Holistic Group Approach to Offender Rehabilitation (From Holistic Approaches to Offender Rehabilitation, P 297-323, 1982, Leonard J Hippchen, ed. - See NCJ-85681)

• NCJ Number: 85694
• Author(s): W R Rule
• Date Published: 1982
• Length: 27 pages
• Sale Source: Charles C. Thomas
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: *This document is currently unavailable from NCJRS.

Annotation

The holistic group approach to offender rehabilitation focuses on the interrelatedness of thinking, feeling, and behaving, as well as the social context of the expression of being, so group counseling is viewed as an effective approach for rehabilitation.

Abstract

In a holistic approach to rehabilitation, the Adlerian view of lifestyle provides the best framework for viewing human nature. Adler viewed each person as having an overriding goal around which subgoals are organized in a holistic fashion. This goal and its supplemental goals provide the main thrust of movement for the lifestyle that enables each person to move from a feeling of insignificance or noncoping to a feeling of significance or coping in social interaction. An Adlerian approach considers that criminal acts serve different purposes for different persons, purposes that do not conform to the normative measures of a person's usefulness in society. In holistic group counseling for offender rehabilitation, the goals of the group process and outcome focus on those self-defeating dimensions of behavior that ultimately work to the actor's disadvantage and the assets that work to the actor's advantage. Specific and realistic personal goals are set to diminish the self-defeating dimensions. Further, group counseling is designed to enhance self-acceptance and self-esteem through an increased awareness of a person's lifestyle strengths. Successful reentry into society is the ultimate criterion of success for holistic group counseling. Twenty-three references are listed.