New article from Dr David Murphy

Related but not replaceable: a response to Warner’s reworking of person-centered personality theory

This new article from the School of Education's Dr David Murphy and Louis Hook is published in the Person-Centred and Experiential Psychotherapies Journal.

Abstract
Whether conditions of worth theory can explain complex forms of human psychological distress, such as those emanating from early experiences of abuse, neglect and trauma, alongside experiences of physiological events later in life is open to debate. It has been suggested that Rogers’s personality theory should be reconsidered and replaced with an actualization-centered formulation that places greater emphasis on the enhancement of self-process and agency through relationship, rather than on a theory of defense. This paper aims to examine these proposals and consider their relative contribution to developing the theory of personality. We suggest that the actualization-centered process theory aids Rogers’s theory of personality but is not an adequate replacement. We also consider the issues associated with maintaining theoretical and practical symmetry and the practice implications of replacing conditions of worth.

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