Person Centred Counselling
The Use of Person Centred Counselling in Guidance and Counselling Practice in Schools
I think that it is accurate to say that the 'first wave' of guidance counsellors who received their counselling training in Ireland did so based largely on the theory and philosophy of counselling formulated by Carl Ransom Rogers (1902 - 1987), considered, by many, to be the most influential psychologist in American history. A leader in the humanistic psychology movement of the 1960's through the 1980's: more than any other individual he was responsible for the spread of professional counselling and psychotherapy beyond psychiatry and psychoanalysis to all the helping professions.
He was one of the helping professions most prolific writers, authoring sixteen books and more than two hundred professional articles and research studies on the major new approach to psychotherapy which he pioneered, known successively as 'non-directive', 'client centred' and 'person centred' counselling. Nowadays pre-service and in-service counsellor training offers a much more varied approach to theory and practice. Nonetheless, it is timely to re-evaluate this theory which formed many of us as counsellors and to look with new eyes at what Rogers still has to offer us through his work.
Origins / Brief History
Born in Oak Ridge, a small village on the outskirts of Chicago in 1902, Rogers had a very strict up-bringing which affected his initial choice of college study. At university, his interests and academic major changed from Agriculture to History, then to Religion and finally to Clinical Psychology when he enrolled for a degree in that area in Teachers College, Columbia University.
Rogers received his doctorate in 1931, and in 1937 he published his first major book: The Clinical Treatment of the Problem Child. His second, Counselling and Psychotherapy was published in 1942. Apart from its innovative ideas, what is most striking about this book is that over one third of it consisted
I think that it is accurate to say that the 'first wave' of guidance counsellors who received their counselling training in Ireland did so based largely on the theory and philosophy of counselling formulated by Carl Ransom Rogers (1902 - 1987), considered, by many, to be the most influential psychologist in American history. A leader in the humanistic psychology movement of the 1960's through the 1980's: more than any other individual he was responsible for the spread of professional counselling and psychotherapy beyond psychiatry and psychoanalysis to all the helping professions.
He was one of the helping professions most prolific writers, authoring sixteen books and more than two hundred professional articles and research studies on the major new approach to psychotherapy which he pioneered, known successively as 'non-directive', 'client centred' and 'person centred' counselling. Nowadays pre-service and in-service counsellor training offers a much more varied approach to theory and practice. Nonetheless, it is timely to re-evaluate this theory which formed many of us as counsellors and to look with new eyes at what Rogers still has to offer us through his work.
Origins / Brief History
Born in Oak Ridge, a small village on the outskirts of Chicago in 1902, Rogers had a very strict up-bringing which affected his initial choice of college study. At university, his interests and academic major changed from Agriculture to History, then to Religion and finally to Clinical Psychology when he enrolled for a degree in that area in Teachers College, Columbia University.
Rogers received his doctorate in 1931, and in 1937 he published his first major book: The Clinical Treatment of the Problem Child. His second, Counselling and Psychotherapy was published in 1942. Apart from its innovative ideas, what is most striking about this book is that over one third of it consisted
References: Axline, Virginia, DBS, In Search of Self, Victor Gallarez, 1966. Dryden, Windy & Mytton, Jill, Four Approaches to Counselling & Psychotherapy. London & New York: Routledge, 1999. Kirschenbaum, H and Henderson, V.L (Eds.) (1990) The Carl Rogers Reader. London: Constable. Merry, Tony and Lusty, Bob, What is Person-Centered Counselling? A Personal and Practical Guide. Essex: Gale Centre Publications, 1993. O’Leary, E. The Psychology of Counselling. Cork: Cork University Press (1982) in second printing. O’Leary, E. and Keane N. Person-Centered Therapy in P. Hawkins and I. Nesteros Perspectives in Psychology (1997) Athens: Ellinka Grammata. Rogers, C.R. Measuring Personality Adjustment in Children Nine to Thirteen Years of Age. New York: Teachers College, 1931. Rogers, C.R. The Clinical Treatment of the Problem Child. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1939. Rogers, C.R. Counselling and Psychotherapy: New Concepts in Practice. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1942. Rogers, C.R. Counselling with Returned Servicemen. Washington, DC: United Services Organisations, 1945. Rogers, C.R. Client-Centered Therapy: Its Current Practice, Implications and Theory. Constable, 1965. Rogers, C.R. On Becoming a Person. Constable, 1974. Rogers, C.R. Client-Centered Therapy, Film No.1 in E. Shostrom (Ed.). Three Approaches to Psychotherapy. Three 16mm colour motion pictures. Orange, CA: Psychological Films, Inc., 1965. Rogers, C.R. Freedom to Learn: A View of What Education Might Become. Columbus. OH: Charles Merrill, 1969. Rogers, C.R. Carl Rogers on Encounter Groups. New York: Harper and Row, 1970. Rogers, C.R. Becoming Partners: Marriage and Its Alternatives. Constable, 1973. Rogers, C.R. Carl Rogers on Personal Power: Inner Strength and Its Revolutionary Impact. Constable, 1978. Rogers, C.R. A Way of Being. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1980. Rogers, C.R. Freedom to Learn in the 80s. Columbus, OH: Charles Merrill, 1983. Rogers, C.R. and Dymond. R. (Eds.). Psychotherapy and Personality Change. Chicago: University press, 1954. Rogers, C.R., Gendlin, E.T., Kiesler, D.J., and Truax, C.B. (Eds.). The Therapeutic Relationship and Its Impact: A Study of Psychotherapy with Schizophrenics. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1967. Rogers, C.R. and Skinner, B.F. Some issues concerning the control of human behaviour. Science, Volume 124, No. 3231, November 1956, 1057-1066. Rogers, C.R. and Stevens. B. Person to Person: The Problem of Being Human. Lafayette, CA: Real People Press, 1968. Thorne, Brian. Key Figures in Counselling and Psychotherapy. London: Sage Publications, 2000.