George Kelly (1905 - 1967)
Theory: Constructive Alternativism
George Kelly's theory, called constructive alternativism, involves the notion that, even though there is only one true reality, it is always experienced from one or another perspective or "alternative construction". Since there are an infinite number of different alternative constructions or perspectives we may take on the world, we are always free to change to a different one if our current one is not doing such a good job helping us adapt or get what we want.
Kelly organized his theory into a fundamental postulate and eleven corollaries. His fundamental postulate states that a person's processes (i.e., experiences, thoughts, feelings, behaviors) are psychologically channelized by the ways in which he anticipates events. Our experiences and perspectives are determined not only by the reality out there, but also by your efforts to anticipate the world. We construct our anticipations using, but not limited to, our past experiences.
According to Kelly, "A person's construction system varies as he successively construes the replication of events." When things don't happen the way we expect them to or the way they have in the past, we learn to adapt and to reconstruct in order to modify our future anticipations.
Kelly says that we will choose to do what we anticipate will most likely improve our understanding and our ability to anticipate. Reality places constraints on what we can experience or do, but we choose how to interpret that reality, and we normally choose to interpret that reality in whatever way we believe will help us the most.
Since everyone has different experiences, everyone's construction of reality is different. Hence, "truth" for Kelly is relative, as is "freedom".
It should be noted that Kelly's emphasis on the importance of and the malleability of personal interpretations, perspectives, and alternative constructions parallels what is taught in such ancient Buddhist texts as the Dhammapada.
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