PLEASE DO NOW! Why do you think people go to college? Why are you going to college?

A RON R ALSTON … WHAT WOULD YOU DO ?

MOTIVATION A need or desire that energizes and directs behavior.

MOTIVATIONAL CONCEPTS: FROM WHAT PERSPECTIVES DO PSYCHOLOGISTS VIEW MOTIVATED BEHAVIOR? Instincts & Evolutionary Psychology: To qualify as an instinct, a complex behavior must have a fixed pattern throughout a species & be unlearned. -salmon returning to their birthplace -infants’ innate reflexes fro rooting & sucking -Most psychologists view human behavior as directed both by physiological needs & by psychological wants. -Although instinct theory fails to explain human motives, the underlying assumption that genes predispose species- typical behavior remains strong.

Drives & Incentives: When the original instinct theory of motivation collapsed, it was replaced by drive-reduction theory : the idea that a physiological need creates an aroused state that drives the organism to reduce the need; when a physiological need increases, so does a psychological drive-an aroused/motivated state. -i.e.: hunger=eat something; thirsty=drink something *The aim of drive reduction is homeostasis: tendency to maintain a balanced/constant internal state; regulation of any aspect of body chemistry (i.e.:blood glucose…) o Not only are we pushed by our “need” to reduce drives, we are also pulled by incentives: + or – stimuli that motivates behavior…. -i.e.: when there is both a need & an incentive, we feel strongly driven…the food deprived person smells baking bread feels a STRONG hunger drive & in the presence of that drive, the baking bread becomes a compelling incentive.

Optimum Arousal: We are much more than homeostatic Sx. Some motivated behavior actually increase arousal. In the absence of any need-based drives, many organisms simple curiosity serves as a motivator. Human motivation aims not to eliminate arousal but to seek optimum level of arousal… *We are “infovores”, lacking stimulation we feel bored & look for a way to increase arousal to some optimum level (Biederman & Vessel, 2006).

T HE Y ERKES -D ODSON LAW / CURVE { STILL PART OF OPTIMUM AROUSAL THEORY } Stress serves as a motivator to increase arousal; as stress increases from minimal, performance also increases. However, once stress reaches a moderately high level, performance peaks. More stress leads to decreased performance beyond the high point. Thus, an optimum level of performance occurs when stress is moderate!

A Hierarchy of Motives: ***Abraham Maslow*** (1970) described a hierarchy of needs: a pyramid of human needs, beginning at the base with physiological needs that must 1 st be satisfied before higher-level safety needs & then psychological needs become active. One cannot move onto the next until the latter has been satisfied…