In: Psychology
define carl rogers personality structures of the self and self-image, describe what is meant by a fully funcioning person and contrast thiswith a person who is incongruent, including the two ways that incongruence can occur; and explain how children develop conditions of worth, how these internalized condition of worth contribute to incongruence, and why unconditional positive regard is so important
Self or self-image or self-concept according to Carl Rogers is an organised, consistent set of beliefs one has about oneself. These beliefs are developed with the help of one’s childhood experiences and from the words of others about oneself. Thus one’s environment plays an important role in determining one’s self-image. A fully functioning person is one who lives in the present, experiencing the present without worrying about the past living, learning and experiences. This person is open to the environment, accepts the changes that comes, receives ideas and people with open mindedness etc. Thus a fully functioning person adopts to the environment and make use of all the opportunities available for one in the present. An incongruent person is one who experiences a gap between what they believe and what is expected. When a person’s self-image and the expected image in the outside world matches one achieves congruence otherwise one develops incongruence because the self-image one developed is not compatible with the real world expectations. Children grow as they are guided, respected and forgiven for their mistakes and given another chance for trying things. Unconditional positive regard refers to the tolerance level one has and the encouraging mind-set one has, especially the parents towards their children which would lead the children to develop positive self-image and grow as confident individuals. When children are punished or not tolerated for their mistakes, their confidence level would be shattered. This is one of the concepts which Rogers integrated in the counselling process.
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