Abraham H Maslow

Abraham Harold Maslow , 1908-70, American psychologist, b. Brooklyn, New York, Ph.D. Univ. of Wisconsin (1934). He taught at Brooklyn College from 1937, then became head of the psychology department at Brandeis Univ. (1951-69). A leader in the school of humanistic psychology, Maslow is best known for his theory of human motivation, which led to a therapeutic technique known as self-actualization. His influential works include Motivation and Personality (1954) and Toward a Psychology of Being (1964).

Bibliography: See also R. J. Lowry, ed., The Journals of A. H. Maslow (2 vol., 1979); E. Hoffman, The Right to be Human: A Biography of Abraham Maslow (1988).

Maslow, Abraham H. (1908–70) An American psychologist who developed a theory of self-actualization from his observations of well-functioning individuals. He is often seen as the leading proponent of the so-called Third Force in psychology—emphasizing humanism and existentialism over behaviourism and Freudianism. See also NEEDS, HIERARCHY OF.

Maslow, Abraham Harold (1908–70). Psychologist and theorist of human personality. He proposed ‘a hierarchical prepotency of basic needs’, goals to which we address ourselves in roughly the same order, with one desire rapidly succeeding another when the first is satisfied: physiological, safety, love, esteem, self-actualization. The self-actualized person exhibits unusual degrees of detachment and self-dependence. S/he also achieves peak-experiences in greater number, which take the individual far beyond the ordinary levels of striving to achieve more proximate goals. He argued that religions derive from founders who have sustained extended peak-experiences.