Humanistic And Existential Theory In Psychology

According to McLeod (2015) in psychology the term of humanism, humanist and humanistic pertains to the approach of dealing with the wholistic aspect and uniqueness of an individual. The humanistic approach is also known as the “third force” following psychoanalysis and behaviorism in the field of psychology. It was known that humanism disapproved the studies of favoring the behaviorist and psychodynamic approach, wherein the behaviorist perspective based on the result from the reinforcement of stimulus-response and animal research, while the psychodynamic approach allows the determining of human behavior and thought from any unconscious irrational and instinctive forces.

McLeod (2015) stated that around the 1970s and 1980s the humanistic psychology has major impacts on society including the identifying of a new set of values that would help to understand human nature and condition, it also allows the expansion of identifying new approach of studying the human behavior and lastly the humanistic approach has been essential in determining effective methods in line with the professional use of psychotherapy.

Get quality help now

RhizMan

Verified writer

Proficient in: Existentialism

4.9 (247)

“ Rhizman is absolutely amazing at what he does . I highly recommend him if you need an assignment done ”

+84 relevant experts are online

Hire writer

McLeod (2015) indicated that the humanistic approach started with the free will of every individual to be good and gain capabilities to make the world a better one. Moreover, it was known that every individual is unique and should be always motivated to explore and identify their skills and potentials in life. Primarily, human behavior can be determined by only studying humans and not animals. In a line of analyzing cases, it was emphasized that it is more effective to focus and study individual cases than having an average performance of certain groups.

In every approach, there will always be limitations, for the humanistic approach the study rejects the scientific and biological discussions while behaviors of humans cannot be compared with animals as well. On the other hand, the strengths will include the focus of identifying the behavior of a specific individual which are applicable in real life that satisfies one’s idea in a line of their personal ideas and self-fulfillment. Also, qualitative data will be more efficient in providing insights and holistic data into behavior.

School Violence

As a humanistic psychologist, Dr. Humine would perceive the school violence related to incidents of being bullied in the school. When a child is bullied in school, those individuals tend to be more violent and aggressive. Every individual has their own ideas and being a child they also have needs that need to be achieved. Once a student is being bullied, problems will occur, they will tend to get frustrated and get mad at those who are bullying them to the extent that they want to eliminate them in their life for them to have the kind of life that they want and study peacefully. In the event of shooting at Columbine High School in 1999, the two students would be a victim of being bullied and wanted to get revenge from their opponents to the extent of killing them. Those students will only kill their enemy to release their anger and frustrations.

Potential Treatment and Prevention of Violence

Dr. Humine will help the student to determine the reason for the violence, it can be related to negative feelings such as anger. The approach will help the student identify the needs that are not being met and what he/she wants in life. After determining the answer, Dr. Humine will focus on how the student can overcome and manage the problem. The counseling should also involve the parents to determine if the child has a problem in their house because it could also aggravate the negative feeling of the child. Whereas, if it was identified, the problem will be greatly attended to.

The school also plays an important role in this kind of event because it is where the problem has started, from students bullying other students. Dr. Humine is aware that every student has their own issues, from there he will suggest an additional conceptualization and training for the teachers and students help the students who are having problems that can be school and home-related. There should be strict compliance of punishment to those who will bully to prevent problems from occurring and to promote a safe and harmonious environment for learning and healthy relationship.

Cognitive Psychology

McLeod (2015) stated that cognitive psychology involves the study of the mind as an information processor that is in line with science. This approach includes the information processing from the people’s mind through perception, attention, language, memory, thinking, and consciousness. In the mid-1950s the cognitive psychology made some impacts in dissatisfaction with the behaviorist approach which focuses on external behavior rather than the internal process, it plays a major role in experimental methods and there has been a comparison between the capabilities of human processing information with the computer. According to McLeod (2015), cognitive psychology emphasized the importance of determining the meditational process aside from the simple stimulus-response because it would be more effective and helpful to understand the behavior. To gather data, the psychologists used objective, controlled and scientific methods.