What are the historical foundations of guidance and counseling?

Answer 1

Historically, guidance & counselling emerged as a synthesis of ideas & practices derived from religion ( search for spiritual meaning/ identity; concepts like "pastoral care"), C19th philosophy ( concept of the "unconscious mind" - in fact, pre Feudian/ philosophical in origin), the Arts ( self expression through performance, literature, autobiography, journalism, poetry, plastic arts, music etc ), and the needs of people to maintain & promote individualism/ sense of autonomous selfhood in the face of large bureaucratic institutions & an increasingly depersonalised, alienating urban industrial society. To some extent, they were substitutes for traditional community life & religion: in a more secular age of mass urban societies, counselling offered ways for individuals to "be known" and to "be heard".

Key figures included: the Dutch physicians Van Renterghem & Van Eaden - "Clinic of Suggestive Psychotherapy", Amsterdam, est. 1887, and JJ Gasner & Anton Mesmer (C18th Austria) who popularized "Animal Magnetism" (aka "Mesmerism"), & opened the door to the modern study/ application of hypnosis; a term coined by Scottish physician J Braid. These early "hypnotherapists" were well aware of unconscious thoughts/ motivations, & used "mesmeric trances" to open areas of mind not accessible during normal waking consciousness.

During the 1880s the French physicians Charcot & Janet used hypnosis to treat "hysterical" patients. More generally, "Mesmerism"/ hypnosis was one of the great popular cultural fads of the Victorian period: a "Golden Age" for stage hypnosis (very popular in Music Hall shows etc), and many public figures were very interested in hypnotism, notably the novelists Charles Dickens (a keen amateur magician, & enthusiastic hypnotist ) and Wilkie Collins.

In parallel with this was the Victorian belief in "Self Help" (Samuel Smiles et al), plus (by the early C20th) the emerging "behaviourist" ideas of people like JB Watson. All of this was compounded by the emergence of "psychological testing" as a personnel selection tool - during & after the First World War.

Sigmund Freud was the key figure in the transition from hypnotism etc to what became "psychotherapy": he was extremely adept at assimilating & integrating many ideas & practices (eg personal interaction between physician & patient; C19th biological theories - Freud's unitary life force or "libido"; the notion that all emotional problems have a sexual cause; the concept of the "unconscious mind" - from contemporary philosophy, literature, & the hypnotists ) into a coherent theoretical model that seemed generally applicable. Freud was a figure of huge cultural as well as scientific significance, but his thinking was situated in his time and place; a very hierarchical, class dominated society.

1950s America saw the emergence of theorists/ practitioners who reinterpreted Freud to suit the emerging needs of a newer, more egalitarian/ socially mobile, and culturally pluralistic society - eg Carl Rogers, Eric Berne, Albert Ellis, Aaron Beck, Abraham Maslow. Prominent European thinkers of this era (eg Fromm, Erikson) tended to relocate to the USA because it was easier (and better renumerated!) to reformulate classical European psychoanalysis for a new, affluent, egalitarian clientele from the wider & more open social/ cultural perspective prevalent there. That stated, it should be noted that they faced considerable opposition & criticism from the academic psychologists (especially the "Behaviourists"!) who were striving hard to achieve "academic respectability" in the universities.

In the general culture, however, the ideas/ concepts of psychoanalysis leached into many areas of education, social work, & the "voluntary sector" (notably self-help groups, marriage guidance, religious organisations etc), and from the 1970s onwards there has been a "boom" in the growth of "counselling & guidance" practices distinct from, but often supplementary to, psychiatry, psychoanalysis/therapy, and research based scientific Psychology. Much of this has been due to the social/ personal demands made of individuals in an increasingly fragmented/ alienating society in which many lack coherent/ reliable emotional & social support systems.

Answer 2

Historically, guidance & counselling emerged as a synthesis of ideas & practices derived from religion ( search for spiritual meaning/ identity; concepts like "pastoral care"), C19th philosophy ( concept of the "unconscious mind" - in fact, pre Feudian/ philosophical in origin), the Arts ( self expression through performance, literature, autobiography, journalism, poetry, plastic arts, music etc ), and the needs of people to maintain & promote individualism/ sense of autonomous selfhood in the face of large bureaucratic institutions & an increasingly depersonalised, alienating urban industrial society. To some extent, they were substitutes for traditional community life & religion: in a more secular age of mass urban societies, counselling offered ways for individuals to "be known" and to "be heard".

Key figures included: the Dutch physicians Van Renterghem & Van Eaden - "Clinic of Suggestive Psychotherapy", Amsterdam, est. 1887, and JJ Gasner & Anton Mesmer (C18th Austria) who popularized "Animal Magnetism" (aka "Mesmerism"), & opened the door to the modern study/ application of hypnosis; a term coined by Scottish physician J Braid. These early "hypnotherapists" were well aware of unconscious thoughts/ motivations, & used "mesmeric trances" to open areas of mind not accessible during normal waking consciousness.

During the 1880s the French physicians Charcot & Janet used hypnosis to treat "hysterical" patients. More generally, "Mesmerism"/ hypnosis was one of the great popular cultural fads of the Victorian period: a "Golden Age" for stage hypnosis (very popular in Music Hall shows etc), and many public figures were very interested in hypnotism, notably the novelists Charles Dickens (a keen amateur magician, & enthusiastic hypnotist ) and Wilkie Collins.

In parallel with this was the Victorian belief in "Self Help" (Samuel Smiles et al), plus (by the early C20th) the emerging "behaviourist" ideas of people like JB Watson. All of this was compounded by the emergence of "psychological testing" as a personnel selection tool - during & after the First World War.

Sigmund Freud was the key figure in the transition from hypnotism etc to what became "psychotherapy": he was extremely adept at assimilating & integrating many ideas & practices (eg personal interaction between physician & patient; C19th biological theories - Freud's unitary life force or "libido"; the notion that all emotional problems have a sexual cause; the concept of the "unconscious mind" - from contemporary philosophy, literature, & the hypnotists ) into a coherent theoretical model that seemed generally applicable. Freud was a figure of huge cultural as well as scientific significance, but his thinking was situated in his time and place; a very hierarchical, class dominated society.

1950s America saw the emergence of theorists/ practitioners who reinterpreted Freud to suit the emerging needs of a newer, more egalitarian/ socially mobile, and culturally pluralistic society - eg Carl Rogers, Eric Berne, Albert Ellis, Aaron Beck, Abraham Maslow. Prominent European thinkers of this era (eg Fromm, Erikson) tended to relocate to the USA because it was easier (and better renumerated!) to reformulate classical European psychoanalysis for a new, affluent, egalitarian clientele from the wider & more open social/ cultural perspective prevalent there. That stated, it should be noted that they faced considerable opposition & criticism from the academic psychologists (especially the "Behaviourists"!) who were striving hard to achieve "academic respectability" in the universities.

In the general culture, however, the ideas/ concepts of psychoanalysis leached into many areas of education, social work, & the "voluntary sector" (notably self-help groups, marriage guidance, religious organisations etc), and from the 1970s onwards there has been a "boom" in the growth of "counselling & guidance" practices distinct from, but often supplementary to, psychiatry, psychoanalysis/therapy, and research based scientific psychology. Much of this has been due to the social/ personal demands made of individuals in an increasingly fragmented/ alienating society in which many lack coherent/ reliable emotional & social support systems.