Do we have free will?

Free will is when a person is free to grow, change and develop how they want to. The power of making free choices that are unconstrained by external (or internal) circumstances.

One of the main assumptions of the Humanistic approach is that humans have free will; not all behaviour is determined.

Personal agency is the humanistic term for the exercise of free will. Personal agency refers to the choices we make in life, the paths we go down and their consequences.

The humanistic approach represented by e.g. Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow are among those who believe in free will. According to this perspective, people have a free will, and they denied that people’s behaviour is at the mercy of outside forces alone. Free will is most apparent in humanistic therapies where the terms client and facilitator indicate the voluntary nature of the situation, and the idea that the individuals have the power to solve their own problems through insight in a usually non-directive therapy.

Carl Rogers believes that humans have an innate (i.e. natural) drive towards positive growth and self-actualisation. It is up to the individual to “own” his or her own behaviour; Rather than saying a particular behaviour is not like them (for example when following the crowd) individuals should strive to be themselves and take responsibility for their own actions. Rogers proposes client centred therapy in which the therapist is called a “facilitator” whose role it is to make it easier for the patient to exercise free will. Humanistic psychologists argue that regarding human behaviour as being influenced by external forces is dehumanising.

A problem for free will is causality. Free will would suggest that nothing causes an action. But anyone displaying only random behaviour would be classified as mentally ill or very stupid. Free will needs to explain what causes actions to take place otherwise behaviours are seen as being determined.