MOTIVATION AND EMOTION

Chapter 12Psychology

SECTION 1 – MOTIVATION The various psychological and physiological

factors that cause us to act a certain way at a certain time.

Because motivation cannot be observed directly, psychologists infer motivation from goal-directed behavior.

Behavior is usually energized by many motives that may originate from outside of us or inside of us.

Psychologists explain motivation and why we experience it in different ways: instinct, drive-reduction, incentive, and cognitive theories.

INSTINCT THEORY

In the 1900s, William McDougall proposed that instincts motivate human behavior.

Instincts are inborn tendencies that determine how an animal will behave in certain situations.

Instincts do not involve reason. Instinctive behavior will be about the

same for all members of a species. Flaw – instincts do not explain human

behavior; they simply label behavior.

DRIVE-REDUCTION THEORY

Theory – Physiological needs drive an organism to act in either random or habitual ways.

Something that motivates us starts with a need and leads to a drive.

Need: a physical or psychological requirement (oxygen, food / love, approval).

Drive: a feeling of tension caused by an unmet need (different needs with different goals – hunger drives us to eat / curiosity drives us to find out something).

DRIVE-REDUCTION THEORY (CONT.)

Theory came form the work of Clark Hull When organism is missing something it needs, it

becomes tense and restless. This tension throws the organism out of balance. Trying to correct the imbalance is called

homeostasis. To relieve the tension and return to

homeostasis, the organism takes random actions.

It will first try the behavior that worked before.

FLAWS TO DRIVE-REDUCTION

Harry Harlow experiment on monkeys: According to DRT, infants become attached

to mothers to relieve drives hunger and thirst

Infant monkeys preferred cloth mothers for comfort to wire mother with food.

Another argument is that people sometimes intentionally do things that increase tension rather than try to relieve it. riding roller coasters or watching scary

movies

INCENTIVE THEORY

Incentive – the object we seek or the result we are trying to achieve through our motivated behavior (also known as reinforcers, goals, and rewards).

Incentive theory stresses the role of the environment in motivating behavior.

When drives push us to reduce needs; incentives pull us to obtain them. Ex: hunger may cause us to walk to the cafeteria,

but the incentive is the sandwich we want. People are motivated to obtain positive

incentives and to avoid negative incentives.

COGNITIVE THEORY

Proposes that we act because of extrinsic and intrinsic motivations.

Extrinsic motivation (“outside ourselves”): Engaging in activities to reduce biological needs or

obtain incentives or external rewards. Too much extrinsic motivation may cause the

overjustification effect (intrinsic motivation declines).

Intrinsic motivation (“inside ourselves”): Engaging in activities because those activities are

personally rewarding or because engaging in them fulfills our beliefs or expectations

You may engage in both at the same time.

SECTION 2

Biological and Social Motives

MOTIVATION: “BIOLOGICAL MOTIVE”

Like other animals, humans must satisfy some physical needs to survive.

The nervous system requires a balance of elements such as water, oxygen, salt, and vitamins to stay healthy.

When you body senses an imbalance, it will motivate actions aimed at retuning itself to balance (homeostasis).

HUNGER

You eat for many reasons: Smell of food Habit (ex: at 11:30 each day) Social reasons (psychosocial hunger

factors) Your body requires food to grow, to

repair itself, and to store reserves. You if you go without food for a long

time, your body will demand food. To what is it responding?

BIOLOGICAL FACTORS AFFECTING HUNGER

Hypothalamus interprets information: Lateral hypothalamus (LH) – the part of the

hypothalamus that produces hunger signals. Stimulated – start eaging / severed - starve

Ventromedial hypothalamus (VH) – the part of the hypothalamus that can cause one to stop eating.

Stimulated – stop eating / severed – eat w/o stopping The glucostatic theory - monitors the amount of

glucose (ready energy) entering the cells of the body.

Set-point – the weight around which your day-to-day weight tends to fluctuate.

SOCIAL FACTORS AFFECTING HUNGER External cues – such as where, when,

and what we eat. When other are eating, we tend to eat

more. You may choose to eat popcorn at a movie

because you always do. You may choose not to eat because you

want to look like a model. Can lead to eating disorders.

OBESITY

The genes you inherit may give you a tendency to be overweight.

Overweight – 20% above ideal weight Obese – 30% over ideal weight Studies show – obese people eat because

of external cues (from the environment). Normal-weight people tend to respond

more to internal signals (hunger). Anxiety and depression are not causes of

overeating.

MOTIVATION: “SOCIAL MOTIVES”

Learned from our experiences with other people. Achievement motivation

the desire to set challenging goals and to persist in trying to reach those goals despite obstacles, frustrations, and setbacks.

High achievers prefer to be associated with experts who will help them achieve, instead of with more friendly people.

Fear of failure motivation Choose easy tasks offering assured success or impossible

tasks with no chance of success. Find excuses to explain poor performances.

Fear of success motivation (motive to avoid success) Found in both men and women Thought of succeeding in traditional male roles makes

women anxious.

OTHER THEORIES

Expectancy-value theory States that how motivated we are depends on

how likely we are to be successful in the task (expectancy) and how much the reward for success is worth to us (value).

Competency theory Suggests that we tend to choose tasks that are

reasonably difficult, so we can find out how competent (skilled) we are.

Abraham Maslow – Hierarchy of Needs Fundamental needs Psychological needs Self-actualization needs

SECTION 3: EMOTIONS

Emotions: Sometimes, emotions work like physical drives –

feelings push us to pursue a goal. Other times we do things we think will make us

feel good (rewards of behavior). Finally, emotions helps us make decisions and

communicate what is going on inside us. Emotional intelligence:

The ability to understand emotions and use that information to make decisions.

Judging the emotions involved in a situation is a sign of emotional intelligence.

EXPRESSING EMOTIONS

Emotions result from 4 occurrences: You must interpret some stimulus. You have a subject feeling (as fear or happiness). You experience physiological responses (such as

increased heart rate). You display an observable behavior (such as smiling

or crying). All emotions have 3 parts:

Physical (how the emotions affects physical arousal) Behavioral (how body responds to experienced

emotion) Cognitive (how we think about or interpret a

situation, which affects our emotions)

THEORIES

Charles Darwin Argues that all people express basic feelings the same

way. Research supports that facial expressions are innate.

Carroll Izard Identified 10 different emotional states from studying

changes in parts of the face (eyebrows, eyes, mouth).

James Averill Believes that we learn our emotional reactions from

social expectations and consequences. We learn to experience and express emotions in the

company of other people.

PSYSIOLOGICAL THEORIES OF EMOTION James-Lange Theory

The body’s physical reactions occur first, and we feel emotions when we recognize these changes.

Cannon-Bard Theory The brain sends two reactions—one waking the

body’s processes and the other an experience of emotion.

One does not cause the other; they occur together.

Facial feedback Theory (Izzard) The way we experience emotion results

from what we feel the muscles in our faces doing.

COGNITIVE THEORIES OF EMOTION

Schacter Two-Factor Theory What you feel depends on the meaning or

interpretation you apply to these changes. Internal parts of emotion affect a person differently,

depending on the person’s perception of the social situation.

Opponent-Process Theory Based on classical conditioning. The removal of a stimulus that excites one emotion

causes a swing to an opposite emotion. State A – external, emotion-arousing event State B – internal force

Ex: make a special friend who moves the next week or make a special friend, marry and live together for many years

Ex: novice vs. experienced parachutist