A D P C A

The Association for the Development of the Person Centered Approach.

Home      Articles       Becoming a member       Events       Journal       Links      Newsletter      Photos   Responsibilities  

e-mail us.                                                                                         Link to Renaissance (our newsletter)

Therapy" by Barbara Temaner Brodley, Ph.D.

Joseph A. Hochberg

This article (The Person-Centered Journal: 4(1) 1997) is in keeping with the high quality of our journal in literary style, ideas, and importance. I was happily moved by a clear statement of "why this topic?": "Some therapists who work from Roger’s philosophical orientation and the theory of the therapeutic attitudes, but without cognizance of the nondirective attitude, evolve somewhat different forms of therapy...The popularity of these deviations and the related loss of focus on the value of client-centered work, is one reason for my attempt to bring attention to the nondirective attitude." In my experience, I and many others often skip the personal context of what they are saying or writing!

How wide Brodley’s view of ‘context’! "the therapist who adopts client-centered values must be --by nature or nurture -- nonpaternalistic, an antiauthoritarian, a democratically oriented personality and be able to resist the prevailing cultural climate of authoritarian values."

What about the arguable question of responsiveness to clients’ questions and requests? Brodley gives her opinion: "The nondirective attitude in client-centered work implies questions and requests should be respected as part of the client’s rights in the relationship...and the client’s right to direct the manner of the therapist’s participation within the limits of the therapist’s philosophy, ethics and capabilities."

I wonder how the author would judge my experience as a client with several client-centered therapists: I believe when directiveness occasionally occurred, it was probably marked by a loss of attention, or following, to what I was experiencing or narrating. I wonder if directiveness can be a marker for the therapist to "get back on course"! The author makes a statement that may be tangential to my question: "...it cannot be being true to the practice to assert that behaviors associated with directivity are impossible in the context of client-centered work..."

I found this paper to be "typically" Barbara Temaner Brodley’s writing: masterful, engaging, and comprehensive. I hope some of you readers return to her article!

Joseph A. Hochberg