“The Good Thing”: Mister Roger's Neighborhood

This article considers aspects of the methodology behind the PBS children's show Mister Roger's Neighborhood. Too easily sentimentalized—and sometimes satirized—for his exploration of feelings and empathy, Fred Rogers in fact carefully structured each show around an investigation of semiotic, phenomenological, and epistemological concerns: the interpretation of images, words, things, events, and kinesthetic sensation that allows children (and adults) to locate themselves in their everyday experience. Mister Rogers explored both the tools and the considerations that facilitate our ability to negotiate relationships, navigate in space, assimilate desires and fears, and ultimately manifest thoughts, projects, and ideals in concrete form. The periodic insertion of graphic clip art in this essay is meant to enact examples of the kind of reflexive thinking that Mister Roger's Neighborhood proposes and presents.     

Mister Rogers’ environmentalism: children’s spirituality in a trash apocalypse

In 1990, when Earth Day was set to go international, the iconic Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood – which ran for 900 episodes from 1968 to 2001 and won a Peabody Award and 4 Emmy Awards and received 25 Emmy Award nominations – ran a series of episodes on ‘Caring for the Environment.’ The show grappled with how children might face the looming environmental crisis. In these episodes, Rogers offers a spirituality for children that enables them to grasp the severity of the issue but does so by situating the concern in a hopeful worldview and indicating ways that children can take action. Instead of instilling fear and apathy as popular environmental apocalypticism does, Rogers prepares children for the new social order that must emerge to address the environmental crisis. It is an approach that prevents children from being overwhelmed by anxiety in the face of the environmental crisis but instead develops in them a sense of responsibility for the environment.     

Similarities between Prescott Lecky's theory of self-consistency and Carl Rogers' self-theory

The teachings of Prescott Lecky on the self-concept at Columbia University in the 1920s and 1930s and the posthumous publications of his book on self-consistency beginning in 1945 are compared with the many publications of Carl Rogers on the self-concept beginning in the early 1940s. Given that Rogers was a graduate student at Columbia in the 1920s and 1930s, the striking similarities between these two theorists, as well as claims attributed to Rogers by Rogers' biographers and writers who have quoted Rogers on his works relating to self-theory, strongly suggest that Rogers borrowed from Lecky without giving him the proper credit. Much of Rogers' writings on the self-concept included not only terms and concepts which were original with Lecky, but at times these were actually identical.     

The Roosevelt years: crucial milieu for Carl Rogers' innovation

This study explores broad features of political culture and event of the 1930s and World War 2 years, viewed in relation to the emergence and rapid early growth of the new therapy of Carl Rogers. The paper traces Rogers' early professional life and examines distinctive emphases in sociopolitical thought and development during Franklin D. Roosevelt's leadership as President over the prolonged emergency of the Great Depression and the crisis of the War. The study includes a focus on the President's own outlook and style, pertinent New Deal innovations, and wartime needs. Twelve features of this larger context are discriminated as together having vital importance for the new therapy and its founder. The congruent courses of the macrocontext and of Rogers' innovation are followed to the ending of Roosevelt's life. Direct causation is not attributed, but the evidence adduced newly points to particular contours of a larger environment favorable for the expression of Rogers' values and rare ability. In sum, the author concludes that a synergy of highly conducive historical circumstance and individual exceptionality contributed to the philosophical underpinnings, attitudinal values and early momentum of Rogers' client-centered therapy.     

Comment — Carl Rogers and postmodernism: continuing the conversation

This paper continues the conversation about the relationship between Carl Rogers and postmodernism initiated by Harlene Anderson and taken up by Maryhelen Snyder. The view adopted here is that postmodernism is undertheorized and there is a need to unravel definitions and concepts which arise from a conflation of social constructionism, post–structuralism and Rogers' existential humanism. It is argued that person–centred principles lie at he heart of therapy and should neither be neglected nor taken for granted.     

Fred Rogers and children’s spirituality: valuing the uniqueness of others and caring for others

Mister Rogers' Neighborhood was a safe haven advocating kindness, empathy, and caring for all children. Making everyone feel loved, Fred Rogers captured the attention and curiosity of young children across America with his compassionate manner, intentional listening skills, and respect for all individuals by encouraging children to feel good about themselves. This article explores the ministry of Fred Rogers and how his approach to children's spirituality focused on valuing the uniqueness of each individual, human connections through play, and caring for others by recognizing spiritual moments and teaching the whole child while appreciating the uniqueness of others. His genuine and patient presence had a healing quality, creating a world for children in which real learning and unconditional love could flourish. The messages of tolerance and acceptance by recognizing and respecting other's beliefs, and unconditional love and care, were beacons of hope for all.     

Otto Rank, the Rankian circle in Philadelphia, and the origins of Carl Rogers' person-centered psychotherapy

Otto Rank's will therapy helped shape the ideas and techniques of relationship therapy developed by the Philadelphia social workers Jessie Taft, Virginia Robinson, and Frederick Allen in the 1930s. Rank's work and these ideas and techniques in turn strongly influenced the formulation of Carl Rogers' person-centered psychotherapy. This article compares and contrasts will, relationship, and person-centered approaches to psychotherapy and discusses the social factors--primarily the professional conflicts between a male-dominated psychiatry and female social workers over the independent practice of psychotherapy--that were crucial in the dissemination of Rank's psychological thought and the early popularity of Rogers.     

The prophetic nature of pastoral counselling

The role of pastoral counselling is explored in the light of the increasing interest among secular therapists in spirituality and the escalation in the number of clients presenting themselves with spiritual issues. Definitions are offered of spirituality, sexuality and religion as well as of pastoral counselling itself. The development of pastoral counselling is contrasted with the upsurge of Christian counselling in the latter years of the 20th century.The central influence of Carl Rogers is examined and it is argued that his late embracing of the spiritual dimension makes him, once more, a potential source of inspiration for pastoral counsellors in the years ahead. The critical tasks of integrating science and religion and of communicating across inter-faith boundaries require both an emphasis on contemplative and mystical experience and a radically evolving theology. Rogers' 'person of tomorrow' is seen as a possible blueprint for the pastoral counsellor of the future who can be assured of a difficult path and much hostility and misunderstanding.     

Rogers' 'Necessary and Sufficient Conditions' Revisited

Rogers' concept of the 'necessary and sufficient' conditions of therapeutic personality change is introduced and the research evidence concerning the efficacy of the core conditions is reviewed. The use of Truax-and-Carkhuff-type rating scales for measuring the conditions is criticised on the grounds of inadequate validity and sampling procedure. It is suggested that relationship inventories such as those produced by Barnett-Lennard (1962) appear to be better suited to test Rogers' position, although it is conceded that Rogers' hypotheses are in need of some revision.     

Denigrating Carl Rogers: William Coulson's Last Crusade

This article reviews William Coulson's assertions that Carl Rogers, Abraham Maslow, and he initiated the humanistic education field, that Rogers repudiated his philosophy late in life, and that they owe the nation's parents an apology. The author argues that these charges are groundless and self-serving and provides examples and quotations from Rogers's later writings to show how Rogers remained constant to his basic person-centered beliefs until his death.     

荣格与罗杰斯的人格及其治疗观的比较探究

本文对荣格与罗杰斯的理论的背景渊源,他们人格理论中的意识、无意识、自我及前者的自性化或后者的自我实现的潜能,他们的治疗目标、态度及方法作了一个浅显的比较,以期在共性与个性之中有所发现。     

"Object categorization: reversals and explanations of the basic-level advantage" (Rogers & Patterson, 2007): a simplicity account

T. T. Rogers and K. Patterson (2007), in their article "Object Categorization: Reversals and Explanations of the Basic-Level Advantage" (Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 136, 451-469), reported an impressive set of results demonstrating a reversal of the highly robust basic-level advantage both in patients with semantic dementia and in healthy individuals engaged in a speeded categorization task. To explain their results, as well as the usual basic-level advantage seen in healthy individuals, the authors employed a parallel distributed processing theory of conceptual knowledge. In this paper, we introduce an alternative way of explaining the results of Rogers and Patterson, which is premised on a more restricted set of assumptions born from standard categorization theory. Specifically, we provide evidence that their results can be accounted for based on the predictions of the simplicity model of unsupervised categorization.     

Temperament as a moderator of the relation between neighborhood and children's adjustment

Although proposed by bioecological models, there has been minimal empirical examination of whether children's individual differences moderate neighborhood effects on development. We used an urban community sample (8-12 years, N = 316) to examine interactions among neighborhood characteristics (problems and social organization) and children's temperament (fear, irritability and impulsivity) in predicting psychosocial adjustment. The main effects of neighborhood and temperament on outcomes were consistent with previous research. Findings show that development is challenging in disadvantaged neighborhoods whatever one's temperament, however, some effects of neighborhood were conditioned by temperament, particularly children's fear and irritability. Neighborhood problems were more strongly related to lower social competence for fearful and for less irritable children. Neighborhood problems were more strongly related to higher internalizing problems for low-fear children. Neighborhood social organization was more strongly related to greater social competence for low-fear children. Findings are discussed in relation to "diathesis-stress" and "differential responsiveness" models of temperament.     

Applications of Carl Rogers' theory and practice to couple and family therapy: a response to Harlene Anderson and David Bott

Recent articles by Harlene Anderson and David Bott in the Journal of Family Therapy (Volume 23) are a gratifying examination of the contribution of Carl Rogers' philosophy and practice to family therapy. However, in my view, an already existing highly effective application of Rogers' approach to couple and family therapy was omitted from Bott's review of the literature. My reading of the two articles has inspired the following response given in the spirit of dialogue with the hope of furthering a conversation on this subject.     

The humanistic paradigm in education

Abstract

This essay revives the humanistic paradigm in education of Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers that in the 1960's fueled the establishment of the humanistic movement in American psychology. The essay discusses how Maslow and Rogers’ views on human nature, more specifically their understanding of the growth hypothesis of Kurt Goldstein, apply to education. The intellectual development of their humanistic thoughts on education, Maslow's concepts of expressive and intrinsic learning and Rogers’ student‐centered education are also discussed. It is argued that Maslow's and Rogers’ critiques and advocacy of the behavioristic and humanistic educational paradigms, respectively, are still meaningful in the 1990's, and that the continuing crisis in American education ensues in part from the failure to address Maslow and Rogers’ concerns and introduce a humanistic dimension to the educational system.     

Behind the Mirror: Reflective Listening and its Tain in the Work of Carl Rogers

Although Rogerian reflective listening is considered a fundamental therapeutic practice, it is widely misunderstood. This article endeavors to dispel myths about Rogers’ reflective approach through detailed readings of his work, while also opening up a central problematic in Rogers’ thinking. Rogers struggled repeatedly with the dilemma of how the therapist can faithfully reflect the client's experience while avoiding insincerity. The metaphor of a mirror and its tain, or back surface, is used to guide a close analysis of how Rogers grappled with the tension between the therapist's reflective listening process and his or her inner experience while reflecting. It is shown that each of Rogers’ revisions of his conceptualization of reflective listening constitutes a dialectical shift that opens a different approach to the problem of the tain, eventually concluding in an interactional formulation of reflection as the provision of tentative therapist understandings designed to be amended in response to client feedback.     

Counselors' Evaluation of Rogers-Perls-Ellis's Relationship Skills

Twenty-two participants (12 employment counselors and 10 counselor supervisors) attended a three-week workshop on enhancing relationship skills, after which each participant evaluated the Rogers, Perls, and Ellis film, Three Approaches to Psychotherapy, on 15 skills. Results indicate that there was general agreement between the counselors and the supervisors when judging levels of therapist functioning by the relationship skills. However, they also show that within each group there is wide divergence of judgment. Neither counselors nor supervisors agree among themselves on their evaluation of the relationship skills of Rogers, Ellis, and Perls. Implications are drawn for the use of the film as a training/evaluation aid for employment counselors and supervisors.     

The Development and Evolution of Person‐Centered Expressive Art Therapy: A Conversation With Natalie Rogers

Many counselors are unaware that Natalie Rogers, daughter of Carl Rogers, has extended her father's work into the creative and expressive arts. This article includes a verbatim conversation with Natalie Rogers as she reflects on her childhood and her professional work. Person‐centered expressive art therapy is an alternative to traditional verbal counseling approaches and may be especially helpful for clients stuck in linear, rigid, and analytic ways of thinking and experiencing the world.     

A new method to evaluate order and accuracy of inaccurately and incompletely reproduced movement sequences

Studying imitation learning of long sequences requires the evaluation of inaccurately and incompletely reproduced movement sequences. In order to evaluate the movement reproduction, it has to be assigned to the original stimulus. We developed an assignment algorithm that considers the Spatial Neighborhood and Order of reproduction (SNOA). To evaluate the features of this analysis it was applied to human performance during learning of long pointing sequences under two conditions: stimulus-guided reproduction with high spatial accuracy and imitation learning with low spatial accuracy. The results were compared with a simple assignment considering Spatial Neighborhood only (SNA) and with a Manual Assignment (MA). In the stimulus-guided reproduction the error measures did not differ between the algorithms. In contrast, with imitation learning, SNOA and MA generated higher estimates of order and omission errors than SNA. The results show that SNOA can be used to automatically quantify the similarity of both movement structure and metric information between long target sequences and inaccurate and incomplete movement reproductions.