PSY 2012 Chapter 10 Motivation and Emotions

Motivation

factors that direct and energize the behavior of humans and other organisms

Motivation includes

• behavioral

• cognitive

• social aspects

Instincts

inborn patterns of behavior that are biologically determined rather than learned

Instinct Approaches to Motivation

the explanation of motivation that suggests people and animals are born preprogrammed with sets of behaviors essential to survival

Weaknesses in this instinct approach

• lack of agreement on number of primary instincts

• unable to explain why behaviors evolve in some species but not others

Drive-Reduction Approaches to Motivation

suggests that a lack of some basic biological need produces a drive to push an organism to satisfy that need

Drive

motivation tension, or arousal, that energizes behavior to fulfill a need

Types of drives

• primary Drives

• secondary Drives

Primary Drives

related to biological needs of the body or of the species as a whole

Secondary Drives

related to behavior that fulfills no obvious biological need

Homeostasis

body’s tendency to maintain a steady internal state

How does homeostasis brings deviations in body functioning back to an original state?

feedback loops

Arousal Approaches to Motivation

belief that people trey to maintain a steady level of stimulation and activity

What does the arousal approach to motivation suggest?

if stimulation and activity levels become too high, individuals tries to reduce them

Incentive Approaches to Motivation

suggests that motivation stems from the desire to attain external rewards, known as incentives

What does the Incentive approach to motivation fail to do?

provide complete explanation of motivations as an organisms sometimes seek to fulfill needs even with no apparent incentives

Internal Drives

(proposed by drive-reduction theory) work in tandem with

External Drives

(proposed by incentive theory) to “push” and “pull” behavior

Cognitive Approaches to Motivation

suggests that motivation is the result of people’s thoughts, beliefs, expectations, and goals

Cognitive Approaches to Motivation draws distinction between

• Intrinsic Motivation

• Extrinsic Motivation

Intrinsic Motivation

causes us to participate in an activity for their own enjoyment rather than for any actual or concrete reward

Extrinsic Motivation

causes individuals to do something for money, a grade, or some other actual concrete reward

Maslow’s Hierarchy

places motivational needs in a hierarchy and suggests that before more sophisticated, higher-order needs can be met, certain primary needs must be satisfied

Order of Maslow’s Hierarchy from highest to lowest levels

• self-actualization

• esteem

• love and belongingness

• safety needs

• physiological needs

Self-Actualization

state of self-fulfillment in which people realize their highest potential in their own way

Esteem

the need to develop a sense of self-worth

Love and Belongingness

the need to obtain and give affection

Safety Needs

the need for a safe and secure environment

Physiological Needs

the primary drives; The need for water, food, sleep, and sex

Why is the Maslow’s Hierarchy important?

• highlights the complexity of human needs

• spawned other theories of motivation, such as self-determination theory

Self-Determination Theory

people have the three basic needs of competence, autonomy, and relatedness

What percentage of adults suffer from obesity?

40%

Obesity

body weight that is more than 20% above the average weight for a person of a certain height

How do we measure obesity

BMI

Body Mass Index (BMI)

based on a ratio of weight to height

Complex biological mechanisms

tells organisms whether they require food or should stop eating

A factor in the regulation of hunger

changed in the chemical composition of the blood

Glucose

a kind of sugar, regulates feelings of hunger

Insulin

a type of hormone, leads the body to store excess sugar in the blood as fats and carbohydrates

Ghrelin

a type of hormone, communicates to the brain feelings of hunger

Hypothalamus

• the part in our brain that monitors glucose levels

• regulates food intake

What does the injury to the hypothalamus affect?

weight set point

Lateral Hypothalamus

damage here results in a death by starvation

Ventromedial Hypothalamus

damage here results in extreme overeating

Weight set point

particular level of weight that the body strives to maintain

Metabolism

rate at which food is converted to energy and expended by the body

Social Factors in Eating

• societal rules

• cultural norms

• individual habits

• operant conditioning

Possible factors in Obesity

• oversensitivity to external eating cues

• insensitivity to internal hunger cues

• higher weight set points than other people

• fat cells in the body

• settling point

Fat cells in the body

starting at birth, the body stores fat either by increasing the number of fat cells or by increasing the size of existing fat cells

Higher weight set points

higher level of the hormone leptin

Settling point

determined by a combination of genetics and environmental factors

Anorexia Nervosa

severe eating disorder in which people may refuse to eat while denying that their behavior and appearance are unusual

Bulimia

an eating disorder in which people binge on large quantities of food, followed by efforts to purge the food through vomiting or other means

Factors in eating disorders

• biological cause

• society’s valuation of slenderness

Need of Achievement

a person’s desire to strive for and achieve challenging accomplishments

Thematic Apperception Tests (TAT)

how we measure a person’s need for achievement

How the TAT works

1. examiner shows a series of ambiguous pictures

2. tells participants to write a story that describes what is happening

3. researchers use a standard scoring system to determine the amount of achievement imagery in people’s stories

Growth Mindset

the belief that individual characteristics, such as intelligence, talent, and motivation, can be developed through hard work

Fixed Mindset

the erroneous belief that individual characteristics, such as intelligence, talent, and motivation, are set at birth and vary little throughout the life span

Need for Affiliation

an interest in establishing and maintaining relationships with other people

Need for Power

a tendency to seek impact, control, or influence over others and to be seen as a powerful individual

Emotions

feelings that generally have both physiological and cognitive elements and that influence behavior

Two system theories of Emotions

• governs emotional response

• governs cognitive reactions to emotional response

Functions of Emotions

• preparing us for action

• shaping our future behavior

• helping us interact more effectively with others

Basic positive emotions

• love

• joy

Basic negative emotions

• anger

• sadness

• fear

Broader positive emotions

• fondness

• infatuation

• bliss

• contentment

• pride

Broader negative emotions

• annoyance

• hostility

• contempt

• jealousy

• agony

• grief

• guilt

• loneliness

• horror

• worry

The James-Lange theory

the belief that Emotional experience is a reaction to bodily events occurring as a result of an external situation

Drawbacks of the James-Lange theory

• visceral changes would have to occur relatively quickly

• physiological arousal does not invariably produce emotional experience

• internal organs produce a relatively limited range of sensations

The Cannon-Bard theory

the belief that both physiological arousal and emotional experience are produced simultaneously by the same nerve stimulus

The Schachter-Singer theory

the belief that emotions are determined jointly by a nonspecific kind of physiological arousal and its interpretation

Contemporary perspectives on the neuroscience of emotions

• Different emotions produce activation of different portions of the brain

• Amygdala plays an important role in the experience of emotions

• Neural pathways connect the amygdala, visual cortex, and hippocampus

Why should we make sense of the multiple perspectives on emotion

• emotions are complex phenomena, encompassing biological and cognitive aspects

• no single theory has been able to fully explain all the facets of emotional experience

Facial-affect program

the activation of a set of nerve impulses that make the face display the appropriate expression

Facial-feedback hypothesis

the hypothesis that facial expressions not only reflect emotional experience but also help determine how people experience and label emotions