Human givens

The human givens approach is an holistic model of human function and well-being. The approach was first developed as an approach to psychotherapy, with the aim to create an model for brief, solution-focused, psychotherapy based on evidence from evolution, anthropology, biology, psychology and sociology. The approach was first outlined in the 1998/9 monograph Psychotherapy, Counselling and the Human Givens (Organising Idea) and amplified in the 2003 book Human Givens: A new approach to emotional health and clear thinking. The human givens organising ideas proffer a description of the nature of human beings, the 'givens' of human genetic heritage and what humans need in order to be happy and healthy.

Human givens approach is grounded in an evolutionary understanding of human nature. It proposes that evolution has endowed all members of our species, regardless of race or culture, with a common set of innate physical and emotional needs along with a set of innate physical, emotional and psychological resources. Like all organisms, humans deploy their 'given' resources in order to meet their 'given' needs in the environment in the course of their daily lives. When innate needs are met in a sufficiently balanced way people will flourish but when this does not happen distress and eventually illness results. The basic human givens proposition is, then, that all emotional distress and mental illness are caused by a failure to get innate needs, particularly emotional needs, met in balance. This may go hand in hand with problems relating to missing, misused or damaged innate resources. The focus of human givens therapy is, therefore, the discovery and rectifying/removal of any impediments to these needs being met in an individual's life. The broader implication of this working hypothesis is that the wellbeing and flourishing (eudaemonia) of humans both individually and collectively is dependent on meeting emotional needs in balance, and the healthy development of psychoemotional resources.

The human givens approach grew out of a psychotherapeutic method - an integrative, bio-psycho-social model of therapy. Within the framework of needs and resources it uses some interventions from known effective therapeutic methods. The organising ideas are new, along with some of the detailed theory (most notably on the function of dreaming), whilst other areas (such as how addictions are created and maintained and the cycle of depression) represents new formulations of existing scientific knowledge.

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