Motivation and Work

1. Motivation and Work

2. Perspectives on Motivation • Need or desire that energizes and directs behavior. • There are four perspectives that psychologists have used to understand motivated behaviors, which include: • Instinct theory (replaced by the evolutionary perspective) • Drive-Reduction Theory • Arousal Theory • Hierarchy of Needs (Abraham Maslow)

3. Instincts & Evolutionary Psychology • Instincts: rigidly patterned, complex behaviors found throughout a species. • Instinct Theory: early instinct theorists, taking their cues from Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection believed that it instincts propelled our behavior. • Today evolutionary psychologists take the view that genes predispose species-typical behavior, but instead looks at behavior and its relationship to adaptive function.

4. Drives and Incentives • Drive-Reduction Theory: a psychological need creates an aroused state that drives the organism to reduce the need (such as satisfying thirst by drinking). • The physiological aim of drive reduction is homeostasis – the maintenance of a stable internal environment. • Incentive Theory: secondary motives or external stimuli (money, approval, grades) regulate and pull us toward a goal.

5. Optimum Arousal • Arousal Theory: We each have an optimum level of arousal necessary to perform tasks which varies with the person and the activity. • Arousal is the level of alertness, wakefulness, and activation caused by activity in the central nervous system. • Yerkes-Dodson Law: • for easy tasks, a moderate high level of arousal is optimal • for difficult tasks, moderately low arousal is optimal • for average tasks, a moderate level of arousal is optimal.

6. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

7. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs (cont’d) • Humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow categorized needs and arranged them in order of priority • According to Maslow, few people reach self-actualization at the top of the pyramid. • Self-actualization includes not only achievement of all of our potentials but also transcendence (spiritual fulfillment). • Note that scientific evidence does NOT support this theory.

8. Why & What We Eat? • Hunger • Hunger pangs (stomach is contracting) • Your blood sugar may be low. • You love the taste of a particular food. • You are with others who are eating. • Cultural Influences • Stress • Religious values • Family influences

9. Hunger and Hormones

10. Hunger & the Hypothalamus

11. Hunger & the Hypothalamus (cont’d) • Three parts of the hypothalamus mediate information concerning hunger and satiety. • Lateral Hypothalamus (LH): when stimulated, LH will promote eating behavior. If lesioned or removed, the person will not eat at all and may even starve to death. • VentromedialHypothalamus (VMH): satiety center, turns off the urge to eat. When removed, a person wdl continue to eat excessively and rapidly gain weight. • Paraventricular nucleus (PVN): also helps to regulate eating behaviors through the simulation/inhibition of neurotransmitters. • Norepinephrine, GABA, and Neuropeptide Y increase the desire for carbohydrates • Seretonin decreases the desire for carbs

12. Thirst & the Hypothalamus • LH is also the “on” button for thirst. We are motivated to drink as a result of the level of fluid in our cells and our relative blood volume. • When osmoreceptorsdetect shrinking cells, we become thirsty. • The hypothalamus stimulates the pituitary to release ADH (antidiuretic hormone), which promotes water reabsorption of water in the kidneys • As blood volume decreases, so does blood pressure, stimulating the kidneys to release an enzyme which causes the synthesis of angiotensin, stimulating thirst receptors in our hypothalamus. • External cues for drinking include seeing others drink, cultural influences, and even the weather.

13. Obesity • Can lead to health problems such as diabetes and hypertension • Obese people tend to focus on short term, external cues such as smell, attractiveness of food, and whether it is meal time. • People are predisposed genetically to body size • Set Point Theory: we have a preset natural body weight, determined by the number of fat cells within our bodies. • Humans regulate their weights through a combination of control of food intake, energy output, and basal metabolic rate – the rate of energy expenditure for maintaining basic body functions when the body is at rest.

14. Eating Disorders • Anorexia Nervosa: generally associated with perfectionism, excessive exercising, and excessive desire for self-control. • People who weight less than 85% of their normal body weight • Usually occurs in young women who follow starvation diets and have unrealistic body images • Bulimia Nervosa: more common, characterized by eating binges involving the intake of thousands of calories followed by vomiting, laxative use, excessive exercise, or fasting. • Both disorders are influenced by challenging family situations, weight obsessed societal pressures, low self-esteem, and negative emotions. • Recent research suggests that eating disorders may also have a genetic component.

15. Sexual Motivation • Sex drive is necessary for the survival of the species – not for the survival of an individual. • Evolutionary Psychologists: • females increase reproductive success by being selective in mating, choosing a male who has resources to provide for children. • Males optimize reproductive success by mating with many females, and tend to choose those females that appear young and healthy.

16. Sexual Motivation(cont’d) • Sex drive also involves the hypothalamus • Increases during puberty with the rise in levels of sex hormones. • Estrogen in females: responsible for widening of hips, secondary hair formation, development of mammary glands. • Testosterone in males: responsible for deepening of voice, secondary hair formation, broadening of shoulders. • Estrogen and testosterone are both responsible for the initiation and maintenance of sexual arousal. • Alfred Kinsey (1940s) pioneered research in sex research. His work, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (followed by a similar book on women) is well-known, even though his participants were not randomly selected.

17. Sexual Response Cycle • Masters and Johnson indicate hat there are 4 stages in biological sexual response, which include: • Excitement –sexual arousal • Plateau – increase breathingrate, muscle tension, heart rate, and pressure • Orgasm– ejaculation in males, pleasurable sensations induced rhythmic muscle contractions in both sexes • Resolution – blood leaves the genitals and arousal lessens. • Refractory Period: time after orgasm in which an ejaculation or orgasm cannot be achieved. Refractory time for females in generally less than it is for males.

18. Adolescent Sexuality • Why don’t teens use some form of birth control? • Ignorance • Guilt related to sexual activity • Minimal communication about birth control • Alcohol use • Mass media norms of unprotected promiscuity • Predictors of Sexual Restraint • High intelligence • Religiosity • Father presence • Participation in service learning programs

19. Sexual Orientation • Sexual Orientation: an enduring sexual attraction toward members of either one’s own sex or the opposite sex. • Homosexuality: sexual desire of a person of the same sex. • Bisexuality: sexual desire of people from both sexes • Heterosexuality: sexual desire of a person of the opposite sex. • Homosexuality appears to be biologically based. Research supports the following: • Critical differences between body and brain structures in homosexual and heterosexual individuals., • Genetic studies of family members and twins • Exposure to certain hormones during critical periods of prenatal development.

20. Social Motivation • Achievement Motive: desire to meet some internalized standard of excellence. • Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) (David McCelland): measures achievement motivation • People with a high need for achievement choose moderately challenging tasks to satisfy their needs and avoid easy goals that provide no sense of satisfaction or difficult tasks that offer no hope of success. • People with low need for achievement select either very easy task (attribute success to own ability) or impossible tasks so they do not have to take responsibility for failure.

21. Why We Want to Belong • Affiliate Motive: the need to be with others. • May have boosted our ancestors’ chances of survival • Our sense of belonging and grouping is prevalent when we look for social acceptance, work to maintain relationships (or mourn their loss) and feel the joy of love (or the gloom of loneliness). • Socially secure people are often healthier, have lower levels of depression, suicide, and early death. • When people are 0stracized, people often suffer from stress and depression. • When social excluded, people experience real pain – there are increases in the brain areas that that respond to physical pain. • Socially excluded people may engage in self-defeating or antisocial behaviors.

22. Intrinsic vs.Extrinsic Motivation • Intrinsic Motivation: a desire to perform an activity for its own sake rather than for an external reward. • People motivated by inner desires for creativity, fulfillment, and inner satisfaction tend to psychologically healthier and happier. • Overjustification Effect: When motivated people are given an external reward for something for which they are intrinsically motivated, their intrinsic motivation often diminishes. • Extrinsic Motivation: desire to perform an activity in order to obtain a reward from outside the person, such as money or other material goods (attention, applause)

23. Social Conflict Situations • Conflict: being torn in different directions by opposing motives that block you from attaining a goal, leaving you frustrated and stressed. • Approach-approach Conflicts: where you must choose between 2 positive options, only one of which you can have. • Avoidance-Avoidance Conflicts: situation involving 2 negative options, one of which you must choose (between a rock and a hard place) • Approach-avoidance Conflicts: situations where you decide if you want/do not want to choose an option that has both positive and negative consequences • Multiple approach-avoidance conflicts: there are several alternative options to choose from, all of which have positive and negative consequences.

24. Motivation at Work • Industrial-organizational (I/O) psychology: the application of psychological principles, concepts, and methods to optimize human behavior in the workplace. • Flow: a completely focuses, involved state of consciousness, with diminished awareness of space and time, resulting from optimal engagement in one’s skills. • Personnel Psychology: focuses on employee recruitment selection, placement, training, appraisal, and development. • Organizational Psychology: examines organizational influences on worker satisfaction and productivity and facilitates organizational change

25. Personnel Psychology • Interviewer Illusion: interviewers often overrate their intuition of prospective employees. Results from • Structured Interviews: better predictors of employee fit because they reduce interviewers’ memory distortions and biases by asking the same questions and using the same rating scales for all candidates. • 360-degree feedback: everyone at all levels of the organization rate each other, including self-rating • Performance Appraisal Biases: • Halo errors: judgments based on personal qualities rather than on the job behaviors. • Leniency & severity errors: reflect the appraiser’s tendency to be overly easy or harsh on everyone’s evaluations. • Recencyerrors: rater focuses on one recently remembered behavior.

26. Organizational Psychology • Research indicates that the most productive and engaged workers are those working in satisfying environments. • Employee satisfaction also tends to translate into higher profits, higher productivity, lower turnover, and more loyal customers. • Effective managers focus their training on people’s strengths. • Task Leadership: sets standards, organizes work, and focuses attention on goals. • Social Leadership: builds teamwork, medicates conflict, and offers support