The History of Motivation and Emotion

1. The History of Motivation and Emotion Chapter 2

2. I. Brief History of Motivation • A. Aristotle’s Theory • Causes of behavior: efficient (trigger), final (purpose), formal (theory), and material (brain) • B. Hedonism • Pursue pleasure and avoid pain • 1. Ancient Sources • Socrates, Democritus, and Epicurus: pleasure is to exceed pain in the long run.

3. I. Brief History of Motivation • 2. Later philosophers • Hobbes on incentive motivation: approach pleasing, avoid displeasings timuli. • Locke on choice: small immediate versus large delayed reward. • Bentham on principle of utility: increase/decrease in pleasure determines behavior.

4. I. Brief History of Motivation • 3. Sigmund Freud • Pleasure principle: pursue pleasure by sudden decrease in tension • Reality principle: circumstances determine when to attain pleasure. • 4. Edward Lee Thorndike • Law of effect: satisfying consequences strengthen behavior; dissatisfying consequences weaken behavior.

5. I. Brief History of Motivation • 5. Law of Effect Today • Consequences refer to observables rather than to subjective states. • 6. Current Trends • Self control: choose delayed rewards. • Impulsiveness: choose immediate reward.

6. C. Evolution and Motivation • 1. Charles Darwin • Theory of evolution is based on variation and selection. • Principle of variation: values of a particular trait vary in frequency. • Principle of selection: environment selects values that aid survival. • 2. Herbert Spencer • Pleasure selects for behaviors that aid survival. • Pain selects against behaviors that are detrimental to survival. • 3. Instincts • Inherited impulses that produce specific pattern of behavior. • 4. Current Trends • Smiles and laughs from play help child master social environment.

7. D. Unconscious Motivation • 1. Freuds’ Conscious-Unconscious Distinction • Preconscious: small room containing thought, feelings, sensations. • Unconscious: large room containing repressed impulses, instincts. • Repression: censor prevents impulses from entering small room. • Consciousness: impulses attract eye of consciousness in small room. • 2. Motivational Instincts and the Unconscious • Instincts originate in the body and exert pressure with the aim of being satisfied through interaction with an object. • Three main Freudian instincts: sex, death, and ego preservation. • 3. Satisfying Unconscious Impulses • Through jokes and through manifest and latent dream content.

8. D. Unconscious Motivation • 4. Current Trends • Automatic processes: behaviors carried out with little awareness.

9. E. Internal Sources of Motivation • 1. Drive concept • Mechanism: Woodworth's idea of how we do something. • Drive: stimulus that induced behavior and keeps it going. • 2. Psychological Needs • Inherent characteristic that indicates a psychological deficit. • Primary or viscerogenic: Murray's physiological needs. • Secondary or psychogenic: Murray's 22 psychological needs. • 3. Current Trends • More needs postulated, which may be hierarchically arranged.

10. F. Commonality among Instincts, Drives, and Needs • All refer to internal sources of motivation that demand satisfaction.

11. G. Environmental Sources of Motivation • Incentives: stimuli that attract or repel an individual. • Tolman &Honzik experiment: reward decreases, nonreward increases maze errors.

12. H. Environmental and Internal Sources Induce Behavior • Motivation depends on internal and external sources • 1. Warden’s Incentive-Drive Link • Incentive (water) links with drive (thirst) to motivate behavior. • Increased drive increases electrified grid crossings. • Delayed incentive decreases electrified grid crossings. • 2. Lewin’s Field Theory • Psychological force: motivation depends on valence of objects in life space, psychological tension, and psychological distance.

13. II. Brief History of Emotion • Historically, description of emotion shifted from outward to inward movement. • A. Emotion as Subjective Feeling • Personal feelings of affect that arise in consciousness • B. Basic Emotions • Early Greeks to Descartes to James considered basic emotions. • Cognitive interpretations of stimulus changes determine emotions. • C. Emotion as Impulses for Action and Thought • Action readiness: impulse to action of emotion-relevant behavior. • Motor explosion: nonadaptive response, e.g., jump for joy. • D. Physiological Arousal • It serves as the basis for feelings and action readiness for emotions. • E. Facial Expression • As indicator of emotional feelings. • As signals used to satisfy social motives. • Facial feedback hypothesis: pattern of facial muscles is informational • basis for emotional feelings.