Martha E.

Rogers Theory of Unitary Human Beings

Description

Rogers theory defined Nursing as an art and science that is humanistic and
humanitarian. It is directed toward the unitary human and is concerned with the nature and
direction of human development. The goal of nurses is to participate in the process of change.

According to Rogers, the Science of Unitary Human Beings contains two dimensions: the
science of nursing, which is the knowledge specific to the field of nursing that comes from
scientific research; and the art of nursing, which involves using the science of nursing creatively
to help better the life of the patient.

Assumptions

1. Man is a unified whole possessing his own integrity and manifesting characteristics that
are more than and different from the sum of his parts.
2. Man and environment are continuously exchanging matter and energy with one another.
3. The life process evolves irreversibly and unidirectionally along the space-time
continuum.
4. Pattern and organization identify man and reflect his innovative wholeness.
5. Man is characterized by the capacity for abstraction and imagery, language and thought,
sensation and emotion.

Major Concepts

Human-unitary human being (Person)

A person is defined as an irreducible, indivisible, pan-dimensional energy field

identified by pattern, and manifesting characteristics specific to the whole, and that cant
be predicted from knowledge of the parts. A person is also a unified whole, having its
own distinct characteristics that cant be viewed by looking at, describing, or
summarizing the parts.
 Health

Rogers defines health as an expression of the life process. It is the characteristics and
behavior coming from the mutual, simultaneous interaction of the human and
environmental fields, and health and illness are part of the same continuum. The multiple
events occurring during the life process show the extent to which a person is achieving
his or her maximum health potential. The events vary in their expressions from greatest
health to those conditions that are incompatible with the maintaining life process.

Nursing

It is the study of unitary, irreducible, indivisible human and environmental fields: people
and their world. Rogers claims that nursing exists to serve people, and the safe practice of
nursing depends on the nature and amount of scientific nursing knowledge the nurse
brings to his or her practice

Scope of Nursing

Nursing aims to assist people in achieving their maximum health potential. Maintenance
and promotion of health, prevention of disease, nursing diagnosis, intervention, and
rehabilitation encompass the scope of nursings goals.

Nursing is concerned with people-all people-well and sick, rich and poor, young and old.
The arenas of nursings services extend into all areas where there are people: at home, at
school, at work, at play; in hospital, nursing home, and clinic; on this planet and now
moving into outer space.

Environmental Field

An irreducible, indivisible, pandimensional energy field identified by pattern and

integral with the human field.
 Energy Field

The energy field is the fundamental unit of both the living and the non-living. It provides
a way to view people and the environment as irreducible wholes. The energy fields
continuously vary in intensity, density, and extent.

Subconcepts

Openness

There are no boundaries that stop energy flow between the human and environmental
fields, which is the openness in Rogers theory. It refers to qualities exhibited by open
systems; human beings and their environment are open systems.

Pandimensional

Pan-dimensionality is defined as non-linear domain without spatial or temporal

attributes. The parameters that humans use in language to describe events are arbitrary,
and the present is relative; there is no temporal ordering of lives.

Synergy is defined as the unique behavior of whole systems, unpredicted by any

behaviors of their component functions taken separately.

Human behavior is synergistic.

Pattern

Rogers defined pattern as the distinguishing characteristic of an energy field seen as a

single wave. It is an abstraction, and gives identity to the field.

Principles of Homeodynamics

Homeodynamics should be understood as a dynamic version of homeostasis (a relatively

steady state of internal operation in the living system).
 Homeodynamic principles postulate a way of viewing unitary human beings. The three
principles of homeodynamics are resonance, helicy, and integrality.

Principle of Reciprocy

Postulates the inseparability of man and environment and predicts that sequential changes
in life process are continuous, probabilistic revisions occurring out of the interactions
between man and environment.

Principle of Synchrony

This principle predicts that change in human behavior will be determined by the
simultaneous interaction of the actual state of the human field and the actual state of the
environmental field at any given point in space-time.

Principle of Integrality (Synchrony + Reciprocy)

Because of the inseparability of human beings and their environment, sequential changes
in the life processes are continuous revisions occurring from the interactions between
human beings and their environment.

Between the two entities, there is a constant mutual interaction and mutual change
whereby simultaneous molding is taking place in both at the same time.

Principle of Resonancy

It speaks to the nature of the change occurring between human and environmental fields.
The life process in human beings is a symphony of rhythmical vibrations oscillating at
various frequencies.

It is the identification of the human field and the environmental field by wave patterns
manifesting continuous change from longer waves of lower frequency to shorter waves of
higher frequency.
 Principle of Helicy

The human-environment field is a dynamic, open system in which change is continuous

due to the constant interchange between the human and environment.

This change is also innovative. Because of constant interchange, an open system is never
exactly the same at any two moments; rather, the system is continually new or different.

Science of Unitary Human Beings and Nursing Process

The nursing process has three steps in Rogers Theory of Unitary Human
Beings: assessment,voluntary mutual patterning, and evaluation.

The areas of assessment are: the total pattern of events at any given point in space-time,
simultaneous states of the patient and his or her environment, rhythms of the life process,
supplementary data, categorical disease entities, subsystem pathology, and pattern appraisal. The
assessment should be a comprehensive assessment of the human and environmental fields.

Mutual patterning of the human and environmental fields includes:

sharing knowledge
offering choices
empowering the patient
fostering patterning
evaluation
repeat pattern appraisal, which includes nutrition, work/leisure activities, wake/sleep
cycles, relationships, pain, and fear/hopes
identify dissonance and harmony
validate appraisal with the patient
self-reflection for the patient
Strengths

1. Rogers concepts provide a worldview from which nurses may derive theories and
hypotheses and propose relationships specific to different situations.
2. Rogers theory is not directly testable due to lack of concrete hypotheses, but it is testable
in principle.

Weaknesses

1. Rogers model does not define particular hypotheses or theories for it is an abstract,
unified, and highly derived framework.
2. Testing the concepts validity is questionable because its concepts are not directly
measurable.
3. The theory was believed to be profound, and was too ambitious because the concepts are
extremely abstract.
4. Rogers claimed that nursing exists to serve people, however, nurses roles were not
clearly defined.
5. The purpose of nurses is to promote health and well-being for all persons wherever they
are. However, Rogers model has no concrete definition of health state.

Conclusion

The Science of Unitary HUman Beings is highly generalizable as the concepts and ideas are not
confined with a specific nursing approach unlike the usual way of other nurse theorists in
defining the major concepts of a theory.

Rogers gave much emphasis on how a nurse should view the patient. She developed principles
which emphasizes that a nurse should view the client as a whole.

Her statements, in general, made us believe that a person and his or her environment are integral
to each other. That is, a patient cant be separated from his or her environment when addressing
health and treatment. Her conceptual framework has greatly influenced all aspects of nursing by
offering an alternative to traditional approaches of nursing.

Analysis

Apart from the usual way of other nurse theorists in defining the major concepts of a theory,
Rogers gave much focus on how a nurse should view the patient. She developed principles
which emphasizes that a nurse should view the client as a whole.

Her statements remind every nurse practitioner that to retain the integrity of the individual, he or
she should be viewed as one complex system interacting with the environment and care should
not be fractionalized in different categories.

Being given with as wide range of principles and statements from Rogers, an aspiring nurse
theorist can develop his or her own concepts guided with her work. Her assumptions are not
confined with a specific nursing approach making it highly generalizable.