Primary Model of Pathology in Humanistic Psychology

Regarding the primary model of pathology in the third force, Maslow (1954) enumerates three points about major impediments to self-actualization: deprivation, conflict, and threat. First, Maslow (1954) points out that being deprived of, for example, love, prestige, respect, or other basic needs will have a negative effect on human psyche. And these kinds of deprivations are almost the same as threats. However, Maslow raises an alarm over this point. In Maslow’s view, the inevitable deprivations in childhood such as sexual deprivation are regarded as a kind of frustration, and these are not necessarily pathological. In that sense, the clear distinction between certain deprivations, which are like threats, and mere deprivations is important to cure the hindrance of deprivations.

              Second, Maslow (1954) demonstrates several types of conflicts, but I’d like to choose one type of them: “catastrophic conflict” (p. 159). It’s a well-known fact that we live with innumerable choices in our daily lives, but “all the choices are equally catastrophic or threatening in their effects or else there is only one possibility and this is a catastrophic threat” (p. 159). Although this type of conflict is common in the animal world, human beings also suffer from it and it becomes a kind of pathology to prohibit self-actualization.

              

             According to Maslow, a certain threat in our lives becomes a factor to inhibit our psychological growth. Maslow (1954) explicates that “synonymizing ‘threat’ with ‘growth-inhibiting’ creates the difficult possibility of a situation being at this moment subjectively nonthreatening, but threatening or growth-inhibiting in the future” (p. 166). This sentence implies that a certain present event seems to be nonthreatening in that moment, but it may include a future risk of prohibiting self-actualization. With respect to this point, Maslow (1954) illustrates by an example that a child hopes for satisfaction which will please him, quiet him, reduce anxiety, etc., but which might have a possibility to inhibit his psychological growth. In terms of Maslow’s view, the above three concepts lead to pathology to restrain self-actualization.

Reference

1 Motivation and Personality