Carl Rogers

Carl Ransom Rogers(1902-1987) is considered among the founders of humanistic psychology. Rogers' approach, commonly known as the Person Centered Therapy, is based on the belief that his model is applicable to all human interaction, not just the interaction of client and therapist. Rogers described humans as having a natural strive to achieve the full of their potential, and mental health as part of this development towards the achievement of potential. Mental disturbance and psychopathology, according to Rogers, is the distortion of this process toward potential. As with Maslow, Rogers' view is very Aristotelean. Mimicking Aristotle's description of potentiality and actuality, Rogers states that living being has a potential, and an actualizing tendency which serves as motivation to reach that potential. Rogers viewed the fully functioning person as exhibiting five qualities:

1. Openness to Experience - refers to one's ability to be accurately aware of one's own feelings and experience, and the ability to accept these feelings and experiences as reality.
2. Existential Living - refers to a focus on living in the present, as opposed to the past or the future. Existential living is a realization that the past cannot be changes and the future is undetermined, the only thing we can control is our actions in the present.
3. Organismic Trusting - refers to a trusting of ones own faculties. According to evolutionary theory, it is these faculties which have provided for our ancestors and allowed for our very existence, thus they must be intrinsically good (at least from a survival standpoint) and should be trusted.
4. Experiential Freedom - refers to the acknowledgement of the fact that while we cannot free choose any action, we are capable of choosing from a ranging of actions to take, and the free acceptance of this choice is intrinsic to a fully functioning person.
5. Creativity - refers to the desire to make a contribution to the world, particularly in the context of the society in which one lives.

Person Centered Therapy (PCT) aims to bring a person with psychological dysfunction closer to their fully functioning, real, and healthy self, as opposed to the current way of functioning, which has arisen due to conflict between their ideal self and the ideal self which society demands. PCT aims emphasizes harmonious relationships, which are based on mutual respect, congruence, and empathy (mirroring the way in which healthy relationships work outside of the counseling setting). Counselor are deliberately non-judgmental and non-threatening to clients.