Explaining Helping Relationships Through Learning Theories and the Question of Human Agency

Abstract

It is argued that counselors too readily accept the mechanistic terminology of learning theories to account for client behavior, when in fact such terminology is not capturing what really takes place in the consulting room. Following a definition of agency, classical causation theory is presented. Psychology has patterned itself after Newtonian precepts, which rely upon material and efficient causation. As an antidote to this narrow usage, the concept of telosponsivity is presented. A telosponse is behavior carried out “for the sake of” purposes, and draws from the meaning of formal and final causation. Oppositional meanings in experience are what makes telosponsivity both possible and, indeed, necessary. A review of one counseling theory is carried out, and it is then shown how the mechanistic biases of psychology have been incorporated into this theoretical account. Corrective theoretical measures, in line with an agential view of behavior, are then recommended.