Talk:Human givens

Serious issues with this page?

 * One of the primary cited sources is a theology journal, and the vast majority of additions on this page are from a single person. This article needs to have some warning banners added noting the problems, and should probably be reviewed by an admin, maybe re-submitted for deletion. Arfed (talk) 14:43, 3 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Hi Arfed. You obviously have a lot of Wikipedia knowledge and experience, and it would really help if you could spell out what you think is wrong with this page, and how it might be improved, in far more detail, in order to help people who don't know as much as you do about the right way of going about things here. Which of the primary cited sources do you think is a theology journal, and why (assuming you are right) does this matter? Please explain your logic here. I wrote a good deal of this page because I thought that the human givens approach to psychology, psychotherapy and counselling needed documenting on Wikipedia. Many other approaches to helping people with mental health problems are represented here, and I think human givens deserves a page because a) it is a thing that exists in the world and b) it has been shown to be highly effective in the research conducted so far. The intent of the page was to describe the human givens approach in as factual way as possible. And I do not understand the rational basis for your suggestion that it should be submitted for deletion. Regards MIDaffin (talk) 22:15, 3 April 2016 (UTC)

The article consists largely of thinly-veiled *arguments for* Human Givens therapy/theory rather than concise, objective detail about it. A major problem throughout is that a lot of the article is padded out with citations of studies that do not pertain to the topic at hand, and have little or nothing directly to do with Human Givens theory. Most citations pertaining directly to Human Givens are self-published, non-peer reviewed by organisations associated with it. There is a very limited body of peer-reviewed publications pertaining to it, most of which are small-scale studies by practioners of Human Givens therapy.

The lack of genuinely independent sources, coupled with an abundance of porimary or irrelevant sources, is the main issue. The article's length is unwarranted, particularly given the padding prevelant throughout, and given the relative importance of the topic. Certainly a Wikipedia article by a single author on a very niche subject, with little independent third-party research, in a highly contested field, need not be this length.

Any Wikipedia article on an established psychological or psychotherapeutic paradigm, be it CBT, object-relations theory, Adlerian psychology, play therapy, etc., etc., will cite numerous criticisms or issues raised by others in the field in a formal academic context. This article fails to do that.

Also concerning is that there are a number of other Wikipedia articles related to Human Givens written exclusively by the same author of this one, with similar sourcing issues, but far worse.

The cynical part of me would say that the article reads more like veiled sales patter than an encyclopaedia, but one way or another there are enough serious outstanding issues with the article to warrant flagging and/or discussion for removal.

2001:BB6:4D04:EF58:8985:F0C9:2003:6E09 (talk) 22:30, 3 November 2017 (UTC)


 * Thanks anonymous person for taking the time to articulate what you think is wrong with this page. I think you point out some things that definitely need fixing. Really very useful. The whole article could do with cutting down and turning into a proper encyclopaedia entry, and I will get on and do this asap. However, as I said before, the hg approach is a thing that exists in the world, just like all manner of other things that, whether we like or agree with them or not, have a presence on wikipedia - from varieties of dog food to cults to porno movies. As such I think that it deserves it's place - as long as the way in which it is represented is objective and informative. So I would ask the powers that be to allow some time for interested people to whip this page into a more acceptable shape. MIDaffin (talk) 12:35, 4 November 2017 (UTC)

I agree with above writers - this is a slick powder puff promo article about Human Givens and not a Wiki article. I remember a previous version citing a metastudy and secondary sources stating clearly that HG had nil validity. All 100% positive articles in the med field should be red flags.This one smells bad.— ⦿⨦⨀Tumadoireacht Talk/Stalk 07:52, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

I disagree with removal of the page because it is valuable to people discussing the development of ideas within modern psychotherapy. Despite not being mainstream and lacking criticism, it still represents decades of ideas and thoughts shared by a group of psychologist and therapists that is out there and affecting other streams of thought and representing thousands of patients treated regardless.

At this moment there are 376 HGI-registered therapists (counted from a blank search). For comparison the UKAHPP reports 138 registrants (as of May 2020). I'm comparing with the UKAHPP as HGI is also UK-based, both the Human Givens and Humanistic psychology are competing schools of thoughts to CBT, Humanistic psychology is probably best known for Maslow's hierarchy of needs. So it's a thing and it's out there.

I've restructure the entire page.


 * I removed the separate mentions of the organizations, to keep in line with the pattern of a single link for any relevant organizations in the external link section.
 * I removed all links from external links that only made sense in a promotional context.
 * I removed the accreditation of the HGI register, because it's not related to Human Givens in the context of a psychological theory and does not add anything to this page as such other than bringing the possibility of registering to the attention of an interested therapist.
 * The page was lacking a section on what therapy actually entails, so I added it. The "key features" section was split up in between the new section describing therapy and "3 reason for mental illness" extending this with examples of how some illnesses are described in the Human Givens framework.
 * The publication biography is moved over to the pages of the authors.
 * Renamed the research and evidence section into "Efficacy and criticism" included a critical review, limited single studies to the most relevant, and reworded to better reflect the strengths and limitations of the studies. Note: this section started with stating that "The first RCT is in process", however the website of Human Given reveals that the RCT never got funded - but even if it were true Wikipedia is generally not the place for on going trials.

I hope this restructuring will help this page move forward.

JGM73 (talk) 04:11, 18 May 2022 (UTC)