Today’s psychotherapy places great importance on the relationship between the therapist and the client, who is seen as an equal who must be understood and respected. However, this was not always the case.

Carl Rogers and his client-centred , or person-centred therapy, marked a very significant turn in the conception of psychotherapy. In this article we will describe Rogers’ therapy, as well as this author’s analyses of the clinical process in general and the therapist’s attitudes that allow the intervention to be successful.

Carl Rogers and client-centred therapy

Client-centered therapy was developed by Carl Rogers in the 1940s and 1950s. His contributions were instrumental in the development of scientific psychotherapy as we know it today.

Rogers’ work is framed in psychological humanism, a movement that vindicated the goodness of the human being and his innate tendency to personal growth as opposed to the colder and more pessimistic perspectives of psychoanalysis and behaviorism. Rogers and Abraham Maslow are considered the pioneers of this theoretical orientation.

For Rogers psychopathology is derived from the incongruence between the experience of the organism (“organismic self”) and the self-concept, or sense of identity; thus, symptoms appear when behavior and emotions are not consistent with the person’s idea of himself.

Consequently, therapy should focus on the client achieving such congruence. When he does so, he will be able to develop fully, being open to the experiences of the present and feeling confident in his own body.

Probably Rogers’ most important contribution was the identification of common factors that explain the success of different therapies . For this author – and for many others after him – the effectiveness of psychotherapy does not depend so much on the application of certain techniques as on going through specific phases and the attitudes of the therapist.

Phases of therapy

Based on his research, Rogers proposed a basic and flexible scheme of the psychotherapeutic process; today this model is still used independently of the theoretical orientation of the therapist , although each type of therapy can be focused on a specific stage.

Later authors such as Robert Carkhuff and Gerard Egan researched Rogers’ proposal and developed it. Let’s see what the three main phases of psychological therapy are.

1. Catharsis

The word “catharsis” comes from classical Greece , where it was used to refer to the capacity of tragedy to purify people by making them feel intense compassion and fear. Later on, Freud and Breuer called their therapeutic technique, consisting of the expression of repressed emotions, the “cathartic method”.

In this model, catharsis is the exploration of the client’s own emotions and life situation. Egan speaks of this phase as “identification and clarification of conflictive situations and unused opportunities”; it is about the person managing to focus the problem in order to solve it during the following stages.

Rogers’ person-centered therapy focuses on the catharsis phase: it promotes the client’s personal development so that he can later understand and solve his problems on his own.

2. Insight

“Insight” is an Anglo-Saxon term that can be translated as “intuition”, “introspection”, “perception”, “understanding” or “insight”, among other alternatives. In therapy, this term denotes a moment when the client reinterprets his or her situation as a whole and perceives “the truth” – or at least becomes identified with a certain narrative.

In this phase the role of the client’s personal goals is key ; according to Egan, in the second stage a new perspective is built and a commitment to the new objectives is generated. Psychoanalysis and psychodynamic therapy focus on the insight stage.

3. Action

The action phase consists, as its name suggests, of acting to achieve the new objectives . In this phase, strategies are prepared and applied to solve the problems that block well-being or personal development.

Behavior modification therapy, which uses cognitive and behavioral techniques to solve specific client problems, is probably the best example of action-phase focused psychotherapy.

Therapeutic attitudes

According to Rogers the success of the therapy depends fundamentally on the fulfilment of certain conditions; he considers these to be necessary and sufficient for the therapeutic change, and therefore more important than any particular technique.

Among these requirements, which relate to client and therapist attitudes, Rogers highlights the three that depend on the clinician: the authenticity, empathy and unconditional acceptance of the client.

1. Psychological contact

A personal relationship must exist between the therapist and the client for the therapy to work. In addition, this relationship must be meaningful to both parties.

2. Customer inconsistency

The therapy will only be successful if there is an incongruence between the client’s organismic self and his/her self-concept or . As we have previously explained, the concept of “organismic self” refers to physiological processes and that of “self-concept” to the sense of conscious identity.

3. Authenticity of the therapist

That the therapist is authentic, or congruent, means that they are in touch with their feelings and that they communicate them to the client in an open way. This helps to create a sincere personal relationship and may involve the therapist making self-revelation regarding their own life.

4. Unconditional positive acceptance

The therapist must accept the client as he is, without judging his acts or thoughts, and respect and take a sincere interest in him. Unconditional positive acceptance allows the client to perceive their experiences without the distortion of everyday relationships , and therefore to reinterpret themselves without a priori judgement.

5. Empathic understanding

For Rogers, empathy implies the ability to enter into the client’s perspective and to perceive the world from that perspective, as well as to experience their feelings. The therapist’s understanding makes it easier for the client to accept himself and his experiences.

6. Customer perception

Even if the therapist has true empathy for the client and accepts him or her unconditionally, if the client does not perceive this, the therapeutic relationship will not develop properly; therefore, the therapist must be able to transmit to the client the attitudes that will help him or her change.