Model of Abnormality
would need to be one capable of responding constructively to this broad conception of factors. This method will be explored in the next chapter, ‘Model of Psychotherapy’.
Abnormality – individual agency and context The following section aims to locate the importance of relationality amidst our biological and volitional capacities. This preserves a space for explanations in which individual freedom operates within the broader network of relationships; these in turn provide boundaries within around which willing may occur. One danger of basing a model of abnormality upon ideas regarding relational def icits alone is that it leaves little room for personal responsibility in relation to pathological outcomes. It fosters a view of pure victimhood and the logical consequence of blaming the parents (or some other external factor), for our problems. Alternatively, a model of sin that has been articulated in Chapter 1, including ‘original sin’ as opposed to McFadyen’s ‘originating in sinful relationships’, holds a balance regarding pathology as both personal and systemic in origin, internal and external in causation, and multi-factorial, rather than reducing it to one issue. This in turn preserves a space for human agency and individual accountability for pathology (unless it is deemed to be purely genetic) which ironically is the basis of hope: we can act not just react, and so may choose reparation towards more healthy patterns of relating. It has been noted by Johnson and Jones that the concept of the will and resultant agency has been marginalised by a psychological tradition rooted in an empirical theory of knowledge. Furthermore, within the context of counselling, approaches lacking a significant concept of human agency will struggle to embrace the core therapeutic ethic of autonomy. Johnson is most helpful in offering a nuanced account of agency which preserves human responsibility in choosing, yet gives weight to numerous factors which influence and thus contextualise our decisions and actions. This kind of explanation flows from the more ‘open-ended’ dialogical portrayal of personhood for which this book is arguing. Johnson’s account includes six contextual factors. 119
The_bible_wisdom_and_human_nature_text_RPT.indd 119
27/03/2019 14:13
