A person-centred approach to psychosexual therapy: theorizing practice

Abstract

There is little explicit referencing of the Person-Centred Approach in the psychosexual therapy literature and clients who experience sexual difficulties seem seldom to be discussed in publications on person-centred therapy. These ‘silences’ might suggest that there is little interest in establishing a greater dialogue between these two therapeutic approaches, yet there is, we would suggest, considerable value in doing so. Drawing on developments in person-centred theory and practice, we outline and extend in this article the ‘theorization of practice’ that has supported the development of a more person-centred approach to time-limited psychosexual therapy. While acknowledging the tensions that exist between the philosophical tenets underpinning the Person-Centred Approach and the practices that constitute psychosexual therapy, we suggest that the experiential therapies of Gendlin and Rennie provide useful meeting points between the Person-Centred Approach and psychosexual therapy. We argue that in addition to facilitating a more idiographic approach to psychosexual therapy, the Person-Centred Approach helps to widen the scope of practice within psychosexual therapy by placing greater emphasis on the promotion of sexual potential.