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Karen J. Prager, Ph.D., A.B.P.P. Professor of Psychology and Program Head for Gender Studies Diplomate in Family Psychology The University of Texas at Dallas |
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More Information About Dr. Prager's work Processes in Couple Relationships Teaching and Professional Practice Selected Papers and Publications
For Students:
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Maslow & Research Based on Humanistic Theories Fall 2002 Personality Students: Use these study questions (in lieu of class lecture) to organize your studying & to emphasize the points that would likely have been covered in the lecture. Remember that you are responsible only for the sections on Self-Disclosure, Loneliness, & Self-Esteem Abraham Maslow's Theory: Review Maslow's theory of motivation and need fulfillment: 1. Q: What is the "self-actualizing tendency?" Does everyone have this? A. The tendency to seek fulfillment of a higher need once a lower need is (mostly) fulfilled. It is innate; we all have it. 2. Q: What is the hierarchy of needs? A. Some (lower) needs are more urgent than other (higher) needs. We will generally attend to fulfilling lower needs first, and address higher needs later. 3. Do lower needs have to be totally fulfilled in order for higher needs to be addressed? A. Needs are not totally fulfilled, nor are they indefinitely fulfilled. Fulfillment comes & goes over the short & long term. 4. Which needs must be fulfilled first, and which ones fulfilled later? A. D (deficiency) needs, which are for survival, safety, belonging, & esteem must be fulfilled first. B (being) needs, which are for self-actualization, which we seek once our basic needs are satisfied. Example: D-love & B-love D-love is need fulfillment oriented. Through D-love we seek to satisfy our needs for belonging & esteem, along with needs for security and safety, self-gratification, power, and pleasure. B-love is "self-actualized love." B-love is welcomed and enjoyed; nonpossesive, admiring, not needing, pleasure-giving. It is never sated, doesn't require gratification, and generates little anxiety or hostility. Most of us love with some of both. Maslow's hierarchy of needs, in order of urgency/necessity: Survival: basic physiological needs Safety: needs for physical security, stability, protection, for law, order, and structure. Love and Belonging: acceptance and love from others, belonging to a family or group, being included. Esteem: self-respect, confidence, sense of competence. Need esteem in the eyes of others (reputation, recognition) and in one's own eyes (feelings of worth). Self-actualization: At this level, people seek to fulfill their purposes in life, to realize all their potential, become everything they can be. They seek to make their highest values a reality, not only for themselves, but for others. Maslow’s Research 5. Q: What was the purpose of Maslow's research? A. to find out if there were self-actualizing people, and what they were like, if so. 6. Q How did he study self-actualized people? A. In-depth interviews of a handful of individuals that he believed were self-actualizing 7. Q On basis was his research criticized? A. his selection of self-actualized persons was based on his own preconceived notions of what that is; their "self-actualization" was disproportionately found in the arena of work and achievement. 8. Q It was important, nevertheless, because? A. First effort to systematically study optimum health, as opposed to the more usual focus of studying neurosis. 9. Q What does it mean to say that self-actualized persons are more likely to "get lost in the flow of experience?" A. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, who identified "flow" said it refers to a sense of the freshness and newness of experience, even when surrounded by the familiar. Maslow's concept of "peak experience" is similar to "flow." STRENGTHS & CRITICISMS OF THE PHENOMENOLOGICAL APPROACH Strengths 1) Focuses on the persons own constructs and experiences. 2) Optimistic. Great belief in human potential for growth & fulfillment. Given the right environmental conditions, people can lead meaningful lives with ample opportunity for joy. 3) Encourages empathy & understanding between people, because of its focus on subjective experience. 4) Here & now focus: a needed correction to psychodynamic theory's focus on the deterministic influence of personal history. 5) Wide applications: the approach has been endorsed & used by educators, psychotherapists, managers, and personal growth experts. Criticisms 1) Sometimes went too far & neglected the influence of the past. 2) People's subjective perceptions of themselves are biased & may be inaccurate. 3) Concepts can be vague (e.g., self-actualization, existential living, organismic experience). 4) Treatments not useful: for people with serious mental illnesses.
HUMANISTIC THEORISTS & RESEARCH 1. Q Why haven’t humanistic psychologists been much devoted to research? A. People are complex & can’t really be reduced to a set of numbers. A. The person’s uniqueness and individuality is more interesting & important than how they compare with others. 2. Q What is the result of the lack of research on humanistic ideas of personality? A. That it has lost some of its influence in psychology – it had a powerful heyday, but that didn’t last very long. Psychologists demand empirical support for theories. Loneliness 1. Q How might Rogers use his concept of organismic experience to explain loneliness ? A. Concealing the organismic self causes loneliness (in part), because most people feel that the organismic self is the "true self." 2. Q What is alienation? How is it related to loneliness? A. Alienation refers to a lack of purpose or meaning in life, accompanied by a sense of detachment from the real problems of the world & other people. A. It is difficult to connect with others & form relationships from a position of detachment & lack of purpose. 3. Q What is loneliness? A. When the quantityor quality of a person’s social/interpersonal contacts is less than what that person desires. 4. 2 types of loneliness are: A. social loneliness: disconnected from group/community; A. Intimacy loneliness: disconnected from intimate contact. 5. Loneliness is a trait when: A. When is a consistent characteristic, from place to place & situation to situation. 6. How are chronically lonely people different from non-lonely people? A. More likely to be introverted, socially anxious & sensitive to rejection. they are NOT less tolerant of solitude. B. Has more difficulty trusting & opening up. 7. What do lonely people do that is different from what non-lonely people do? A. Lonely people are more likely to present themselves as aloof and self-conscious. 8. What do lonely people think about when in social situations? A. They think about others not liking them (whether true or not). They think they are not likeable. A. They dwell on the possibility that they will do or say something embarrassing. Sometimes this self-preoccupation makes lonely people seem disinterested in others. Not true, usually. Self-esteem 1. Q What is self-esteem? A. The evaluation of the self-concept. 2. Q What are domains of self-esteem? A. Self-esteem is not a global thing for most people. Domains are situations in which self must function well, such as academic, social, and athletic domains. 3. What does research tell us about people with low self-esteem? What seems most closely associated with low self-esteem? A. They don’t bounce back very quickly from negative evaluations/criticisms. A. They don't try as hard if they are given critical feedback. they withdraw from making an effort. They are just as capable, but do worse when they do not try. A. Low self-esteem people reported feeling stronger negative emotions as a result of the poor feedback than those who had higher self-esteem. 4. Q What causes the elevated levels of negative emotion? A. People make internal, stable attributions about their failures (they tell themselves they did poorly because they are incompetent & will always be incompetent). 5. How do some people seem to avoid low self-esteem, most of the time? A. They actively refute their own negative self-thoughts, reminding themselves of the good things they've done. |