ADPCA China Hub · First Edition
2025 China Hub
A gathering space for everyone who speaks Chinese and loves the Person-Centered Approach.
- Date
- 2025.06.28 – 06.29
- Format
- Beijing time (GMT+8) · Fully online · Zoom
This was the first time ADPCA had a China Hub. After communicating with ADPCA, we organized this gathering space for everyone who speaks Chinese and loves the Person-Centered Approach—no hierarchy, everyone has an equal voice. Over two days, six speakers offered authentic shares ranging from personal growth to clinical theory, with encounter groups running throughout.
2
Duration
June 28 (Sat) – 29 (Sun), fully online
6
Presentations
From personal-growth narratives to Difficult Process theory, covering diverse perspectives
4
Encounter Groups
Running through both days, the enduring core of the conference
¥100
Registration Fee
Includes all presentations, workshops, and encounter groups; reductions available for those in need
About This Edition
The ADPCA annual conference is a unique way to experience and learn about the Person-Centered Approach (PCA) and Client-Centered Therapy (CCT). Held once a year, it aims to offer participants opportunities for self and professional development, allowing attendees to express themselves freely.
The experiential aspect of the conference includes large group meetings (encounter groups) every day and regular small groups; both are central to the conference. The academic quality is equally strong, with person-centered practitioners, trainers, and students from diverse cultural and professional backgrounds offering workshops, lectures, discussion groups, and practice demonstrations.
Unlike most traditional associations, ADPCA has no hierarchical structure; all members have the right to share their views and have an equal voice in decision-making. After communicating with ADPCA, in 2025 we specially established the China Hub, organizing this gathering space for everyone who speaks Chinese and loves the Person-Centered Approach.
Special Notes
- 01At the ADPCA conference, all speakers and participants have equal rights to engage; speakers' views do not represent those of the organizing team or the Carl Rogers Center.
- 02Speakers and other participants are treated equally regarding fees; all pay a 100 RMB registration fee. If you face financial difficulties, you may contact the organizing team to discuss a reduction.
- 03The ADPCA conference aims to provide a space for exchange and expression; encounter groups, workshops, and presentations are all forms, with none emphasized or diminished.
Conference Schedule
June 28Sat
June 29Sun
All activities take place online via Zoom, with live captioning provided.
Presentation Introductions
A Client's Growth: How the Person-Centered Approach Helped Me
白亦初
A person-centered client over a span of 13 years; lived experience of Asperger's, ADHD, and depression.
In my twenties, my counselor introduced me to Carl Rogers' On Becoming a Person. As someone with Asperger's, I then had severe alexithymia and struggled to sense my own and others' emotions. Rogers' seven stages of psychotherapy gave me a frame for understanding myself—What is my phenomenal field? How does my perceptual field work? How does sensing all this connect to my mental health? Gradually, I developed my own approach from these reflections.
Localizing the Person-Centered Approach
吴瑾、谢茜怡、张婉璐
Wu Jin, person-centered counselor; Xie Xiyi, LL.B., person-centered oriented counselor, practicing art healing; Zhang Wanlu, Deputy Director of the Shaanxi Provincial Education Society Family-School Collaborative Education Research Center, expert instructor in mental health and family education for national and provincial training programs, M.A. in Psychology from Central China Normal University, person-centered oriented counselor.
How can person-centered ideas help us better understand ourselves and make decisions? Through real personal stories, we show how the person-centered approach functions across different life stages—from confusion about career planning to challenges in professional development, from study to building a family. What we share is neither pure theoretical discussion nor simple personal narrative; we hope that real cases and reflection can help listeners more deeply understand the practical meaning of person-centered ideas.
Person-Centered Therapy and Severe Psychological Difficulties — Difficult Process Theory
Margaret Warner
A leading person-centered theorist, in 2022 she received the Eleanor Criswell Hanna Award from Division 32 of the American Psychological Association for her contributions to humanistic psychology through her Difficult Process theory.
Introducing how client-centered therapy works with clients experiencing fragile states (emotional isolation or intense emotional reactions), dissociation (dissociative identity disorder), psychosis, and other severe psychological difficulties. (Interpretation provided)
Person-Centered Parent–Child Communication — P.E.T. Parent Effectiveness Training
胡蝶
Over ten years of personal-growth experience, former participant in long-term humanistic training, with extensive practical experience applying person-centered ideas in family education and parent–child communication, long engaged in parent-effectiveness training, and continuously leading parent growth support groups.
Understanding P.E.T. Parent Effectiveness Training; how to hold boundaries in family communication; resolving family conflicts from a person-centered perspective; how to support parent groups using person-centered ideas. Format: speaker sharing + live discussion + case study/practice.
Person-Centered Case Conceptualization
吴今
Person-centered psychologist, supervisor, and teacher. Teaches doctoral-level person-centered therapy courses in the United States, including case conceptualization.
Case conceptualization is now a common requirement in the counseling profession. In person-centered counseling, case conceptualization is not used to analyze the client's problems or to devise a treatment plan; rather, it seeks to understand the client's experience from within, deepening the counselor's understanding of the person.
Foundational Training Model for Humanistic Counselors
臧伟胜
Humanistic-oriented psychological counselor, M.A. in Applied Psychology from Shanghai Normal University, US Focusing-Oriented Therapist (FOT). Many years of experience in counseling and lecturing, specially appointed psychology mentor at Fudan University, Shanghai Senior Cadre University, Xingwei College, and other institutions.
Introducing a verbatim-based foundational training model for humanistic counseling, centered on Rogers' core conditions and common techniques of humanistic therapy, to help trainees understand and assimilate the fundamentals of counseling. The speaker has explored this approach for four years and trained over a hundred new counselors with notable results.
Reflections from Participants
“Here I met realness. Real individuals, vivid lives. Everyone expressed themselves and made space for each other to express. This respect felt like a big hug, as if saying, welcome.”
“ADPCA gave me great support. Because it allowed me to participate, not participate, or choose how much to participate. It allowed me to seek my own peace and relaxation, and it allowed me not to put it first on my schedule.”
“Thank you for holding this event. It let me feel, not just at the theoretical level, the importance of self-care and empathy!”
“So glad to meet you. So lucky to have crossed paths with you. Thank you, fate.”
“So such a beautiful place still exists in this world. Isn't this what I've been searching for? All of this feels as real as a dream. I truly hope we can have more exchanges and sharing after this. The conference has ended, but the connection between us will not. Looking forward to the future.”
“Through these days of encounter group exchange, I realized that as social beings we need to connect with others. No matter what you are sharing, I will be here watching you. In this group, I felt that everyone was seen.”
The 2025 ADPCA Conference China Hub was our gathering—let us work together to create opportunities for authentic encounters among every unique person.
Authors | 2025 ADPCA China Hub Organizing Team · Editor | Julia