When reading through my notes for the class, I have found that the humanistic approach to the development of personality is the most interesting. The book describes humanistic as development through interaction. Every day we come in contact with people who then influence the way we think and perceive ideas. An example in the book given by Carl Rogers’s study explains a young girl who perceives she is liked by every one and makes friends easily. Later when she over hears someone talking about how rude she is, she immediately conceives the idea through one of two possibilities. Distortion causes the girl to believe that the people talking about her don’t know her very well. Denial makes the girl doesn’t allow the girl to realize that they were talking about her.
This form of study is extremely interesting. As a child when I played with neighbor children we knew of a child that also had misconceived perceptions. The little boy thought every one liked him, and he was so much fun. When confronted about it, the immediate action was shock, but the next day the same things occurred. I always thought denial played a role in this some how but wasn’t educated enough to understand.
Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow both had ideas surrounding self-actualization, or the goal to be complete. I think that this goal is acquired through personal experience as defined through the humanistic study personality. Interaction plays a huge role in any species, especially humans with a large development in the brain. The study of self-concept is also very interesting. We all have ideas regarding ourselves but the beliefs we have may be conceived in accurately. How do we know how others think about us?
This subject has been something I have been interested in long before I took psychology for 2 years in high school, and even after taking this course, I am still interested!
