Psychology Motivation Concepts

Motivation

• Motivation is the process that initiates, directs, and sustains behavior to fulfill physical or psychological needs or wants.
• Extrinsic motivation arises from external rewards or consequences.
• Intrinsic motivation stems from internal factors like enjoyment, challenge, and satisfaction.

Instinct Approaches to Motivation

• Instinct refers to innate, biologically determined patterns of behavior in both humans and animals.
• Instinct approach to motivation suggests that people are guided by instincts similar to those observed in animals.

Drive-Reduction Theory of Motivation

• Need is a requirement for survival, such as food or water.
• Drive is a psychological tension and arousal resulting from a need, motivating the organism to act.
• Drive-reduction theory posits that behavior aims to fulfill needs and reduce tension and arousal.
• Primary drives involve basic physiological needs like hunger and thirst.
• Acquired (secondary) drives are learned through experiences or conditioning, like the need for money or social approval.
• Homeostasis refers to the body's tendency to maintain a steady state.

McClelland’s Theory - Three Types of Needs

• Need for achievement (nAch): A strong desire to succeed in achieving goals, both realistic and challenging.
• Need for affiliation (nAff): The need for friendly social interactions and relationships.
• Need for power (nPow): The need to have control or influence over others.

Arousal Approach to Motivation

• Stimulus motive is an unlearned motive that increases stimulation, driven by curiosity.
• Arousal theory suggests individuals seek to maintain an optimal level of tension by increasing or decreasing stimulation.
• Yerkes-Dodson law: Performance is related to arousal. Moderate levels lead to better performance compared to excessively low or high arousal.
• Sensation seeker: An individual needing more arousal than the average person.

Incentive Approaches to Motivation

• Incentives are factors that attract or lure people into action.
• Incentive approaches explain behavior as a response to external stimuli and their rewarding properties.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

• Self-actualization: Achieving full human potential after satisfying lower-level needs.
• Peak experiences: Moments of temporary self-actualization in a person's life.

Hunger: Bodily Causes

• Insulin and glucagon: Pancreatic hormones regulating blood glucose levels.
  • Insulin lowers blood glucose levels.
  • Glucagon increases blood glucose levels.
• Hypothalamus: Plays a role in hunger, responding to glucose and insulin levels.
• Leptin: A hormone signaling the hypothalamus that the body has had enough food, reducing appetite and increasing feelings of fullness.
• Weight set point: The specific weight the body strives to maintain.
• Basal metabolic rate (BMR): Energy expenditure at rest.

Hunger: Social Cues

• Cultural customs: Influence meal timings and food choices.
• Food preferences: Vary across individuals and cultures.
• Food as a comfort device: Using food as a coping mechanism for stress or unpleasant emotions.

Obesity

• Obesity is a condition where body weight exceeds 20% above the ideal weight for height.
• Biological causes of obesity: Heredity, hormones, and slowing metabolism with age.
• Overeating: A significant factor in obesity, especially in developed countries with readily available food and Westernized lifestyles.

Elements of Emotion

• Emotion is the feeling aspect of consciousness characterized by:
  • Physical arousal: Physiological changes like heart rate or breathing.
  • Behavioral expression: Outward expressions like facial expressions or body language.
  • Inner awareness: Subjective experience of feelings.

The Amygdala and Emotion

• The amygdala is a brain structure involved in processing emotional stimuli, particularly fear conditioning.
• Emotional stimuli reach the amygdala via two pathways:
  • Fast, crude “low road” (subcortical): Rapid, immediate response.
  • Slower but more involved cortical “high road”: More detailed and complex processing.

Other Brain Regions Involved in Emotion

• Hemispheres: Specific hemispheres may be more dominant in processing certain emotions.
• Frontal lobes: Involved in higher-level emotional control and regulation.
• Anterior cingulate cortex: Plays a role in emotional awareness and decision-making.
• Lateral orbitofrontal cortex: Involved in processing reward and emotional value.

Facial Expressions and Emotion

• Facial expressions: While they can vary across cultures, certain expressions appear universal.
• Display rules: Cultural norms governing when and how emotions are expressed.

Labeling Emotion

• Labeling emotion: Attributing a label or description to a subjective feeling.

Theories of Emotion

• Common-sense theory of emotion: Stimulus leads to emotion, which then causes bodily arousal.
• James-Lange theory of emotion: Physiological reaction leads to the labeling of an emotion.
• Cannon-Bard theory of emotion: Physiological reaction and emotion occur simultaneously.
• Cognitive arousal theory: Both physical arousal and labeling of arousal based on environmental cues must occur before an emotion is experienced.
• Facial feedback hypothesis: Facial expressions provide feedback to the brain, influencing and intensifying the emotion being experienced.
• Cognitive-mediational theory: An individual's interpretation of a stimulus triggers a physical response and emotional reaction.

Explore the key concepts of motivation in psychology, including intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, the instinct approaches, and drive-reduction theory. This quiz will challenge your understanding of how various factors influence behavior and needs.