College of Contructivist Psychotherapists
Philosophical position
Constructivism as a philosophical stance sees the world's 'reality' as mediated through the experience of each individual. This is not to deny the reality of lived experience, rather that a person can change their lived experience by making sense of the world in different ways. Constructivist positions see existence as contextual and relational. The act of the construal - i.e. making both sense and meaning of being human - can only be understood in terms of living in a shared world which is socially negotiated through shared perspectives with others.
This understanding affirms the engaged reality of the other and proposes that how everyone lives in the moment is always ethical, for example, based on the principle of personal integrity. In other words, how we perceive and describe the world and others who inhabit it with us, is always an ethical act.
One of the advantages of the Constructivist approach is that it emphasises 'fit', not as in fittest but as in good enough fit with 'reality' rather than mind's content. Therefore, it tells us not what to think but rather how to explore and understand why we think and experience the way we do.
This view of the human being emphasises personal and subjective authorship of the 'reality' we experience. Helping a person, couple, family or organisation understand and take ownership of this authorship is key to what Constructivist psychotherapists engage with when working with clients. Put another way, authenticity is emphasised in the sense that Constructivist psychotherapy attempts to empower people to increase their sense of freedom and choice in the way they live their lives.
To this aim, Constructivist therapists engage with the client in the 'as if' or
propositional mode and assume with them that there is not an 'objective reality' but that the clients' experiences can be construed in a variety of ways. The lived experience of the client(s) is listened to and validated by the therapist while at the same time within the therapeutic process the client is invited to look at both the structure and process of how they construe their world and how they may or may not like to change the way they view or experience the world.
The process of therapy is conversational and experimental. This experimentation is always invitational and does not give privilege to the professional abstract construals of the therapist. The therapist is also invited to inquire and reconstrue their own personal world views within this act of exploration of the personal process of the other; what Varela and Maturana term 'Making space for the other beside us' and Bateson described as the cybernetic or systemic approach. Constructivism does not privilege any one world view thus supporting the growing interconnectedness of the multiethnic, multi-cultural society of the developing global world village.
23rd July 2010
UK Council for Psychotherapy | Registered Charity No. 1058545 | Company No. 3258939 Registered in England
