Reading List

Authors Like Carl Rogers

Carl Rogers was born in Oak Park, Illinois, on 8 January 1902. He spent about two years at Union Theological Seminary before moving to Teachers College, Columbia, where he took his PhD in 1931, and by 1930 he was working for the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children in Rochester, New York. In 1945 he set up a counselling centre at the University of Chicago; in 1947 he was elected president of the American Psychological Association. His method asked the therapist for acceptance without judgement — what he called unconditional positive regard — and let the client, not the expert, lead. On 30 November 1956 he and B. F. Skinner set out their disagreement about the control of human behaviour in the journal Science. A 1982 survey of American and Canadian psychologists named him the most influential psychotherapist in history. The ten writers below share his question: what helps a person become more fully themselves?

By Lisanne Swart · 10 authors · Psychology · Psychotherapy · Humanistic · Updated October 2026

Quick answer

If you love Carl Rogers, start with Abraham Maslow, the other founding voice of humanistic psychology. Irvin Yalom shows what a therapy built on the relationship looks like from the therapist’s chair, and Marshall Rosenberg, who studied under Rogers, turned his listening into a method anyone can practise. Further down are the philosopher Rogers debated in public and the behaviourist who argued the opposite case.

10 authors like Carl Rogers

01
Psychology before the schools

William James

American · The Principles of Psychology (1890), The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902)

James was born in New York City in 1842, the elder brother of the novelist Henry James, and died in New Hampshire in 1910. The Principles of Psychology helped found the discipline in America; The Varieties of Religious Experience takes personal accounts of faith and conversion seriously as evidence, and Pragmatism (1907) judges ideas by what they do in a life.

The American ancestor of Rogers’s respect for experience as the person reports it. Both took religious experience seriously as a psychologist’s subject, and both write for the general reader.

— Lisanne

Every book by William James →

02
The philosopher of meeting

Martin Buber

Austrian-Israeli · I and Thou (1923)

Buber was born in Vienna in 1878 and died in Jerusalem in 1965. Ich und Du (I and Thou) distinguishes between treating another person as an object and meeting them as a whole person. In 1957 he and Rogers held a public dialogue that is still studied as a case of what genuine dialogue requires.

The philosophy underneath Rogers’s idea of the therapeutic relationship. Their 1957 conversation is the best place to see where a philosopher of relationship and a therapist of relationship meet and where they part.

— Lisanne

Every book by Martin Buber →

03
The good-enough parent

Donald Winnicott

English · The Child, the Family and the Outside World (1964), Playing and Reality (1971)

Winnicott was born in Plymouth in 1896 and died in London in 1971. A paediatrician and psychoanalyst, he gave the ideas of the good-enough parent, the holding environment and the true and false self, and between 1943 and 1966 he gave more than sixty talks to parents on BBC radio.

The British counterpart to Rogers’s belief that people grow when the conditions around them are safe enough. Winnicott comes from psychoanalysis rather than humanism, which makes the overlap more striking.

— Lisanne
04
The opposite case

B. F. Skinner

American · Walden Two (1948), Science and Human Behavior (1953), Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971)

Skinner was born in Susquehanna, Pennsylvania, in 1904 and died in 1990. The leading behaviourist of his time, he argued that behaviour is shaped by its consequences; Walden Two imagines a community designed on those principles, and Beyond Freedom and Dignity argues that ideas of free will stand in the way of a better society. In 1956 he and Rogers published their debate in Science.

The writer who argues most directly with Rogers. Where Rogers trusts the person to find their own direction, Skinner asks who should design the environment that shapes them. Reading both makes Rogers’s position much sharper.

— Lisanne
05
Love as a practice

Erich Fromm

German-American · Escape from Freedom (1941), The Art of Loving (1956), To Have or to Be? (1976)

Fromm was born in Frankfurt in 1900, joined the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research in 1930 and died in Switzerland in 1980. Escape from Freedom asks why people give up freedom for authority; The Art of Loving argues that love is a skill to be learned rather than a feeling one falls into.

The same humanist faith in growth, set against a social background Rogers mostly left aside. Fromm suits readers who want Rogers’s warmth with more politics.

— Lisanne

Every book by Erich Fromm →

06
Humanistic psychology’s other founder

Abraham Maslow

American · Motivation and Personality (1954), Toward a Psychology of Being (1962)

Maslow was born in Brooklyn in 1908 and died in California in 1970. His 1943 paper “A Theory of Human Motivation” introduced the hierarchy of needs, and he named the new field humanistic psychology. The famous pyramid diagram does not appear in his own published work, and later researchers have found that people share his needs without following his strict order.

The closest match. Maslow’s self-actualisation and Rogers’s fully functioning person are two descriptions of the same hope: that people move towards growth when their basic needs are met.

— Lisanne
07
The existentialist who pushed back

Rollo May

American · The Meaning of Anxiety (1950), Love and Will (1969), The Courage to Create (1975)

May was born in Ada, Ohio, in 1909 and died in 1994. Like Rogers he studied at Union Theological Seminary, where Paul Tillich became a close friend and influence. Late in his career he criticised humanistic psychology for a naive belief in people as inherently good, and he wrote an open letter to Rogers.

A friend of the movement who complicates it. May keeps anxiety, will and the capacity for evil in view, where Rogers keeps his eye on growth, and reading May makes clear what Rogers’s optimism leaves out.

— Lisanne

Every book by Rollo May →

08
Therapy from the therapist’s chair

Irvin Yalom

American · Existential Psychotherapy (1980), Love’s Executioner (1989), The Gift of Therapy (2001)

Yalom was born in Washington, D.C., in 1931 and joined the psychiatry faculty at Stanford in 1963. The Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy (1970) became a standard text; Love’s Executioner tells ten stories from his practice, and The Gift of Therapy is a short book of advice to younger therapists.

The writer who shows the relationship at work in real sessions, with all the therapist’s doubts left in. Yalom is the natural next step for readers who liked the case material in On Becoming a Person.

— Lisanne

Every book by Irvin Yalom →

09
Rogers’s listening, as a method

Marshall Rosenberg

American · Nonviolent Communication (1999)

Rosenberg was born in Canton, Ohio, in 1934 and died in 2015. He took his PhD in clinical psychology at the University of Wisconsin in 1961, studying under Rogers, and founded the Center for Nonviolent Communication in 1984. Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Compassion sets out a practice of observing, naming feelings and needs, and making requests.

Rogers’s empathy and acceptance turned into steps that anyone can practise at home or at work. Suits readers who want to use the ideas, not just understand them.

— Lisanne

Every book by Marshall Rosenberg →

10
Shame, acceptance, courage

Brené Brown

American · The Gifts of Imperfection (2010), Daring Greatly (2012), Atlas of the Heart (2021)

Brown was born in San Antonio, Texas, in 1965 and holds an endowed chair at the University of Houston’s Graduate College of Social Work. Her 2010 TEDx Houston talk, “The Power of Vulnerability”, made her research on shame and vulnerability widely known.

A present-day writer working on the problem Rogers named: people hide the self they fear will not be accepted. Brown writes for a wide audience in a personal, conversational voice.

— Lisanne

Every book by Brené Brown →

Where to start if you loved Carl Rogers

If you want humanistic psychology’s other founder, read Maslow.

Toward a Psychology of Being (1962) is the companion to On Becoming a Person.

If you want to see therapy in practice, read Yalom.

Love’s Executioner (1989) tells ten stories from his consulting room.

If you want to practise Rogers’s listening, read Rosenberg.

Nonviolent Communication (1999) is written by one of Rogers’s own students.

If you want the opposite argument, read Skinner.

Beyond Freedom and Dignity (1971) is the strongest case against Rogers’s trust in the self.

If you are new to Rogers himself, start with On Becoming a Person.

The 1961 collection is his most readable book; A Way of Being (1980) is the later, more personal one.

Frequently asked questions about authors like Carl Rogers

Who writes like Carl Rogers?

Abraham Maslow, Irvin Yalom and Marshall Rosenberg are the closest matches, with Martin Buber and Erich Fromm on the philosophical side.

What should I read after On Becoming a Person?

Abraham Maslow’s Toward a Psychology of Being (1962) or Irvin Yalom’s Love’s Executioner (1989).

Which Carl Rogers book should I read first?

On Becoming a Person (1961), the collection of essays and talks that is the best way in.

Is Carl Rogers like Abraham Maslow?

Both are central figures of humanistic psychology and both believed people move towards growth. Maslow built a theory of motivation; Rogers built a practice of therapy.

What did Carl Rogers and B. F. Skinner disagree about?

Whether human behaviour should be shaped by design or left to the person’s own direction. They published their debate in Science in November 1956.

Is there a new Carl Rogers book?

Rogers died in 1987. The most recent book with his name on it is On Becoming an Effective Teacher (2013), written with Harold C. Lyon and Reinhard Tausch.

Sources

List last reviewed 31 October 2026.

Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021. Every comparison here is a judgement about method and subject, not an algorithmic match. See more on her personal bookshelf.

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