Question

Martin Seligman and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi describe the basic tenets and philosophy of positive psychology, What do you see as the most significant similarities and differences between the perspectives of positive psychology and humanistic psychology

Answer 1

• Though the principles and themes of “Positive Psychology” can be found in the ideas and theories of prominent psychologists such as Abraham Maslow, and various schools of philosophy such as Stoicism, the concept took on new life in 1998 when Martin Seligman chose it as the theme for his term as president of the American Psychological Association.
• It concentrated on repairing damage using a disease model of human functioning, giving exclusive attention to pathology. Positive psychology is concerned with eudaimonia, "the good life" or human flourishing, and focuses on the factors that contribute the most to a well-lived and fulfilling life.
• The philosophy or lifestance of Humanism asserts human responsibility for solving our own problems, shaping our destiny, forging lives of meaning, virtue and wellbeing, and building a world of less suffering and more flourishing. Not just that we are responsible, but that we are up to the task based solely upon the merits of being human. Humanism would affirm certain human traits or capacities such as personal agency, self-efficacy, self-actualization and locus of control.
• The most significant similarities between the perspectives of positive psychology and humanistic psychology are that they explore human happiness. Positive psychology is the study of how humans prosper in adversities while humanistic psychology is largely concerned with the quality of human experience.As such, they show similarities in addressing the cause of happiness in humans.
• They differ in that positive psychology uses a scientific approach to address the cause of happiness as a human behavior while humanism explores issues such as love, creativity, growth, self-actualization, peak experience, courage, and other related topics hence is it considered more of non-scientific approach.