Transcript Intro to Motivation

Unit 8: Motivation
WHY?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0zVPZBykSE
What moves people to action?
• Pursuit of pleasure and avoidance of pain
– Counterproductive?
• Drug use? Studying?
Freud
• Basic sexual/ aggressive
instincts operate
unconsciously
– dreams
– fantasies
– slips of the tongue
Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow
• Basic tendency toward growth to master our
lives
Martin Seligman
• Emphasized cognitive factors
in motivation and emotion
– How do you explain your
successes and failures?
Human sexual nature?
• Shows relationship between psychological and
biological
– How did we go from caveman to Kimye?
What does it all come down to?
• Drives/Incentives/Homeostasis/Optimum Arousal
Need
(food/water)
Drive
(hunger/thirst)
• Pushed by need and pulled by incentive
Drive-reducing
behavior
(eating/drinking)
Close your eyes…
• Think about the future
– Hopes?
– What do you see?
What is hope?
• Agency: willpower or energy to get towards a
goal (choice)
• Pathways: perceived ability to generate
routes to achieve that goal
Hope Index
•
• Add items 2, 9, 10, and 12 = agency
• Add items 1, 4, 6, and 8 = pathways
• Add agency + pathway
• Mean for each is 12.5 (total 25)
• High on hope scale = pursue greater number
of life goals and tend to be more successful in
achieving those goals
– Interpret obstacles as “life challenges” rather than
threats
– React to obstacles with less stress and less
increase in blood pressure
– Hopeful women report less pain in childbirth
– Higher life satisfaction, self-esteem, optimistic
So why are you here?
Motivation Theories
1. Evolutionary Theory
A. Early instinct theories: fixed, genetic programs
behavior
1.
2.
3.
4.
William James Principles of Psychology
William McDougall – 18 Instincts
Migrating behaviors and mating displays of birds
Examples in human behaviors, including rooting,
sucking, and grasping
B. ethology: relating behavior to features of
environment
1. Nest building (inherited dispositions)
2. Instincts reflect adaptation to environment
3. Development and expression can vary
(seasons, food, mates)
4. Sign stimuli shapes/triggers behavior
C. Charles Darwin’s evolutionary theory
1. Natural selection
2. Emotions are based on instincts
D. Modern evolutionary psych: predispositions and
probabilities, not instincts
1. Natural selection acts on genes expressed in
particular circumstances
2. Selection takes place at the individual level; it is not
“survival” in the literal sense
3. Behaviors adaptive in one time or place may not be
adaptive to others (affluence and food choice)
2. Arousal Theory
A. Motivation: to achieve and maintain a
certain level of arousal
•
•
Animals seek activities that create levels of
physiological arousal
Theories differ in assumptions about whether
arousal is negative or positive
B. Drive-reduction theory (Clark Hull)
1. Behavior originates from physiological need for
food, water, air.
•
•
These needs create tension (irritation) away from
homeostasis
When needs are met (homeostasis), arousal is low;
needs give rise to drives
• Drive: internal state of tension that motivates an
organism to engage in activities that reduces
tension
Restore equil.
•Blood vessels in skin dilate to
remove heat
•Person sweats
•Turn down furnace
•Remove Sweater
Temp. too high
Comfortable range for body temp centered at 98.6°F
Temp. too low
•Blood vessels in skin constrict to
conserve heat
•Person shivers
•Turn up furnace
•Put on sweater
Restore equil.
C. Animals are motivated to reduce the drive
•
•
•
Behaviors (eating, drinking, breathing) reduce need
by restoring homeostasis
Behaviors are reinforced/strengthened thru drive
reduction
Acquired motivation: stimuli associated with drives
become motivators; stimuli associated with drive
reduction become rewarding
Optimal Arousal
• Why do we feel driven to experience
stimulation?
• Why is there a variety?
• Exploration Inventory
• Sensation Seeking Inventory
3. Optimal Arousal Theory
a. Some nonzero level of arousal is optimal
•
•
Arousal below optimal level motivates behavior to
increase arousal
Arousal above optimal level motivates behavior to
decrease arousal
b. Individual differences
–
–
People vary in the ways they seek levels of arousal
Sensation-seeking is an aspect of personality related to
risky behavior
Just how sensation-seeking are you?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iuv__-nyO1M
Four Types of Sensation Seeking
• Peaks in late teens and early 20’s
– Higher in men than women/60% genetic
• Categories:
1. Thrill and adventure seeking
• Skydiving, bungee jumping, race car drivers
2. Experience seeking
• Nonconforming lifestyle, reject middle-class lifestyle: unusual
friends, frequent travel, artistic expression
3. Disinhibition
• Social drinking, partying
4. Boredom susceptibility
• Restless: must… get… out… of… here….
Higher – 7-9pm Patriot Hall Next Thursday 2/12
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCtpAIaOYW0
4. Incentive Theory
• Motivation is produced by need for goal
attainment
A. Need for goal attainment or achievement
may be either intrinsic or extrinsic
•
Feelings vs. material often tangible reinforcers
B. Effect of external reward on intrinsic motivation
1. Providing extrinsic reward for intrinsic motivated
behavior can decrease interest in task
•
•
Overjustification effect: Deci’s puzzle solving experiment
Or school in general – what it was like to go to school in
kindergarten vs. 11th or 12th grade
C. Conditioned incentives
i. Cravings – thru learning environmental stimuli =
craving
i.
ii.
Watch someone eating popcorn = you want popcorn
2. Wanting – motivation to approach incentive
•
If you have a cold, you may want cold medicine but not
like it
5. Cognitive Consistency Theory
• Motivation for thoughts to be consistent with
behavior
– Cognitive dissonance
– Self-perception theory: an individual perceives his
or her own behavior and forms beliefs and
attitudes that are consistent with it
Self Perception Theory
• A man is asked whether he likes wheat bread
and replies, “I must like it; I’m always eating
it.” His wife would say the same thing.
• Introspection/justification is a poor guide due
to weak cues
– Outside observer assumes another’s internal
states
6. Humanistic Theory
A. Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs
B. Csikszentmihalyl’s flow
1. deep, authentic involvement in meaningful
activities
2. Requires skilled control over instinctive drives
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
High Challenge
Flow
Anxiety
Low Skill
High Skill
Apathy
Boredom
Low Challenge