MARTHA ROGERS’ THEORY SCIENCE OF

UNITARY HUMAN BEINGS

Jonah Nyachae
MARTHA
(1914-1994)
ROGERS “Professional practice in nursing
seeks to promote symphonic
interaction between man and
environment, to strengthen the
coherence and integrity of the
human field, and to direct and
redirect patterning of the human and
environmental fields for realization
of maximum health potential”
-Rogers, 1970
Introduction

 Martha Rogers’ theory Science of Unitary

Human Beings is mainly focusing on the
four concepts: energy fields, openness,
pattern, and pandimensional and the three
concepts of homeodynamics: integrality,
resonancy, and helicy.
Objectives

1. Describe the background of Martha Rogers

2. Explain the philosophical underpinnings of
science of unitary human beings
3. Discuss assumptions, concepts and relationship
of science of unitary human beings
4. Critique usefulness of science of unitary human
beings in practice
5. Explain testability and parsimony of the theory
6. Explain the value in extending nursing research
7. Give an example of research study utilizing
need theory
 Background of the theorist
i) Early life
• Rogers was born on May 12, 1914 in Dallas,
Texas; sharing a birthday with Florence
Nightingale
• She was the eldest of four children of Bruce
Taylor Rogers and Lucy Mulholland Keener
Rogers.
• She had a thirst for knowledge at an early age.
• She found Kindergarten to be exciting & had
love & passion for books fostered by her parents.
 Cont’
• Her father introduced her to the public library at the
age of 3 where she loved story time.
• She liked to go off by herself with a book.
• And by the fourth grade, she had read every book in
her school library
• She loved various topics like anthropology,
archaeology, cosmology, ethnography, astronomy,
ethics, psychology, eastern philosophy & aesthetics.
• By her senior year she had completed all the high
school math courses & was taking a college level
algebra course as the only female in the class.
 ii) Education
• Initially, Martha wanted to do a course that would
contribute to social welfare i.e. law & medicine.
• However, she only studied medicine for a couple
of years b’coz women in medicine were not
desirable
• Instead, Rogers along with her fried entered a
local hospital that had a school of nursing.
• But just like Nightingale, her parents weren’t
really any happier over that decision.
• 1931 - attended the University of Tennessee taking
undergraduate science courses for 2 years
• 1936- attended nursing diploma programme at
Knoxville General Hospital
• 1937- completed a BSN in Public Health
Nursing from George Peabody College
(Nashville)
• 1945- earned master’s degree in public health
nursing supervision from the Teacher’s College
Columbia University
• 1951- returned East earning a M.P.H. From the
Johns Hopkins University while teaching at
Catholic University
Cont’
• 1954- continued on at Johns Hopkins and
completed a Doctorate in nursing
• 1963 she edited the second journal in nursing i.e.
Nursing science
• 1970- published An Introduction to the
Theoretical Basis of Nursing
• Rogers’ publication include three books and
more than 200 articles
• Died on March 13, 1994
 Publications of Martha Rogers
• She completed her studies in 1954 and the title of
her dissertation was “The association of maternal
and fetal factors with the development of behavior
problems among elementary school children.”
• Theoretical basis of nursing (Rogers, 1970)
• Nursing science and art :a prospective
(Rogers,1988)
• Nursing: science of unitary, irreducible, human
• beings (Rogers,1990)
• Vision of space based nursing (Rogers, 1990)
 Theory
• Martha Rogers developed her model of unitary
human beings based on concepts of systems
theory.
• Rogers viewed human being & his environment as
integral that cannot be separated.
• She believed that human & his environment are a
single unit & therefore, must be studied together.
• She also felt that human beings & their
environment evolve, change, & move ahead
together &after the change occurs, both humans &
their environment cannot return to their former
stage (George 2002).
 Philosophical Underpinnings Of Science Of
Unitary Human Beings
• The Science of Unitary and Irreducible Human
Beings started as an abstract theory
• It was synthesized from theories of numerous
sciences; therefore, it was deductively derived.
• Von Bertalanffy’s theory on general systems, which
posited that open systems are characterized by
constant interaction with the environment was key.
• The work of Rapoport provided a background on
open systems, and the work of Herrick contributed
to the premise of evolution of human nature
(McEwen & Wills,2017).
 Cont’
• Rogers’ synthesis of the works of these scientists
formed the basis of her proposition that human
systems are open systems, embedded in larger,
open environmental systems.
• She also brought in other concepts such as :-
a) time is unidirectional
b) living systems have pattern and organization
c) that man is a sentient, thinking being capable of
awareness, feeling, and choosing.
 Cont’
• From all these theories, and from her personal
study of nature, Rogers (1970) developed her
original Theory of Unitary Man.
• She continuously refined and elaborated her theory,
which she retitled Science of Unitary Humans
(Rogers, 1986)
• finally, shortly before her death, the Science of
Unitary and Irreducible Human Beings (Rogers,
1994).
Major assumptions, concepts and relationship
of science of unitary human beings
 a) Assumptions
• Human being is considered as whole which cannot be
viewed as subparts
• The life process of human is irreparable and one way
i.e. From birth to death
• Health and illness are the continuous expression of
the life process
• The energy flows freely between the individual &
environment
• Human being possesses the ability to think, imagine,
sense, feel, and can use language for expression
• Human beings have the ability to adapt according to
the new changes in the environment
Concepts
• In Rogers’ work, the unitary human being and the
environment are the focus of nursing practice.
• Rogers’s concepts is based on her assumption
about the person and his interaction with the
environment.
• She used energy fields, openness, pattern, &
pan dimensionality as building blocks to dev. her
model (Rogers, 1970)
• Rogers also derived three other components for
the model, which served as a basis of her work
(Rogers, 1990).
 Cont’
• These were based on principles of homeodynamics
and were termed resonancy, helicy, and integrality
(Rogers, 1990)
• Her concepts were from the idea that the universe
is an open system within which individuals & their
env. interact independently & continuously (Tomey
& Alligod 2006).
• According to Rogers, all the human beings are
viewed as an integral part of universe.
 Concepts cont’
• And ‘energy fields’ are the 1st basic units of both
living and non-living things.
• These energy fields provide guidance to perceive
human being & environment as whole.
• She identified man and environment as the
energy fields.
• The energy fields continuously vary in intensity,
density, and extent.
• Nursing action is directed towards patterning
and maintaining these energy fields.
 Concept cont’
• The second building block is ‘openness’
• It says that the energy fields, i.e., humans & env. are
constantly exchanging their energy.
• The energy flow between these two fields does not
have any boundary that inhibits the flow of energy.
• The third building block is the ‘pattern’.
• Rogers explains it as a distinguishing characteristic
of an energy field.
• It is perceived as a single wave.
• Pattern is a character that gives identity to the field.
 Cont’

• The fourth building block is ‘pan

dimensionality’ which is a non-linear domain,
without any spatial or temporal attributes; its
boundaries are imaginary and fluctuate
constantly.
• (http://currentnursing.com/nursing_theory/unit
ary_human_beings.html)
cont’
Principles Of Homeodynamics
• Rogers stated the principles of homeodynamics
are based on the above building blocks.
• These principles help individuals to understand
life and the mechanisms affecting life.
• They also provide knowledge on how to
intervene and redirect the clients.
• In other words homeodynamics refers to the
balance between the dynamic life process and
environment
 cont’
• These principles help to view human as unitary
human being.
• The three separate principles are integrality,
resonance, and helicy
 Principles Of Integrality
• Energy fields are dynamic and constantly
interact with the human and environment,
which affects our environment and vice versa
• This principle is divided into two i.e.,
a) reciprocity (wholeness, openness, continuous,
and mutual interaction between human being
and his environment)
b) synchrony (simultaneous change in human and
environmental fields) e.g. the child playing in
the sun on a bright summer day gets a sun
burn.
Cont’
• This is the process of interaction between sun
and a child.
• However, the mutual process between the
child and the sun occurs simultaneously, where
he gets Vitamin D along with the ongoing
effects of radiation (George 2002).
• This is the ongoing mutual process and is the
nature of human beings and their environment
Cont’
Principles Of Resonancy
• According to Rogers, resonancy is continuous
change from the lower to higher frequency wave
pattern in the energy fields.
• Humans are perceived as wave patterns & a
variety of life rhythms i.e. sleep – wake rhythms,
hormonal levels, & fluctuating emotional states
can be linked to the wave patterns.
• The change occurring in these are from lower to
higher frequency
Cont’
Principles Of Helicy
• Any minute change in the environment which
leads to ripple effect i.e. results in a larger
changes in other field
• This change is constant, unpredictable and
there are many factors which mutually interact
and cause the change
 Relationships
• Among the relationships that Rogers posited are that
all things are integral in that their energy fields are
in continuous mutual process and that pattern is the
manifestation of the integrality of each entity and of
the environmental energy field (Rogers,
• 1986). Other major relationships within Rogers’
work are contained in the following
• statements:
 Metaparadigm In Nursing
 Person
 A unitary human being is open systems which
continuous interact with environment.
 A person cannot viewed as parts, it should be
considered as a whole
 Environment
 It includes the entire energy field other than a
person
 These energy fields are irreducible, not limited
by space and time, identified by its pattern &
organization
 Health
 It is determined by the interaction between energy
fields i.e. Human and environment
 Bad interaction or misplacing of the energy leads to
illness
 Nursing
 Both science and art
 it constantly maintains the energy field which is
conductive for patient
 Nursing action directs the interaction of person & env.
to maximize health potential
 Explain testability and parsimony of the
theory
a) Parsimony
• Although the concepts seems quite difficult to
understand it is a parsimonious theory
• Parsimony refers to theory based on simple
assumption but proves very valuable
 Cont’
b) Testability
• Rogerian theory has been used in many research works
and has been found testable and applicable in research
• However many limitations have been identified by
researchers such as difficult to understand concepts,
lack of operational definitions and instruments for
proper evaluation of the instruments
• Overal Rogerian science of unitary human beings is
considered complex but still efforts are going on to
clarify the complex concets
NURSING PROCESS ACCORDING
TO SUHB

MUTUAL
ASSESSMENT EVALUATION
PATTERNING
 ASSESSMENT

 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.
 MUTUAL PATTERNING
 It is the proper patterning of the energy fields
between the human and environment

 It is the mutual interaction between the client and

nurse

 Patterning can be done by various alternatives,

educating, empowering, educating, encouraging etc.
Depending on the client’s condition and needs.
 EVALUATION
 Evaluating is done by repeating the pattern appraisal
after the mutual patterning to determine the extents of
dissonance and harmony
Conclusion
 SUHB leads to a new way of seeing the person as a
unitary human being and new style of nursing practice

 This model is applicable in all the setting and every

spheres of life
• CONCLUSION
ENERGY FIELDS
• inevitable part of life
• Human and environment both have energy
which is open i.e. energy can freely flow
between human and environment
OPENNESS
• there is no boundary or barrier that can
inhibit the flow of energy between human and
environment which leads to the continuous
movement or matter of energy
 PATTERN

 is the distinguishing character of the energy field

PANDIMENSIONAL
 Undeviating field which is not constricted by space or
time, it is an infinite domain without boundary
 Reference
George, J. B. (2002). Nursing Theories, A base for
professional nursing practice. USA; A Pearson
Education.
http://currentnursing.com/nursing_theory/unitaryh
u man_beings.html)
McEwen, M., & Wills, E. M. (2017). Theoretical
basis for nursing. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins
Tomey, A. M., & Alligod, M. R. (2006). Nursing
theorists and their work, Philadelphia; Mosby.