Understanding and Enhancing Positive Regard in Psychotherapy: Carl Rogers and Beyond
A conversation with:
Dr. Barry A. Farber, Ph.D. and Daisy Ort
April 30, 2023 , 7:30-9:15 PM Israel Time/ 12:30 pm New York Time
Barry Farber met Carl Rogers just once when he escorted him for the two days Rogers was at Teachers College (Columbia University), receiving a medal of honor from his alma mater. But that meeting enormously influenced how he perceived what makes real change in psychotherapy. Though Farber never became a loyalist to Roger's client-centered therapy, he experienced through their brief interaction Rogers's unique way of active listening that made those who spoke with Rogers feel heard and valued.
Farber found that positive regard (PR) is the least well-researched and most misunderstood of Rogers's three facilitative conditions (the therapist’s empathy, PR, and genuineness/congruence).
Farber, along with two talented clinical psychology doctoral students and the co-authors of this book––Jessi Suzuki (now graduated) and Daisy Ort–– initiated a positive regard lab at Teachers College. Through case studies, interviews, and the development of new assessment instruments to measure PR, they have investigated the ways in which therapists and clients view this concept and examined the association between PR and therapeutic outcome. One of the most interesting chapters in their book discusses the work of prominent therapists outside the person-centered community who have integrated into their own theoretical systems concepts similar, though not identical, to PR. Among those are Marsha Linehan and the concept of "validation," Heinz Kohut and his views about "mirroring," D. W. Winnicott and the "holding environment," John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth's ideas about a "secure base," and Shari Geller's (and others') concept of "therapeutic presence." They conclude that that the foundation for greater widespread clinical adoption of PR may already be in place, albeit with terms unassociated with the person-centered community.
In this conversation, Aner Govrin and Sharon Ziv-Beiman will discuss some of the following questions with Barry Farber and Daisy Ort:
What are the specific, active components of PR?
How has positive regard been modified and reinterpreted by theorists and clinicians within and without the person-centered community?
Can PR be “faked”?
Are there optimal levels of this attitude?
Can a therapist be both person-centered and eclectic?