At last, the secret to happiness?
While therapy is catching on in Asia, many psychologists are having their doubts about the talk therapies now available in the west. One problem is the confusing number of conflicting approaches. Even more worrying, there is no consensus as to how, or even if, any work. This is one of the reasons a new line of thinking, called the 'human givens' approach, has developed. It aims to pull together the best from the many hundreds of different kinds of therapy on offer.
The term 'human givens' refers to the basic ingredients of contentment: our emotional needs and how we meet them. According to one interpretation of the research, at our present stage of evolution, we appear to feel best - and function optimally - when we have five basic feelings: security, love, a sense of connection, some degree of control, and a certain level of self-esteem.
To maintain a healthy balance of security, love, connection, control and self-esteem, the human race has developed psychological tools, such as imagination, memory, self-awareness and a range of thinking styles and skills - problem-solving abilities, for example. These five optimal ingredients of psychological health and the resources that have evolved them, and which are carried in our biology, are what is meant by 'human givens'. The idea is to do away with theoretical rivalries and do whatever it takes to restore or create the 'givens' that are malfunctioning in a person's life.
Enthusiasts of this approach complain that the roots of conventional psychotherapy are too esoteric. Freud's theories, such as the Oedipus Complex, which describes a son's sexual jealousy of his father, are more literary than scientific. The continuing influence of such an idiosyncratic perspective, they say, illustrates just how immature psychology still is as a science.
They propose a way for the discipline to grow up. It is a path similar to what occurred in the field of astrology as it gradually emerged as the more scientifically credible astronomy, or how 'magical' alchemy was the basis for the more rigorous discipline of chemistry.
For comparable changes in clinical psychology, say followers of the new approach, complex theories need to be demystified and the best of each boiled down to an accessible range of skills. Naturally, this scandalises purists and risks stepping on a lot of very influential toes. Just as the livelihood and status of astrologists and alchemists depended in part on impenetrability, highly specialised psychologists can fall into using academic theories to justify and defend their authority, expertise and source of income. What ruffles feathers most is the suggestion that the assembled set of therapeutic skills could be applied as successfully by a caring novice as by a seasoned professional.
The new approach aims to avoid dealing with any one specific aspect of a person's problems. Currently, cognitive therapists, for example, focus on a person's conscious thoughts, while psychotherapists looks for answers in a client's past and subconscious, both at the cost of the influences of social context or culture. Eclectic approaches are emerging. But mix and match is the rule, not synthesis: theoretical camps may trade secrets, but do not yet go in for mergers.
Critics say that the new approach is simplistic, intellectually incoherent and that therapy needs the rudder of theoretical depth.
But at a time when ailments like depression, anxiety and substance abuse appear to be rising alarmingly, it is perhaps time to re-examine the potential of an overarching eclectic approach. It is also maybe time to reassess the cult of the expert. That means placing value on the personal coping ability and caring attitude of 'healers', and not pinning all our hope on training and qualifications.
Jean Nicol is a psychologist specialising in issues of cultural identity and change in an era of globalisation
