Contributor – Jacqueline Fawcett
January 19, 2024

Author – Martha Raile Alligood

Year First published – 1991

Major Concepts

Creativity
Actualization
Empathy

Typology

Theory

Brief Description

This theory, derived from Rogers’ theory of accelerating change, asserts positive relations among creativity, actualization and empathy, as well as the assertion that the combination of creativity and actualization account for more variance in empathy then either creativity or actualization alone (Alligood, 1991).

Primary Source

Alligood, M. R. (1991). Testing Rogers’ theory of accelerating change. The relationships among creativity, actualization, and empathy in persons 18 to 92 years of age. Western Journal of Nursing Research, 13(1), 84–96. doi: 10.1177/019394599101300106

See also Butcher, H. K., & Malinski, V. M. (2010). Martha E. Rogers science of unitary human beings. In M. E. Parker & M.C. Smith, Nursing theories and nursing practice (3rd ed., pp. 253-276). F.A. Davis.

About the Author

Dr. Alligood has retired from her position as Professor, College of Nursing, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC. She is co-editor and then editor of several editions of Nursing Theorists and Their Work, and the founding editor, then co-editor, and then sole editor of Nursing Theory: Utilization and Application. Dr. Alligood also is the interviewer for Volumes 2 and 3 of the The Nurse Theorist: Portraits of Excellence series of DVDs produced by the Fuld Institute of Technology for Nursing Education (FITNE).