When Therapy Today dedicated a significant amount of space to Human Givens (HG), I thought, well, there are so many similar things around, it does not do any harm. But when I read the following sentence in Ivan Tyrrell’s response to a not particularly strong critique in the last issue of Therapy Today, my attitude changed: ‘Currently, apart from HG, there are no schools of psychotherapy that use the very latest biological, psychological and sociological knowledge and integrate it in a variety of practical ways.’ I will refer to HG’s website as source in this letter since a large proportion of Tyrrell’s response is actually cut and pasted from the website.

The Mental Health Review Journal in December 2008 reviewed the body of knowledge on HG. The vast majority of the publications were HG’s own. The review article called for better research design and methods because what was available was very weak (descriptive case studies and anecdotes). So there had not been a change in the reliability of HG research from May 2007, when the rewind technique was looked at.1 It probably has not changed – I was unable to find proper data on the Luton project. What is clear, however, is that it was a self-reporting project, thus a control group would have been necessary to consider it valid to any degree. I repeat: currently there is no peer-reviewed publication on this method.

HG claims that it is very keen on a research base, but what it proposes, what it calls practice-based evidence, is just an attempt to avoid scrutiny. Here is a simple proposal for the beginning of a proper test for the utility of HG:

1. X number of participants, who may or may not have diagnosed depression (as HG is an unproven therapy, the level of depression cannot be severe) measured with the BDI (Beck Depression Inventory)

2. The therapists may not know the result of BDI

3. The participants are allocated to four groups: those who receive HG, those who receive an approved therapy, those who receive high level empathy with tea, those on a ‘waiting list’

4. The participants may not know which group they are in and the therapists may not inform them what therapy they receive

5. Evaluation on BDI (after the therapy, after three and six months). The evaluator may not know which group the participant was in.

The concept itself is not more validated than its efficiency. On its website, HG attempts to get around the lack of evidence by listing unrelated scientific papers as references, by unconstructed logic, by use of anecdotes and by references to authorities irrelevant to the subject (eg Ignác Semmelweis).

HG summarises its breakthrough method in points and it helps to demonstrate these attempts:

1. The expectation fulfilment theory of why we dream. This is based on Griffin’s assumptions for which there are no peer-reviewed publications.

2. How to lift depression safely and quickly. This starts2 with an unproven and discredited claim that depression is the cause of suicide (statistically). The article then continues with many referenced points, followed by a paragraph without a reference: ‘The human givens approach to counselling works with what we are all born with – our genetic endowment – namely the physical and emotional needs programmed into us by evolution, which seek their fulfilment through our interaction with the environment, and the innate resources provided to help us meet those needs.’ The earlier references disguise the fact that there is no evidence for this claim and that it does not follow from the previous references. These are outdated views, anyway – could HG explain how social needs (with its variety) are born with us and how evolution produced this? The article does not give a logical construct for this (how can evolution of the human neural system result in the desire to build up a share portfolio, or to secure funds for old age in countries without adequate pension systems?) because there is none.

The logical shortcuts are numerous in the article, for example: ‘When emotional needs are not met or when our resources are used incorrectly, we suffer considerable mental distress – most commonly anxiety and/or depression.’ Or equally plausibly it triggers action. They also claim: ‘The dreaming brain which preserves the integrity of our genetic inheritance every night.’ While there are many dream theories, one would expect some logical explanation or some evidence for such an outlandish claim. ‘There is evidence to show that the function of dreaming, which occurs predominantly during REM sleep, is the metaphorical acting out (not the resolving) of unexpressed, emotionally arousing preoccupations, so that the arousal can be discharged and the brain freed up to deal with the concerns of the following day.’ Unfortunately, the reference for these claims is Griffin’s book… The claim combines popularised and somewhat misunderstood neural phenomena and Freudian assumptions in an ad-hoc manner. From this the article concludes: ‘The process of discharging, and thus completing, patterns of arousal in this way preserves the integrity of our core personality.’ What is core personality? The rest of the page is similarly depressing – logical mistakes, confused terms (eg brain and mind). The evidence for the efficiency and efficacy of HG? The leaders’ own publications!

3. APET model. The theoretical basis of the model3 is a 19th century view of the relationship between the physical aspects of neural system and consciousness. The references actually do not support the conclusions HG draws from them. The model is a mixture of neurology, Watsonian behaviourism, and misinterpreted cognitive approaches and confusion of the brain and mind.

4. Molar Memories. This4 is a rehashed version of Jung’s most esoteric assumptions mixed with some of the dubious points in evolutionary psychology and superficially interpreted conditioning. The references for HG’s assumptions are only self-references.

5. Dreaming forget. In this section5 the authors pile up quite a few references about the neural processes of sleep and dreaming, but ignore the fact that these do not support their conceptual framework; they are not even related to the proposed framework. The article confuses the nature of dreams, the neural processes of dreams, the relationship between the conscious and dreams and the assumed function of dreams.

6. Great expectations. After some grandiose claims, the article6 is essentially a rehash of the previous points using the same technique: references unrelated to the proposition and anecdotes.

7. Post-traumatic stress disorder. The article claims that HG has many cases to show the effectiveness of the rewind technique. Why have these not been submitted to peer-review? It clearly confuses the operation of the neural system and its function in the mind. In any case, there is no published evidence that it works and the proposed mechanism contradicts our knowledge about the neural system and the conscious.

8. The last of the claims: the road to recovery is a collection of unrelated, unsubstantiated anecdotes.

So, where is the use of ‘the very latest biological, psychological and sociological knowledge’?

Laszlo Czaban

1. http://www.arif.bham.ac.uk/h/human-givens-rewind-technique.shtml
2. http://www.hgi.org.uk/archive/lifting-depression.htm
3. http://www.hgi.org.uk/archive/APET-model2.htm
4. http://www.hgi.org.uk/archive/molarmemories.htm
5. http://www.hgi.org.uk/archive/dreamtoforget.htm
6. http://www.hgi.org.uk/archive/expectation.htm