Carl Rogers Is a Prominent

Carl Rogers is a prominent American psychologist who is best known as being one of the founding fathers of the humanist approach made applicable to psychology during his lifetime. For his role in founding psychotherapy research the American Psychological Association eventually honored him with the 1956 Award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions. Rogers specific contribution to the humanist approach in psychology was the development of the person-centered approach. Under this approach, the purpose of psychological research was to better understand personality and human relationships. Today it is still widely used in such fields as psychotherapy, counseling, education, organizations, and many other group settings. Rogers was awarded the Award for Distinguished Professional Contributions to Psychology by the American Psychology Association in 1972 and was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize in recognition for his work on intergroup conflict at the national level in such war-torn places as South Africa and Northern Ireland.

Carl Rogers was born on January 8, 1902 in the Chicago suburb of Oak par, Illinois. Rogers was a remarkably intelligent child, being able to read by kindergarten and thus starting his formal education at the second grade, having skipped first grade. Being from a devout Christian family, Rogers' education was conducted in a strictly religious environment and heavily focused on ethics. This led to Rogers being an isolated and highly disciplined and independent individual.

Rogers main focus during his studies was with the scientific method and its practical use in the real world. His first job was with the University of Wisconsin at Madison in the field of agriculture and later history and religion. Rogers' religion played a dominate role in his life until the age of twenty when, somewhat ironically, he took a trip to Peking, China to attend an international Christian conference. Because of this trip, Rogers began doubting his religious beliefs. In an attempt to preserve his religious beliefs, he enrolled in a seminar entitled Why am I entering the Ministry?, which solidified his decision to distance himself from his strong Christian beliefs, eventually causing him to leave the seminary in order to attend the Teachers College at Columbia University. At Columbia, Rogers earned his Masters of Arts in 1928 and his Ph.D. In 1931.

It was during his doctoral studies that Rogers first engaged in a child study. This study was done at the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, located in Rochester, New York. By 1930, Rogers had become this agency's director. During his time with this agency Rogers authored his first book, entitled the Clinical Treatment of the Problem Child, which was published in 1939. In 1940, largely due to the publication of this book, Rogers was given a full-time professorship at the Ohio State University.

Rogers second book, Counseling and Psychotherapy: New Concepts in Practice, was published in 1942. This book made the bold suggestion that the client, through the establishment of a relationship with an understanding therapist, is the one who can actually resolve their own problems by being given an opportunity to gain an insight into the need to restructure their own life.

In 1945 Rogers left Ohio State University in order to found a counseling center at the University of Chicago. While working here, Rogers published his most important work in 1951, entitled Client-Centered Therapy. It is in this work that Rogers outlines his central theory of person-centered psychotherapy.

Rogers became the first President of the American Academy of Psychotherapists in 1956 and in 1957 he moved to the University of Wisconsin-Madison. However, after several internal conflicts with the Wisconsin psychology department, Rogers became disillusioned with academia and left the field.

In 1964, after being selected "Humanist of the Year" by the American Humanist Association, Rogers moved to La Jolla, California where he joined the Western Behavioral Sciences Institute as a researcher. In 1968 Rogers went on to found the Center for Studies of the Person. Rogers devoted the later part of his life to applying his theories in the areas of international and national social conflict, focusing on the Northern Ireland and South African conflicts. Along with his daughter, Rogers also conducted a series of residential programs on the Person-Centered Approach throughout the United States, Europe, and Japan. These workshops focused on such things as cross-cultural communications, personal growth, self-empowerment and social change.

Carl Rogers' primary contribution to society was his development of the person-centered approach to psychotherapy. Rogers and his theory are considered to be both humanistic and phenomenological. According to Rogers, the person-centered theory is based on nineteen essential propositions. Included within these nineteen propositions are the belief that all individuals exist in a constantly evolving world of experience and at the center of this ever-changing world is the person. Further, it is the individual that reacts to these experiences based on their perceptions of the experience. This perception is what makes the individual's particular reality. More so, as a result of the individual's interaction with the environment, particularly as a result of evaluation interaction with others, the structure of the individual's self is formed. Finally, behavior is the goal directed attempt by the individual to satisfy its needs as experienced in their reality, whereas emotion is something that both accompanies and facilitates the goal directed behavior of the individual.