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Journal of Humanistic Psychology
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The Immovable Object Versus the Irresistible Force: Problems and Opportunities for Humanistic Psychology

Larry M. Leitner, Ph.D.

Miami University leitnelm{at}muohio.edu

Sally N. Phillips, M.A.

Stone Institute od Psychiatry at Northwestern Memorial Hospital/Northwestern University Medical School

The immovable force of an increasingly reductionistic approach to understanding and treating psychological life and the irresistible force of people searching desperately for solutions to struggles that allow for meaning, purpose, and richness in life create serious challenges and great opportunities for humanistic psychology. Humanistic psychology, if it can grasp these opportunities, has the chance to transform the field of psychology. To do so, humanistic psychology will have to deal adequately with three major manifestations of this reductionistic approach to psychology: the DSM as the means for understanding human distress, manualized treatments as the only scientifically based treatments of distress, and randomized controlled trials as the best way of determining treatment effectiveness. This article, after describing each of these reductionistic challenges, briefly reviews the current state of the humanistic response and concludes with a template that, if followed, offers us the chance to create a science that is both intellectually rigorous and experientially rich.

Key Words: humanistic psychology • diagnosis • therapeutic artistry • qualitative research

Journal of Humanistic Psychology, Vol. 43, No. 3, 156-173 (2003)
DOI: 10.1177/0022167803043003013
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