Being one who has deprecated the use of compulsion as a means of altering personality and behavior, it is no doubt singularly appropriate: Integrative Counselling and Psychotherapy Essay, IC, Ireland

Being one who has deprecated the use of compulsion as a means of altering personality and behavior, it is no doubt singularly appropriate that I should be forced to acknowledge the value of the gentle compulsion of a formal request. For some time I had recognized the need for a more adequate and more up-to-date statement of the theories which have been developing in the group associated with client-centered therapy.

This might well have remained in the realm of good intentions, had it not been for the formal request from the American Psychological Association, in connection with its Study of the Status and Development of Psychology in the United States, to prepare a systematic statement of this developing theory.

To join with others who were endeavoring to formulate their own theories and to use, so far as possible, a common outline—this seemed to be both an obligation and an opportunity which could not be refused. It is this softly voiced but insistent pressure from my colleagues which has caused me to write the following pages now, rather than at some later date. For this pressure I am grateful.