Motivation and Work

What is Motivation?

• Motivation is defined as a need or desire that energizes behavior and directs it toward a goal.

Motivation’s Four Theories

• Drive-reduction theory: the idea that a physiological need creates an aroused tension state (a drive) that motivates an organism to satisfy a need.

• Instinct theory: (later replaced by evolutionary perspective) is the idea that genetically predisposed behaviors motivate a person

• Arousal theory: focusing on finding the right level of stimulation

• Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs: describes how someone’s needs take priority over others

Other Motivating Factors

• Instinct: a complex behavior that is rigidly patterned throughout a species and is unlearned

• Instinct: a positive or negative environmental stimulus that motivates behaviors

• Homeostasis: a tendency to maintain a balanced or constant internal state; the regulation of any aspect of body chemistry, such as blood glucose, around a particular level

Hunger Motivation

• Hunger is triggered by glucose or the form of sugar that circulates in the blood and provided the major source of energy for body tissues. When its level is low, we feel hunger.

• Hormones are released in the brain that encourage eating or depresses eating

• Measured by one’s set point – the point at which an individual’s “weight thermostat” is supposedly set. When the body falls below this weight, an increase in hunger and a lowered metabolic rate may act to restore the lost weight

The Psychology of Hunger

• Our eagerness to eat is indeed pushed by our physiological state – our body chemistry and hypothalamic activity. Yet there is more to hunger then meets the stomach.

• Taste preferences are influenced by biology and culture. For example: preferences for sweet and salty tastes are generic and universal, however, others are conditioned, as when people develop a likening for excess salt.

• Culture affects taste too. For example what is culturally normal for people to eat.

The Psychology of Eating

• Situations also control our eating.

• People tend to eat more when eating with others

• Serving sizes can be different among different countries which has an affect on eating

• People in America tend to get the bigger portion

Eating Disorders

• Anorexia nervosa: an eating disorder in which a person diets and becomes significantly underweight (15 percent or more), yet, still feeling fat, continues to starve

• Bulimia nervosa: an eating disorder characterized by episodes of overeating, usually on high calorie foods, followed by vomiting, laxative use, fasting, or excessive exercise.

• Binge-eating disorder: significant binge-eating episodes, followed by distress, disgust, or guilt, but without the compensatory purging, fasting, or excessive exercise that marks bulimia nervosa

Sexual Motivation

• Estrogen: Sex hormone secreted more by females rather than by males. Contributes to female sex characteristics.

• Testosterone: the most important of the male sex hormones. Secreted more by males then females which contributes to the male sex characteristics.

• Sexual response cycle: the four stages of sexual responding described by Masters and Johnson – excitement, plateau, orgasm, and resolution

• Refractory period: a resting period after orgasm

• Sexual disorder: a problem that consistently impairs sexual arousal or functioning

Psychology of Sex

• Hunger and sex are different sorts of motivations but both have internal physiological factors. Both are influenced by external and imagined stimuli, as well as cultural expectations.

• External stimuli: pictures, sounds, reading materials -> can have both positive and negative psychological effects

• Imagined stimuli: Our imagination in our brain can be a stimuli – both conscious or unconsciously

Adolescent Sexuality

• Cultural factors can led to psychological effects in adolescent sexuality

• Compared to European teens, American teens have a lower rate of contraceptive use and thus a higher rate of teen pregnancy and abortion

• Ignorance, minimal communication over birth control, guilt related to sexual activity, alcohol use, and mass media are all causes

• In 2008, 39.5 percent of teens 14-19 years old have had a sexually transmitted infection

Psychological Factors of Teen Abstinence

• High Intelligence

• Religious Engagement

• Father presence

• Participation in service-learning programs

Sexual Orientation

• Sexual orientation: an enduring sexual attraction towards members of either one’s own sex or the other sex.

The Need to Belong

• Social bonds boost our survival rates

• Adults which have formed attachments are more likely to reproduce and to co-nurture their offspring to maturity

• As humans we are motivated to sustain relationships and have a sense of belonging

• To be shunned – especially at a young age – will lead to psychological problems late in life – people may seek new friends or develop psychological disorders

Motivation at Work

• If we feel dissatisfied with our work-related pay, relationships or identity, we may change where and for whom we work. Most people do not have a single vocation nor a predictable career path.

• Flow: a completely involved, focused state of consciousness, with diminished awareness of self and time, resulting from optimal engagements of one’s skills.

• Industrial-organizational psychology: the application of psychological concepts and methods to optimizing human behavior in the workplace

Interviews

• Do you think job interviews predict performance?

Interviews

• Interviews are not a good predictor of job performance.

• They disclose a person’s good intentions but not their habitual behaviors

• Instead, employers should use structural interviews in which the interviewee gets several organization and job related tasks

Workplace Motivation

• Achievement motivation is a desire for significant accomplishment; for mastery of things; people, or ideas; for rapidly attaining a high standard.

• Task-leadership: goal-oriented leadership that sets standards, organizes work, and focuses attention on goals.

• Social leadership: group oriented leadership that builds teamwork, mediates conflict, and offers support.

Supporting Videos

• Motivation to Survive: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h91Iptsl5CM

• Culture differences in food: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thpghNTYcjU

• Teen sexuality in the media:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQCm6CW7acA

• Workplace motivation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5D11e424M_Q