Theories of motivation

By Khan

Key word; Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Needs vs. Wants, Maslow's and Alderfer's
Hierarchies, Self-actualization:

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

Abraham
Maslow (1954) presented his theory hierarchy of human needs based on two
factors: first deficiency needs and second growth needs.  In deficiency
needs, one must lower the need before moving to the next higher level. 
When these needs of an individual satisfied, if in future at some point a
deficiency is detected, the individual will remove the deficiency easily. 
The first four levels of attribution are:

Physiological: hunger, thirst, and comforts etc.

Security: need of Safety and Security (out of danger)

Belongingness: Love and Belongingness, affiliation with others,
acceptance by others

Esteem: Get approval and recognition from others for his
achievement, and competency

Self-actualization:

It
is the most important need. It means self-awareness, to know one’s own skills
and weaknesses. The individual focus on fulfilling his dreams on his own potential
and he no longer worry about what others think. At this stage, the individual
is concerned with his own personal growth.

According
to Maslow, an individual is ready to act upon the growth needs if the
deficiency needs are met. 

 Needs vs. Wants

What
is need? And what is difference between needs and wants? Needs are those things
which necessary for one’s life while wants are those for which people desire to
have it but it is not necessary for life. For examples water, food, shelter,
breathing, care, health and basic clothing, etc. are the basic needs for
survival of life. 

The
examples of wants include television, fashion clothing, computers, Internet,
movies, vacations, makeup, outing, mobile, new cars, etc. these are the things
that bring comfort in life and it will improve the standard of life, but these
things are not necessary for survival of life.

Psychologists
believe that needs impact the personality of an individual, for example without
food, water, shelter, and basic clothing, it would drastically impact the personality
of an individual; he would suffer from low self-esteem, and he may not survive.
On the other hand if all these basic things are being met, he will feel more
comfortable in life, which wills make him more secure and confident in life.

But,
What if all the wants were achieved, as is often happened, people get over-confident
or arrogant, acts like superior to others, and children, act like spoiled brats
in this case. So the completion of wants may also affect their personality
badly.

Maslow
considers needs and wants the stages of development of personality; he think,
that people gradually goes through these stages of need and development.
Starting from the bottom, when one need is met at first level, he goes on to
the next need, as a result it bring improvement in personality but, if
something threaten the needs, such as not having food or safety, etc., then an
individual go back down the hierarchy. If the needs are not fulfill, it will
have a bad impact on the personality development. If all the needs are fulfill,
the individual will progress and continue to grow having a good personality.
Maslow believed that an individual do not advance to the next level of needs
until the needs of each level have first been met. For example, if someone is
at the safety level, then he cannot advance to love and belonging level until the
safety and security needs have been met.

Maslow
admitted that not all personalities develop as he proposed in hierarchy. 
While some of personality dimensions might be due to motivational needs, for
example introversion and extroversion.  Considering the
introversion/extraversion dimension of personality, which suggests there may be
two side of each level that differentiate how people relate to each set of
needs. Some personalities might relate more to one dimension than the
other. 

A Reorganization of Maslow's
and Alderfer's Hierarchies
 

Maslow's
work on Hierarchy of Needs lead to additional attempts to develop a grand
theory of motivation, a theory that would added all the factors influencing
motivation into one model of motivation.  The example provided by Leonard,
Beauvais, and Scholl (1999).  They proposed five additional factors for the
sources of motivation:

1.    Instrumental Motivation (rewards and punishment)

2.     Intrinsic
Process Motivation (enjoyment and fun)

3.    Goal Internalization (self-determined values and
goals)

4.    Internal Self Concept-based Motivation (matching
behavior with internally-developed ideal self)

5.    External Self Concept-based Motivation (matching
behavior with externally-developed ideal self) 

Individuals
are influenced by all these five factors; the effect of change could be
different by degrees in different individual and specific situations. 

Factors
one and five are both very motivational. The main difference between the
two factors are that the individuals who are instrumentally motivated, they are
influenced more by immediate actions or change in the environment (e.g. operant
conditioning) whereas self-concept motivated individuals are  influenced more by their constructions of
external demands and ideals.

Factors
number two, three, and four are more internally-oriented.  In the
intrinsic process, the specific tasks are interesting, funny and provide more immediate
internal reinforcement for motivation. The person with a goal internalization
is more task oriented (e.g., humanistic theory) in this theory the person with
an internal self-concept orientation is more influenced by the individual
constructions of an ideal self.

Resources

AACAP and David Pruitt. Your
Child: Emotional, Behavioral, and Cognitive Development from Infancy through
Pre-Adolescence. New York: Harper Collins, 1998.

AACAP and David Pruitt. Your
Adolescent: Emotional, Behavioral, and Cognitive Development from Early
Adolescence through the Teen Years. New York: Harper Collins, 1999.

Allen, Bem P. Personality
Theories: Development, Growth, and Diversity. Harlow, UK: Allyn &
Bacon, 2002.

Berger, Elizabeth. Raising
Children With Character: Parents, Trust, and the Development of Personal
Integrity. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1999.

Erikson, Erik. Childhood
and Society. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1993.

Erikson, Erik. The Erik
Erikson Reader. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2000.

Goleman, Daniel. Working
With Emotional Intelligence. New York: Bantam, 1998.

Rogers, Carl. On Becoming
a Person. Boston: Mariner Books, 1995.

Shaffer, David R. Social
and Personality Development. Independence, KT: Wadsworth Publishing, 1999.

"Social, Emotional, and
Personality Development." Handbook of Child Psychology , edited by
William Damon and Nancy Eisenberg. 5th ed. New York: Wiley, 2000.