Motivation

Motivation concerns the factors that direct and energize the behavior of humans and other organisms.

Tries to identify why people seek to do the things they do.

Theories of Motivation Drive Theory (Hull 1943) - A drive is a

state of unrest or irritation that energizes one behavior after another until one of them removes the irritation. According to Hull’s drive reduction

theory animals and humans behave so that they can reduce drives.

If you are thirsty you are driven to drink

All behavior occurs to reduce drives

Problems with drive theory

Most people seek variety and activity in life. We like a moderate amount of stimulation. In short we are not driven, to have no

drive at all. It also ignores external stimulation.

We are not only driven by hunger, but also by which foods are available.

Cheese cake

Homeostasis theory an addition to drive theory Homeostasis is the maintenance of an

optimum level of biological conditions within an organism humans and animals are motivated to

maintain a state of equilibrium, not to reduce all drive to zero.

We strive to maintain an optimum body temperature.

Put on or take off clothes shiver or sweat same with food and water

Problem with homeostasis theory

It ignores the fact that new stimuli can arouse motivated behaviors. Even if you are not hungry, you may

eat to be sociable, or because someone has made something you really like, or you have never tried before.

Incentive Theories

Incentives are external stimuli that pull us toward certain actions. In contrast drives are internal forces

that push us to behave in certain ways

A tasty looking desert has appeal and draws us toward it regardless of whether we have a hunger drive

Most motivated behaviors are a combination of drives and incentives Thus if we are hungry we are driven

to relieve that hunger, however a piece of pie may have

more incentive (draw us more) than a piece of bread

Intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation

An intrinsic motivation is a motivation to engage in act for it’s own sake. playing the guitar or piano, playing

basketball, painting. We engage in many behaviors, just

because doing the behavior is reward enough.

Extrinsic motivation

Motivation based on the rewards and punishments that an act may bring. Working -- for pay studying -- to get the social reward of

doing well, to avoid feeling guilty about the money you lost if you fail

Most behavior probably results from a combination of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation

Artists paint for the intrinsic “joy” of painting, but also for “money” and “social recognition” that can come from painting.

Is it always better to have a combination of extrinsic and intrinsic motivation? Are we more motivated to play the

guitar if we get paid, than if we don’t get paid?

Greene, Sternberg and Lepper (1976)

Mathematical games with schoolchildren The children seemed to enjoy them.

After a while, they started giving rewards for success.

When they took away the rewards, the children stopped playing the games. 

The children had decided that they were playing for the reward, not for the fun

The seven year old fly fisherman and his parents.

Types of motivation Primary and secondary

primary motivation (nature) are automatic, built-in processes.

Search for food, water, and sex. Secondary motivations (nurture) develop

as a result of specific learning experiences. Strive to get Money - associated with ability to get

food, and other basic needs strive to get certain types of foods and drinks -

cheese, coffee, beer strive to get certain kinds of sexual partners?

Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs

An organization of needs (motivators) from the most necessary and insistent to the ones that receive attention when all others are under control

Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs

Physiological needs food, drink, shelter

Safety needs The world is organized and predictable. Need to feel safe secure and stable

Paranoid schizophrenia Fugitive from the law Dangerous part of a city

Belongingness and love needs. Need to be accepted Need to avoid loneliness and alienation. Need to be loved

Esteem needs Need for achievement and independence. Need for recognition and respect from

others Self-actualization

Need to live up to one’s fullest and unique potential

Emotion Emotions may be necessary for making

good decisions Phineas Gage in 1848 an explosion caused an iron railroad spike

to shoot through his head damaged his prefrontal cortex showed little emotions

Although he was easily provoked and combative lost values

no restraint in sexual advances, or profanity could not carry out long-term plans

Elliot Damage to prefrontal cortex to remove a

tumor. No emotional experiences cannot make plans or “good” decisions

perhaps his inability to make decisions, comes from not having emotional feedback how do you evaluate a good thing versus a

bad thing if you don’t feel anything when you consider it?

Emotional intelligence The ability to perceive, imagine, and

understand emotions and to use that information in decision making evaluating the emotional content of

social interactions. A car cutting you off in traffic,

get mad ignore it

depends partially on how you interpret the emotionality of the situation

Lie detection – an attempt to detect the emotionality involved in telling a lie

The polygraph is an instrument that records physiological indications of sympathetic nervous system arousal blood pressure, heart rate, breathing rate, electrical conduction of skin (sweaty palms

increase electrical conduction). The idea is that people that lie become

nervous and will show a sympathetic response.

Is the lie detector effective? 50 criminal cases,

two suspects took the polygraph, and one later confessed to the crime.

About 76% of the guilty suspects were judged to be lying by experts.

However, 37% of the not guilty suspects were also judged as lying

our justice system advocates avoiding incarceration of not guilty individuals. This finding illustrates why lie detectors are not allowed in criminal cases.

It shows that physiological response is an indicator of lying ( it is just not precise enough)

Theories of emotion First let’s examine what common sense

tells us. If you see something that scares you what

happens? You see a large man wearing a hockey mask and

holding a bloody knife approaching you you get scared your heart-rate increases and other sympathetic

responses The three major theories of emotion differ

from this interpretation

James-Lange theory of emotions Proposed independently by William

James and Carl Lange in 1884. A person’s interpretation of a stimulus

evokes the autonomic changes directly; the emotion is a perception of those changes. See killer heart rate increases, and blood pressure

increases, therefore I must be scared.

It is the physiological response that determines what emotion you think you are experiencing

More James-Lange Differences in the autonomic response

will be subtle for many emotions, anxiety and happiness can have similar

sympathetic responses perhaps facial responses and other physical

responses tell us what emotion we are experiencing

I am smiling and laughing; I must be happy. Frowning and clenching my fists; I must be angry Frowning and running; I must be afraid

A test of James-Lange

Read comics while holding pen in teeth (similar to smiling).

Or while holding pen in lips (similar to frowning). Rate how funny the comics are The comics were rated reliably

funnier when the pen was held in the teeth.

Cannon-Bard Theory of emotions Certain areas of the brain evaluate

sensory information and, send one set of impulses to the autonomic nervous system and another set to the forebrain. The autonomic nervous system causes

physiological changes The forebrain causes cognitive changes. These things happen in parallel.

Neither one causes the other. They are activated at the same time

may be partially true People with spinal core injuries do not

get input from the autonomic system Can still feel the cognitive aspects of fear,

and anger. However they often say their emotions are

somewhat flattened. Drugs that decrease the sympathetic

response tranquilizers cause a decrease in reports of

anxiety.

Schacter and Singer The intensity of the physiological state

determines the intensity of the emotion, but not the type of the emotion. Cognitive appraisal of the situation tells us

what emotion we are experiencing see killer causes physiological arousal I am very aroused “why?”

look around and determine the situation. There is a killer so it must be fear

Schacter and Singer’s experiment Inject people with epinephrine (adrenaline), but told it

was vitamins causes a sympathetic response.

Half of the subjects were told to expect physiological arousal, the remainder were not told to expect anything

Half of the subjects from each group were divided into two more groups

1. Euphoria situation 2. Anger situation

Which member of your immediate family does not bathe or wash regularly?

With how many men (other than your father) has your mother had extramarital relationships?

4 or fewer 5-9 10 or more

If people had been told to expect a physiological response, they interpreted that response as an action of the drug. They did not become very euphoric or angry

If people did not expect a physiological response, they interpreted that response as an emotional response to the situation. They had fun in the euphoric condition They got mad in the anger situation

This shows that it is not just the physiological response that determines emotion (as James-Lange said).

Your cognitive appraisal of a physiological response determines the emotion. Arousal in a happy situation = happy Arousal in a mean situation = mad Arousal in a sad situation = sad

Try these Monica feels as though she is in love because she feels her heart race,

is out of breath, and has shaky knees James - Lange

Bill walks into a room and realizes that the gray shape behind the door is not a shadow but a man with a gun. His heart begins to race at the same time as he experiences the emotion of fear

Cannon - Bard Rosemary notices that her palms are sweating and her heart is

beating quickly. She looks around the room and sees that the teacher is handing out a pop quiz. So she concludes that she must be feeling nervous due to the quiz.

Schacter and Singer After a hard night of drinking you feel sad and irritable, you attribute

this to your room mate being an ass. This is a misattribution. I think it is consistent with Schacter and

Singer’s idea. When we are depressed we often attribute it to someone, or

something around us.