Psicologia em Revista
Print version ISSN 1677-1168
Abstract
FEIJOO, Ana Maria Lopez Calvo de and MATTAR, Cristine Monteiro. HITS AND MISSES OF EXISTENTIAL PERSPECTIVES IN PSYCHOLOGY. Psicol. rev. (Belo Horizonte) [online]. 2016, vol.22, n.2, pp.258-274. ISSN 1677-1168. https://doi.org/DOI-10.5752/P.1678-9523.2016V22N2P258.
Humanistic psychology has been largely confused with phenomenological existential psychology in both the lay and the academic milieux. Students, authors and professionals in the area of psychology, as well as those who seek clinical help, believe these perspectives to be identical, with variations only in denomination. In this article, we intend to put this way of understanding into perspective through analysis, presenting its historical and philosophical origins and, consequently, its differences and singularities. Although both may also be called existential perspectives, straying away from behavioral and psychodynamic perspectives as they severe the bonds with any determinism, they show important divergences and discords, which must be remembered and guarded so that knowledge about psychology may be enhanced with greater rigor. Finally, pointing out the essential difference between the existential-humanist and phenomenological-existential perspectives, we will resume the affirmative of Heidegger that all humanism lies in a metaphysics
Keywords : Psychology; Existential perspectives; Humanism; Existential; phenomenology.