figures or peers. Anglo‐American children showed more intrinsic motivation when they made their own choices. However, Asian‐American children showed greater intrinsic motivation when their choices were made for them by trusted authority figures or peers (Iyengar & Lepper, 1999). Thus, the extent to which self‐determination reflects a universal human need requires careful consideration and more research. More generally, the Rogerian emphasis on self‐actualization may be most appropriate to understanding people who live in a Western culture in which Rogers formulated his theory. A final note in relation to self‐determination theory concerns its recent emphasis on how social contexts can facilitate or impair satisfaction of the basic psychological needs (Deci & Ryan, 2012a). In particular, there is an interest in how cultural values and economic systems promote or thwart autonomy. For example, capitalism is viewed as a complex system that can either support or thwart autonomy. In the former case, capitalism fosters autonomy that maximizes creativity and innovation. In the latter case, however, capitalism can thwart autonomous, intrinsic motivation by its focus on accumulation, personal gain, and recognition. Cross‐Cultural Research on the Self The research on intrinsic motivation among Asian‐American and Anglo‐American children that we have just reviewed raises a general question. Carl Rogers was an American psychologist. He developed his theory on the basis of clinical experiences with Americans. Most of the psychological research on self processes conducted during Rogers's lifetime was conducted with citizens of the United States, Canada, or western Europe. The question that arises, then, is as follows: Does Rogers's work provides us with a general view of human nature or with a view that pertains primarily to people in the industrialized Western world? This is a deep and important question that has relevance far beyond the personality theory of Carl Rogers. All theoretical conceptions of human nature inevitably are constructed by people who live in a certain geographical location, in a certain culture, at a certain point in history. The question, then, is whether the theorist possibly can circumvent the limits of his or her circumstances to provide a theoretical framework that applies to all persons, in all cultures and all historical contexts. Cultural Differences in the Self and the Need for Positive Self‐Regard The basic nature of the self, as well as the extent of the need for positive regard, may vary from culture to culture (Benet‐Martinez, 2008; Heine, Lehman, Markus, & Kitayama, 1999; see Chapter 14). For example, one of the distinctive differences between Eastern and Western cultures is the degree to which the self is viewed as connected to others (Markus & Cross, 1990). In Eastern cultures, the self‐concept consists of connections with others, and individual parts that cannot be understood when separated from the greater, collective whole. This cultural understanding of self stands in contrast to the dominant view of the self in Western civilization, which views the self as unique and separate from others. One of the authors of this book, while teaching a multiethnic group of students in Hawaii, was struck with the very different views of the self expressed by students from these two cultures. In fact, what was particularly striking was that at times those from one culture could not comprehend what was being expressed about the self by members of the other culture. Personality and the Brain Culture and the Self Not long ago in the history of psychological science, “culture” and “brain” were explanations of behavior that competed. Some theorists explained behavior by referring to the beliefs and skills that people acquire by living in a culture. Others disagreed, saying that the proper explanation would refer to neural systems within the brain. The debate between these competing camps of theorists has a happy conclusion: They were both right. The brain evolved, in part, to enable people to acquire the beliefs and skills of their culture. Cultural experience, in turn, shapes the “wiring” of the developing brain. An example of how this works comes from research on a central feature of personality, namely, the self. People learn who they are—their roles in life; their rights and obligations; what it means to be a person—through interactions with the people and social practices of their culture. Neuroscience research shows how these cultural experiences are represented in the brain. A key strategy in this research is to compare brain activity among individuals from parts of the world whose cultures are known to differ. Zhu, Ziang, Fan, and Han (2007) compared college students from Eastern (China) and Western (e.g., England and North America) cultures. They took brain images while participants performed the following task. As each of a series of personality trait adjectives (e.g., “brave,” “childish”) appeared on screen, participants judged whether the word accurately described (1) themselves or (2) their mother. The study employed a within‐subjects experimental design, so each participant made a number of “self” judgments and “mother judgments.” When analyzing the resulting brain images, the researchers focused on a region in the front of the brain known as the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) because it had been shown, in prior research, to be a brain region that is highly active when people make judgments about themselves. Consistent with prior research in Western cultures, the researchers found that, among Western participants, the MPFC was highly active during judgments about the self but not during judgments about one's mother. However, Eastern participants were different. Among people from China, the MPFC was active during both self‐judgments and mother judgments. As the researchers summarized, “the representation of Chinese mother cannot be distinguished from the representation of their selves, in terms of the MPFC Activity” (Zhu et al., 2007, p. 1314). Fascinatingly, this merger of self and other at a biological level of analysis parallels cultural findings at a psychological level of analysis, which show that self‐concept in the East consists of closer psychological connections with others than in the West. Subsequent work provides related evidence about culture and the brain. In a study with participants from the United States and Japan, variations in participants' cultural beliefs (specifically, their beliefs about the degree to which they are interconnected with others in their culture) predicted levels of MPFC activation that occurred while people made judgments about themselves (Chiao et al., 2009). Again, then, culturally based thinking and brain activity were linked. Thanks to findings such as these, psychology's traditional debates about “culture versus biology” are being replaced by new understandings of how culture and biology work together in the shaping of personality. As we have reviewed, Rogers believed that all people have a need for positive self‐regard. To Rogers, unconditional acceptance of the individual, whatever his or her faults may be, is the pathway to psychological health. Such unconditional regard builds the individual's sense that he or she is a valued, prized person. In the absence of such unconditional regard, the individual's need for a positive self‐view may be unfulfilled, leading to psychological distress. But is this how things work for all persons the world over? If psychological processes regarding the self are akin to biological processes, then the answer is yes. But psychological processes involving the self may not be like this. The very notion of self—of one's identity, one's role in family and society, one's goals, one's purpose in life—is acquired socially. People acquire a sense of self from interaction with the individuals who make up their family, community, and wider culture. It is possible, then, that some cultures in essence teach people to have a need for positive regard; a culture that values the individual and individual achievements may foster the belief that individuals should enhance their own well‐being. In principle, other cultures may teach people a different way of life that does not involve a striving for positive self‐regard. Compelling evidence that there are, in fact, variations from culture to culture in the nature and functioning of self‐esteem are found in the study of differences between Japanese and American culture. Heine, Lehman, Markus, and Kitayama (1999) review evidence that the basic patterns and functions of self‐esteem seem to vary from one culture to another. In the United States, most people report having relatively high self‐esteem; as Rogers might have predicted, people seem biased to maintain positive self‐views. But in Japan, there is no sign whatsoever of this bias; as many people report low self‐esteem as high self‐esteem. In psychological studies conducted in the United States, people seem inevitably to engage in psychological strategies to maintain high self‐esteem. For example, they compare themselves to others who are not doing well, they blame others for personal failure, and they lower the perceived importance of activities on which they cannot perform competently (reviewed in Brown, 1998). But Heine and colleagues (1999, p. 780) “are unable to find clear and consistent evidence of any self‐esteem maintenance strategies within the Japanese psychological literature.” Rather than being prone to an enhancement of self‐esteem, Heine and colleagues (1999; also see Kitayama & Markus, 1999; Kitayama Markus, Matsumoto, & Norasakkunkit, 1997) contend that Japanese culture makes one prone to self‐criticism. In Japan, this self‐criticism serves a valuable personal and social function. It motivates people toward self‐improvement that can benefit the individual and his or her society. In Japan, then, self‐criticism is not “bad.” It is not a sign of being depressed or down on oneself. Instead, it is “good”—that is, it is a functional, valuable way for individuals to mesh with their surrounding culture. Consistent with this view, tendencies toward self‐criticism and the experience of discrepancies between the actual and ideal self are predictive of depression in North America but are less strongly related to depression in Japan (Heine et al., 1999). In summary, it appears that the cultures of the United States and of Japan teach people different ways of evaluating the self. If you, the reader, are a citizen of North America, then you may be particularly prone to engage in psychological strategies that maintain a positive view of self. If your professor gives you a bad grade on a paper, you may conclude that there is something wrong with the professor. If a romantic partner dumps you, you may conclude that the relationship wasn't all that important anyway. If you didn't get into the college of your choice, you may conclude that it was because you didn't take your application seriously enough. These conclusions are functional in the cultural system of the United States; they enable you to maintain a high sense of self‐esteem in a culture that values high self‐esteem. But if you are a citizen of Japan, you may be much more likely to draw other conclusions that are more self‐critical; in so doing, you would be fitting in with a culture that values continual personal improvement. These variations in the nature and functioning of self‐evaluation and self‐esteem are understandable in light of contemporary research on culture and personality; however, these variations were not well anticipated by Carl Rogers when he formulated his theory of personality and self.

Contemporary Developments in Personality Theory: Personality Systems Interaction Theory and the Integrated Self A distinctive feature of Rogers's theory of personality is that it is holistic. Most other theories dissect personality into a set of distinct parts (e.g., the id/ego/superego structural variables of Freud's psychoanalytic theory, or the personality trait variables you will see in Chapters 7 and 8). Rogers, by contrast, believed that personality cannot be dissected into parts; the core of personality, the self, is an organized, integrated whole. Just as you cannot understand a whole painting by breaking the image into little parts and studying them one piece at a time, you cannot understand a person as a whole, in Rogers's view, by dividing the individual into a set of variables that are analyzed one‐at‐a‐time. A Limitation of Rogerian Theory: What Exactly Is the “Integrated Self”? A strength of Roger's approach, as you have seen, is that it captures people's experience of themselves, or their “phenomenology”. People commonly experience themselves as whole, unified persons, not as collections of personality variables. Consider your own experience when making a significant life decision such as choosing what college to attend or deciding whether to maintain or break up a relationship. When deciding, you rely on intuitions about what is right for you; for example, you might conclude that one school “just doesn't fit my personality” but that another “really does feel like a good place for me.” Now consider these feelings. They concern yourself as a whole; your intuitions do not center on one “part” of your personality but, instead, on your whole self. This experience of a unified, integrated, whole self that can guide your intuitive decision‐making aligns with Rogers's theory. But what exactly is this whole, integrated self? A limitation of Rogers's theory is that he does not answer this question in a precise way. When it comes to the analysis of the self, Rogers's theory is more descriptive than explanatory; he vividly described the psychological experiences that compel one to propose an integrated self as the core of personality, but never explained where this integrated self comes from. Consider what needs to be explained. When one analyzes the workings of the mind, it is immediately obvious that mental processes are highly diverse. People hold a wide variety of beliefs and possess a near‐infinity of memories. Everyone experiences a diverse range of emotions, which sometimes conflict with one another and often change rapidly from one moment to the next. Furthermore, a variety of motives, values, and rules for social behavior guide everyday actions. At a biological level of analysis, these diverse psychological processes are possible because people possess brains that contain large numbers of distinct neural subsystems. The diversity and complexity of psychological and neural processes is so great that one cannot help but ask whether the idea of a singular, “integrated” self is more fiction than fact. What needs to be explained is how a whole, integrated self emerges out of this psychological and biological diversity. Rogers did not accomplish this; he never identified the psychological or neural systems that enabled people to experience an integrated, unified sense of self. In historical retrospect, it is hard to blame him. Contemporary scientific understanding of mental processes and associated brain systems developed almost entirely after Rogers penned his theory of personality in the middle of the 20th century. However, thanks to these developments, today's personality scientists can advance beyond the understanding of self that was provided by Rogers. One major advance is the Personality Systems Interaction (PSI) Theory of the German psychologist Julius Kuhl and his colleagues (Kuhl, 2000, 2010; Kuhl & Koole, 2004). Personality Systems Interaction Theory The first step in learning about Personality Systems Interaction theory is to understand what type of theory it is. Many psychological theories concern mental content, where “content” refers to the type of information that the mind contains. For example, Rogers's distinction between the actual and the ideal self is based on content. The content of the actual self is information about a person's current psychological qualities, whereas the content of the ideal self is information about desired qualities that one might not currently possess. PSI theory, by contrast, identifies different types of mental systems with different functional properties; in other words, the systems work (or “function”) differently, no matter what content goes into them. The following analogy helps to clarify the distinction between function and content. Your smart phone stores music on a solid‐state flash memory device. Decades ago, people stored music exclusively on vinyl records. Current‐day flash memory and old‐fashioned vinyl work differently no matter what music you put on them; they have different physical properties and therefore function differently, no matter what the musical content. Similarly, it is possible to identify mental systems whose functioning differs from one another, no matter what content—that is, no matter what beliefs and feelings about the self—goes into them. Four Functionally Distinct Personality Systems PSI theory identifies four personality systems that each has distinct functional properties. The second of the four is key to the theory's analysis of the holistic, integrated self1: Analytical Thinking System: The analytical thinking system is a mental system that processes material in a logical, step‐by‐step manner. You commonly are consciously aware of this step‐by‐step analytic thinking when you “talk to yourself” about your day. For example, if you tell yourself things like “Today, I have to start writing a paper for my psych class. And I also need to get to work by 7,” these consciously accessible thoughts about your goals and intentions are produced by the analytic thinking system. Holistic Thinking‐and‐Feeling System. The Holistic Thinking‐and‐Feeling System is not a step‐by‐step thinking system. Instead, it is a parallel‐processing system. A parallel processing system is one in which large numbers of psychological processes occur at the same time, or “in parallel”. Cognitive psychologists have recognized since the 1980s that parallel processing is a central feature of the human mind (Rumelhart &McClelland, 1986). The brain, with its billions upon billions of neurons, inherently engages in large numbers of activities at the same time. PSI theory recognizes that two features of parallel processing systems are of great importance to personality. One is that parallel processes occur outside of consciousness. Conscious awareness is limited; in other words, it is impossible to be aware of a large number of things at the same time. It is therefore inevitable that, if many mental activities occur at the same time, they will occur outside of conscious awareness. A simple illustration of this point is that sometimes ideas “pop into your head” for no apparent reason. Before they popped into your head, there had to have been some mental activities—but you were unaware of them. A second feature of parallel processing systems is that different processes often are interconnected. Although your brain may be engaged in multiple thinking processes at the same time, the interconnections among these processes allow information to be combined. For example, if you are near someone who lights a fire (e.g., a fireplace or campfire), your brain engages in a number of different perceptual processes: your visual system sees the light, your auditory system hears the crackling of the fire, and your haptic system (or sense of “touch”) perceives warmth. But what is your conscious experience? You do not consciously experience three distinct streams of information involving light, sound, and temperature. Instead, these information streams are connected to one another, and you are consciously aware of a single, integrated, whole object: the fire. PSI theory argues that interconnections among mental processes that occur in parallel are key to the integrated sense of self‐described by Rogers. Parallel‐processing connections enable the mind to automatically combine multiple thoughts and feelings about the self into an integrated whole. “The integrated self [is] based on parallel processing that integrates cognitive, emotional, motivational, and volitional processes within the person” (Kuhl, Quirin, & Koole, 2015, p. 119). Once these thoughts, feelings, and motives are combined, you are consciously aware of a single, whole self. PSI theory even identifies a brain basis of this integrated self‐system. As you know, the brain has two hemispheres, the left and the right. The right hemisphere is known to be more strongly involved in parallel processing, and thus is a neural basis for the integrated self (Kuhl et al., 2015). Intuitive Behavior Control System. A third PSI system is called the Intuitive Behavior Control System. This is a mental system that allows you to engage in behavior without have to pay attention to each step you are taking. For example, if you play a musical instrument well, you don't pay attention to each of the individual movements your hands make to produce each sound; instead, the individual movements are controlled in an automatic, intuitive manner by the Intuitive Behavior Control System. The free‐flowing nature of the dancer's movements suggest that her behavior is under the control of her intuitive behavior control system, which enables people to engage in behavior without paying attention to each step they are taking. Discrepancy Detection System. Finally, the fourth PSI system is a Discrepancy Detection System. This is the mental system that recognizes when something is going wrong—or, to phrase it more precisely, this is the mental system that is sensitive to differences between sensory experiences and prior expectations or goals. Sticking with our music example, suppose you are playing a song and expect to hear yourself play a C major chord but, instead, hear yourself playing a C minor chord. Your Discrepancy Detection System will be aware of this difference between sensory input (the sound of C minor) and prior expectations (C major) and will produce a signal that something has gone wrong. Such signals can quickly change your state of mind. If you are playing in front of a crowd, the wrong‐chord detection can shift you from a state of pleasant concentration on the music to an unpleasant, anxious thought about yourself and how the crowd is reacting to you. Emotion and the Four Personality Systems PSI theory takes an additional step that was not taken by Rogers. It identifies ways in which emotional states influence the ways in which people think about themselves (Kuhl & Joole, 2004). A core insight of PSI theory is that changes in emotions—specifically, increases or decreases in positive and negative emotions—activate the personality systems. These relations between emotions and personality systems are shown in Figure 6.2. FIGURE 6.2 Four psychological systems identified by Personality Systems Interaction Theory and the ways in which changes in emotional states influence the activation of those systems. (This figure is not a complete presentation of all aspects of PSI theory; instead, it represents the theory's treatment of the regulation of behavior by cognitive systems that interact with emotional states. The terminology employed here simplifies some terminology employed originally. See Kuhl and Koole (2004), from which this figure is adapted). A key relation between emotion and personality systems is the one shown in the upper‐right portion of the figure. According to PSI theory, decreases in negative emotion tend to activate the holistic thinking‐and‐feeling system. Reductions in negative emotion are a signal indicating the one is in a safe situation, and this safety signal allows a person to rely on the intuitive thinking‐and‐feeling system that is the integrated self (Kuhl & Koole, 2004). By contrast, decreases in positive emotion—or the sort one would experience in our musical example above, in which you hit a wrong note—signal that one's goals are not being met. This signal, in turn, causes people to engage in analytic thinking to figure out what is going wrong. Regarding the other two personality systems, increases in negative emotion are signals that there is a threat in the environment. These signals increase activity in the discrepancy detection system; the negative emotions cause this system to be “on the lookout for” problems that need to be detected and fixed. Finally, increases in positive emotion are associated with greater activation of the intuitive behavioral control system. Positive emotion states enable people to engage in creative, intuition‐based actions. Illustrative Research Substantial lines of research support the theoretical claims of Personality Systems Interaction Theory. We will illustrate the approach by describing one example study, which explores the relation between emotion and intuitive, holistic styles of thinking. To test the PSI prediction that decreases in negative emotion enables people to think holistically, Baumann and Kuhl (2002) asked participants to perform a “word triple” task. In this task, participated are presented with sets of three words. In some of the sets, the words are related to one another in ways that are hard to figure out; for example, you can see that the words “salt,” “deep,” and “foam” are related to one another only if you recognize that they are all linked to the word “sea”. Identifying these relations requires holistic thinking; one has to consider the overall pattern that can be found in a whole set of information. The dependent measure in this study was participants' ability to solve word triple by providing a fourth word that was related to the other three (“sea” in the example above). You might expect that word triples are entirely a cognitive task, that is, one whose success rests exclusively on the ability to think quickly. But PSI theory predicts that emotional states would influence task performance. People who are experiencing negative emotions that they are unable to control should perform less well on the task (see the upper right portion of Figure 6.2). To test this prediction, Baumann and Kuhl measured two qualities among their research participants: (1) the degree to which they currently were experiencing negative emotions (e.g., sadness, guilt) and (2) their tendency to stay in negative mood states rather than being able to get out of them (e.g., some people say that they “feel paralyzed” when things go wrong for them, whereas others say that bad news does not bother them for long).

The results of the study were just as predicted by PSI theory. Emotional states predicted the ability to think holistically. Specifically, the lowest level of performance on the word triple task was displayed by people who reported high levels of negative emotion that they could not control. The highest level of performance was achieved by people who said they were in a bad mood, but who also said that they could control their negative emotions. Reduced negative emotions enhance holistic thinking—a result with direct implications for Rogers's theory of personality, as we now discuss. Implications for Rogers's Self Theory of Personality PSI theory has two major implications for Rogers's theory of personality. The first concerns the concept of an integrated, whole self. Scientific Basis for the Holistic, Integrated Self As we noted, Rogers's was not able to identify the cognitive, emotional, and brain systems that enabled people to achieve a coherent sense of self. He proposed that the self exists, but did not provide a firm scientific basis for this proposal. This caused some psychologists, back in Rogers's day, to conclude that his theory was too speculative—in other words, that is was not sufficiently grounded in scientific evidence. But today, PSI theory shows that the concept of an integrated self does, in fact, have a firm scientific basis (Kuhl et al., 2015). This is the major implication of the PSI analysis for Rogers's theory. The analysis of parallel process in human cognition, which is highlighted by PSI theory, supports Carl Rogers's central insight that the self is a coherent, integrated, holistic psychological system. Demystifying Processes of Change in Client‐Centered Therapy A second implication concerns the process of therapy. As explained earlier in the chapter, Rogers felt that the central ingredient of his Client‐Centered Theory was interpersonal. Rogers provided a warm, supportive interpersonal relationship in which clients experienced unconditional positive regard. This, in turn, changed the way clients thought about themselves, with the change being in the direction of positive personal growth. The success of Rogerian therapy demonstrates the applied value of Rogers's approach. Yet, the psychological processes through which this change occurs remain, in Rogers's theory, a bit of a mystery. As you probably could detect in our coverage of “Presence” earlier in this chapter, even Rogers himself seemed a bit mystified that his therapeutic presence alone was sufficient to change clients' self and well‐being. “Presence” is a compelling term to describe the therapeutic encounter. But it does not explain why the therapy works. PSI theory demystifies the process of client‐centered change in the following way. Clients entering therapy generally are experiencing distressed, negative emotions; these distressing emotions are, of course, a main reason why people seek therapy. An encounter with a supportive therapist is like to reduce these negative emotional states. In contrast to the stressful encounters that may make up the rest of the client's day, the therapeutic encounter is warm, positive, and uplifting. This positive interpersonal experience naturally would lower the client's level of negative emotions. Critically, this psychological process—a decrease in negative emotional states—is exactly the one that enhances holistic thinking according to PSI theory (see Figure 6.2) and research (Baumann & Kuhl, 2002). PSI theory thus suggests that the influence of Rogerian therapy on clients' thoughts and feelings is a special case of a more general psychological process. Whether a reduction in negative emotions occurs in everyday life, in a psychology experiment, or in client‐centered therapy, lower levels of negative emotion enhance the holistic thinking‐and‐feeling system.

In sum, the implications of PSI theory for Rogers's theory of personality are quite positive. Some of Rogers's proposals about personality lacked firm scientific support when he stated them, but are more firmly supported today due to the advances provided by Kuhl's Personality Systems Interaction theory. Critical Evaluation We conclude our coverage of Rogers's theory by evaluating it critically. We do so in the same manner as we evaluated the psychodynamic approach, namely, by assessing its success in achieving five goals enumerated at the outset of our text, in Chapter 1. We then summarize the theory's major contributions. Scientific Observation: The Database The first goal is to build a personality theory on a database of solid scientific observations. In many respects the scientific observations on which Rogers based his theory are quite admirable. Far more than Freud, Rogers was sensitive to the fact that scientific observations must be objective. One must ensure that any personal biases are eliminated from the process of data collection. Rogers and his colleagues took a number of steps to achieve this objectivity. They used objective personality assessment techniques such as the Q‐sort. They employed experimental methods to evaluate whether client‐centered therapy is effective. Even when working with traditional clinical interview data, Rogers took a major step forward that was never taken by Freud. Rogers allowed (with his clients' permission) transcripts and recordings of his therapy sessions to be made public. Outside observers thus could verify Rogers's clinical reports. Other features of Rogers's scientific observations seem limited in light of contemporary science. One limitation involves the type of personality assessment method he used. Rogers relied exclusively on measures that are explicit, that is, measures in which clients and research participants make statements about their personality that are formed through conscious self‐reflection and are stated publicly. The limitation is that people may not be able—or willing—to put some aspects of their personality into words. There may exist personality qualities that people cannot articulate explicitly. Recognizing this, many contemporary researchers employ implicit measures of self‐concept. Rather than relying on people's explicit, conscious self‐reports, research employs subtle, indirect measures, such as indices of the speed with which people respond to certain words or ideas that are related to the self‐concept (Asendorpf, Banse, & Mücke, 2002; Greenwald et al., 2002). These implicit measures often are correlated only modestly with explicit measures of self‐concept. This, in turn, suggests that people possess implicit beliefs about the self that are not revealed by the explicitly self‐reported methods on which Rogers relied. The general point is that the phenomenological approach may exclude from investigation critical psychological processes that occur outside of conscious experience. Rogers, a self‐critical thinker, was aware of this problem. His response was that the phenomenological approach is a valuable, necessary one for psychology, but perhaps not the only one of value (Rogers, 1964). A second limitation of Rogers's database is its relative lack of cultural diversity. Rogers devoted surprisingly little attention to the possibility of cultural variation in the nature of self‐concept. The contemporary research reviewed in our discussion of culture and self processes suggests that Rogers's theorizing may be compromised by this limitation in its database.

Theory: Systematic? Much of Rogers's writing is impressionistic rather than systematic. In keeping with his approach to therapy, Rogers relates, in an open and genuine manner, his own experiences and feelings as a psychologist. The relative absence of strict logical structures contrasts starkly with the writing of most of the other theorists you will learn about in this book and raises the question of whether Rogers's theorizing was systematically enough. This question is answered—in the affirmative—by Rogers's 1959 essay in which he presented his theoretical ideas in a formal manner. His exposition of interactions among alternative types of parent–child interactions, self‐concept, and psychological distress versus well‐being affirms that his impressionistic style was accompanied by extremely admirable clarity of thought. The main limitation to Rogers's theorizing does not involve quality (e.g., whether it is systematic) but quantity. There is rather little of it. A biographer notes that Rogers was “reluctant to begin theorizing in the first place” and that even when he began his theoretical work he was “still reluctant to place too great an emphasis on his own formulation” (Kirschenbaum, 1979, p. 240). Even Rogers himself recognized the lack of development of his theoretical work. Reflecting back on the propositions of his own theory, Rogers (1959; 1977, p. 232) laments its “immaturity … only the most general description can be given of … functional relationships” that, ideally, would be specified with mathematical rigor. In sum, Rogers provided a theory that was systematic, yet less systematic than that of some other theorists discussed in this text, if only because he composed less formal theoretical work than did others. Theory: Testable? If one asks whether Rogers provided a theory that is testable through standard scientific methods, the answer depends on which elements of his theory one is talking about. In some aspects of his work, Rogers defined constructs with great clarity and provided suggestions for personality assessments that could be used to measure those constructs. Rogers's work on the actual and ideal self stands out in this regard. He formulated these theoretical ideas with clarity. He indicated that the Q‐sort is a viable method for assessing aspects of self‐concept. As a result, he provided an overall theoretical conception of self‐concept that was testable. In addition, to this day his work on the necessary and sufficient conditions for therapeutic change stands out as among the very best of research on the process of psychotherapy. Other aspects of Rogers's work are far less testable. Consider his belief that there is a universal motive toward self‐actualization. How would one test this idea? As we noted in Chapter 5, Rogers's writing about self‐actualization sometimes is more poetic than scientific; Rogers does not provide the sort of clear definition of the construct that could guide research. He himself also provided no objective assessment tool for measuring a person's degree or level of self‐actualization. Rogers also provided few conceptual tools for comparing his belief in a single self‐actualizing motive to potential alternative beliefs, such as that there are a number of fundamentally distinct motives that each play a role in self‐actualization (e.g., a motive to understand oneself, a motive to understand the spiritual world, a motive to be compassionate toward others, etc.). It is hard to know what kind of evidence Rogers would have accepted as proof that there is not, in fact, a single overarching motive for self‐actualization. This element of this theory, then, is not clearly testable. Theory: Comprehensive? When introducing personality theories in Chapter 1, we explained that one task for the theorist is to develop a framework that is comprehensive. In psychology, theories abound. But the field houses few theories with the intellectual breadth to qualify as a theory of the whole person, or a theory of personality. The first theory you learned about, Freud's, was extraordinarily comprehensive. It is difficult to formulate questions about personality, personality development, and individual differences that are not addressed, either directly or indirectly, in Freud's framework. The same cannot be said of the theory of Rogers. Consider some of the following questions. How does our evolutionary background contribute to the explanation of personality structure and functioning? How do emotional states influence thinking processes? If people are so self‐actualizing, why are sexual and aggressive impulses so central to human experience? How does our genetic endowment interact with social influences in the course of development? Now consider the question “What does Rogers say about these issues?” A limitation of Rogers's work is that he simply does not say much at all about these issues. In this regard, and others, his work is not comprehensive. Rogers at a Glance Structure Process Growth and Development Pathology Change Illustrative Case Self; ideal self Self‐actualization; congruence of self and experience; incongruence and defensive distortion and denial Congruence and self‐actualization versus incongruence and defensiveness Defensive maintenance of self; incongruence Therapeutic atmosphere: congruence, unconditional positive regard, empathic understanding Mrs. Oak If one were to ask why Rogers's work is relatively lacking in comprehensiveness, one simple answer is that he devoted much of his energies to developing individual and group therapies rather than to establishing basic theory and research on personality. A further answer, though, is that in Rogers's efforts—and the highly related efforts of other phenomenological, humanistic, and hermeneutic thinkers—to treat people as social beings, he sometimes fails fully to treat people as biological beings. Sometimes we feel bad because of our views of ourselves. But sometimes we feel bad owing to biochemical factors that influence our mood. Sometimes we are anxious because events are incongruent with self‐perceptions. But sometimes we are anxious because of the activation of basic biological mechanisms that have nothing to do with self‐perception (see Chapter 9). Integrating the biological and the social aspects of human nature is difficult. Rogers's failure to tackle this task head on makes his work less comprehensive than some of the other personality theories we review in this text. Applications Rogers's contributions to applied psychology are profoundly important. At least three aspects of his client‐centered therapy are of enduring significance to the field. Rogers underscored the importance of the interpersonal relationship between client and therapist, while also providing techniques for building that relationship. He helped to establish objective methods for determining whether a given therapeutic approach actually benefited clients. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, he treated his clients as persons, not as patients. Rather than treating people as patients who harbored mental illnesses that needed to be diagnosed, he empowered clients by treating them as people who were capable, through the power of the self‐actualizing motive, of improving their own lives. Few other figures in modern psychology can claim as strong a set of contributions to the field. Rogers's ability to generate not only abstract theory but also useful applications is a great strength of his work. Major Contributions and Summary Carl Rogers's contributions to personality theory must be understood in historical context. Today, in early 21st‐century psychology, discussion of the role of the self is commonplace. Almost all personality psychologists recognize that cognitive and affective processes involving the self are central to personality structure and functioning. This, however, was not the case in Rogers's day. When he began his work in the mid‐20th century, neither of the guiding theoretical models in the field, psychoanalysis and behaviorism, attended carefully to the role of self processes. Rogers and his colleagues in the phenomenological and humanistic traditions contributed importantly to a historical redirection of attention to aspects of human psychology that had been neglected. We conclude by summarizing the strengths and limitations of Rogers's contributions (Table 6.1). We encourage you, the reader, to weigh these strengths and limitations against those of other theories you learn about in this text. We end by applauding Rogers for something he did uniquely. More than any other personality theorist, Rogers attempted to be objective about what is otherwise left to the artist: TABLE 6.1 Summary of Strengths and Limitations of Rogers's Theory and Phenomenology Strengths Limitations Focuses on important aspects of human existence that are neglected in many other theories, including self‐concept and the human potential for personal growth. Provides concrete therapeutic strategies that have proven useful in bringing about psychological change in therapy. Brings scientific objectivity and rigor to difficult‐to‐study processes involving both interpersonal relations and phenomena experience. Less comprehensive than some other theories, with little attention devoted to the biological bases of human nature. May exclude from research and clinical concern phenomena that lie outside of conscious experience. Devotes little attention to the possibility of cultural variation or situation‐to‐situation variation in psychological structures and processes involving the self, and thus provides few tools for explaining those variations that exist. Truly, nothing in the world has occupied my thoughts as much as the Self, this riddle, that I live, that I am one and am separate and different from everybody else, that I am Siddhartha; and about nothing in the world do I know less than about myself, about Siddhartha. Source: Hesse (1951, p. 40). MAJOR CONCEPTS Authenticity Client‐centered therapy Congruence Contingencies of self‐worth Empathic understanding Existentialism Human potential movement Self‐determination theory Self‐experience discrepancy Unconditional positive regard REVIEW For Rogers, the neurotic person is one who is in a state of incongruence between self and experience. Experiences that are incongruent with the self‐structure are subceived as threatening and may be either denied or distorted. Research in the area of psychopathology has focused on the discrepancy between the self and ideal self, and the extent to which individuals disown or are vague about their feelings. Rogers's focus was on the therapeutic process. The critical variable in therapy was seen as the therapeutic climate. Conditions of congruence (genuineness), unconditional positive regard, and empathic understanding were seen as essential to therapeutic change. The case of Mrs. Oak, an early case published by Rogers, illustrates his publication of recorded therapy sessions for research purposes. Rogers's views are part of the human potential movement, which emphasizes self‐actualization and the fulfillment of each individual's potential. Abraham H. Maslow and existentialists like Viktor Frankl are also representatives of this movement. Contemporary work on existentialist concerns, including feelings of authenticity, internally motivated goals, and cultural variations in the perceptions of self, extend Rogers's theorizing while also raising some questions about the universality of some psychological motives posited by Rogers. Note 1 The present summary is not a complete presentation of all aspects of PSI theory. It focuses specifically on the theory’s treatment of the regulation of behavior by cognitive systems that interact with emotional states. Also note that the terminology used to reference the systems varies slightly from the terminology employed by Kuhl (2004), in order to obtain a relatively simpler introductory presentation of the ideas.