Psychology: Unit 9 chapter 12 and 13

Motivation and work

Perspectives on motivation

Psychologists define motivation as the energizing and directing of behavior. The four perspectives discussed in this chapter are the instinct/evolutionary, drive-reduction, arousal, and hierarchy of needs perspective.

Instincts are rigidly patterned, complex behaviors found throughout a species, such as the nest-building behaviors of species of birds. Early instincts theorists, influenced by Darwin's theory of natural selection, tries to classify human behaviors as though they were propelled by such instincts. When it became clear that they were naming, not explaining, behaviors, this approach fell into disfavor. The underlying idea- that genes predispose species-typical behavior - is, however, still influential in evolutionary psychology,which studies behaviors in search of their adaptive functions.

Drive-reducing theory proposes that physiological needs (hunger, thirst) create aroused psychological states that drive us (motivate us) to reduce or satisfy those needs (by eating, drinking). The physiological aim of drive reduction is internal stability, or homeostasis. We are most strongly driven when pushed by our need to reduce a drive (such as satisfying hunger), and also pulled by an external incentive (the smell of cooking food, for example). Depending on our personal and cultural histories, we will respond more to some stimuli (for example, raw oysters) than to others.

Not all behaviors reduce immediate physiological needs or tension states. Arousal theory helps explain the motivation for these behaviors. Curiosity-driven behaviors, for example, suggest that too little as well as too much stimulation can motivate people to seek an optimum level of arousal.

Maslow's hierarchy of needs proposes a pyramid-shaped sequence in which lower-level needs, such as the need to love, to belong, or to be respected. Although critics note that Maslow's sequence of needs is not universal, his hierarchy provides a framework for thinking about motivated behaviors.

Hunger

Washburn and Cannon showed that hunger's inner push corresponds to the stomach's contractions, but hunger has other causes. Variations in body chemistry that influences our feelings of hunger include those of insulin (secreted by fat cells; signals brain to increase metabolism and decrease hunger), orexin (secreted by the hypothalamus; triggers hunger), ghrelin (secreted by empty stomach; sends hunger signals to brain), and PYY (secreted by digestive tract; sends not-hungry signals to brain). All this information is integrated in two areas of the hypothalamus, which regulates the body's weight by affecting our feelings of hunger and satiety. Researchers differ on whether the body has a precise set point (a biologically fixed tendency to maintain an optimum weight) or a settling point (an environmentally and biologically influenced level at which weight settles in response to caloric intake and output).

Our hunger is influenced not only by our physical state but also by our memory of when we last ate and our expectation of when we should eat again. And although we humans as a species prefer certain tastes (such as sweet and salty), we learn to satisfy those preferences with specific food eaten in the context of our families and our culture. Some of our taste preferences, such as the avoidance of new foods or of foods that have made us ill, have survival value.

In the past half-century, a dramatic increase in poor body image has coincided with a rise in eating disorders among women in Western cultures. In both anorexia and bulimia, psychological factors, such as challenging family settings and weight-obsessed societal pressures, apparently overwhelm the homeostatic drive to maintain a balanced internal state. People with anorexia nervosa (usually adolescent females) starve themselves but continue to diet because they view themselves as fat; those with bulimia nervosa (primarily females in their teens and twenties) binge and purge in secret. In addition to cultural pressures, low self-esteem and negative emotions seem to interact with stressful life experiences to produce these disorders. Twin research also indicates, however, that these eating disorders may have a genetic component.

Sexual Motivation

Masters and Johnson described four stages in the human sexual response cycle: excitement, plateau, orgasm, (which seems to involve similar feelings and brain activity in males and females), and resolution. During the resolution phase, males experience a refractory period, when renewed arousal and orgasm are impossible. Sexual disorders (problems that consistently impair sexual arousal or functioning, such as premature ejaculation, female orgasmic disorder, and erectile disorder) are being successfully treated by behaviorally oriented therapy, which assumes that people learn and can modify their sexual responses, or with drug therapy.

The sex hormones testosterone and estrogen are present in both males and females, but males have higher level of testosterone and females a higher level of estrogen. These hormones help our bodies develop and function as either male or female. In nonhuman animals, they also help stimulate sexual activity. Assuming a normal level is present, hormones have a looser influence on human sexual behavior, though desire does rise slightly at ovulation among women with mates. Unlike other mammalian females, women's sexuality is more responsive to testosterone level than to estrogen level. Short-term shifts in testosterone level are normal in men.

Erotic material and other external stimuli can trigger sexual arousal in both men and women, although the activated brain areas differ somewhat. Sexually explicit material may lead people to perceive their partners as comparatively less appealing and to devalue their relationships. Sexually coercive material tends to increase viewer's acceptance of rape and violence toward women. In combination with the internal hormonal push and the external pull of sexual stimuli, fantasies (imagined stimuli) influence sexual arousal.

Adolescents' physical maturation fosters a sexual dimension to their emerging identity, but rates of teen intercourse vary from culture to culture. In the twentieth century, increased teen sexual activity in North America was reflected in increase rates if adolescent pregnancies. Factors to teen pregnancy include ignorance of the potential consequence of sexual activity; guilt related to sexual activity; minimal communication about contraception with parents, partners, and peers; alcohol use; and mass media norms of unprotected promiscuity.

STIs – sexually transmitted infections, such as the human papilloma virus, AIDS, and others – have spread rapidly. People under the age of 25 account for two-thirds if such infections, and teen girls seems especially vulnerable because of their less mature bodies and lower levels of protective antibodies. Attempts to protects teens through comprehensive sex-education programs include a greater emphasis on teen abstinence. High intelligence, religiosity, father presence, and participation in service learning programs tend to be predictors of teen sexual restraint.

Studies indicate that about 3 or 4 percent of men and 1 or 2 percent of women are homosexual, and that sexual orientation is enduring. Research does not support cause-effect links between homosexuality and any of the following: a child's relationship with parents, father-absent homes, fear or hatred of people of the other gender, childhood sexual experiences, peer relationships, or dating experiences. Evidence supporting the likelihood of a biological component of homosexuality is found in studies of same-sex behavior in several hundred species, straight-gay differences in body and brain characteristics, genetics studies of family members and twins, and the effect of exposure to certain hormones during critical periods of prenatal development. The increasing public perception that sexual orientation is biological influenced is reflected in increasing acceptance of gays and lesbians and their relationships.

Scientific research on sexual motivation does not attempt to define the personal meaning of sex in our lives, but sex research and education are not value-free. Some say their sex-related values, recognizing the emotions significance of sexual expression.

The need to belong

Our need to affiliate – to feel connected and identified with others – boosted our ancestors' changes for survival, which may explain why humans in every society live in groups. The need to belong appears when people seek social acceptance, work to maintain relationships (or mourn their loss), and feel the joy of love (or the gloom of loneliness). Ostracized – excluded or shunned by others – people suffer from stress and depression – a real pain that increases activity in the same brain areas that respond to physical pain. When socially excluded, they may engage in self-defeating behaviors (performing below their ability) or in antisocial behaviors.

Motivation at Work

People may vary their work as a job, a career, or a calling. Those in the last group report the highest satisfaction – a feeling consistent with flow, the involved focused state of consciousness in which we have a diminished awareness of ourselves and of passing time. Industrial -organization (I/O) psychology studies behavior in the workplace through the three subfields of personnel psychology, organizational psychology, and human factors psychology.

Personnel psychologists work with organizations to devise selection methods for new employees, recruit and evaluate applicants, design and evaluate training programs, identify people's strengths, analyze job content, and appraise individual and organizational performance. Subjective interviews lead to quickly formed impressions, but they tend to foster the interviewer illusion – a feeling of overconfidence in one's intuitive ability to predict employee success. Structured interviews (which pinpoint job-relevant strengths) are better predictors because they reduce interviewers' memory distortions and biases. Checklists, graphic rating scales, and behavior rating scales are useful performance appraisal methods. Forms of bias that can affect performance appraisal are halo errors (judgments based in personal qualities rather in-the-job behavior), leniency or severity errors (blanket judgment treating everyones too kindly or harshly), and recency errors (judgments based on easily remembered recent behavior).

Achievement motivation is the desire for significant accomplishment; for mastery of things, people, or ideas; and for attaining a high standard. Organizations turn to I/O psychologists because research shows that the most productive and engaged workers are those working in satisfaction also tend to translate into higher profits, higher productivity, lower turnover, and more loyal customers.

Effective managers focus their training on people's strengths rather than on weak ares that may never advance to the point where they can contribute to the organization's success. They attempt to “catch the employee doing something right” and reward that behavior. Effective managers also work with employees to set specific, challenging, and measurable objectives and to outline detailed paths to achieving those goals. Leadership style should be appropriate for the people and goals involved. Task leadership sets standards, organizes work, and focuses attention on goals. Social leadership builds teamwork, mediates conflict, and offers support. Manager's personalities do matter, and some may be better suited to one leadership style that to the other, or to a combination of the two.

Chapter 13 Emotion

Theories of emotion

The three components of emotion are (1) physiological arousal, (2) expressive behaviors, and (3) conscious experience. William James and Carl Lange proposed that we feel emotion after we notice our physiological responses. Walter Cannon and Philip Bard believed that we feel emotion at the same time that our bodies respond. Stanley Schachter and Jerome Singer's two-factor theory of emotion focused on the interplay of thinking and feeling, not on the timing of feelings. They proposed that emotions have two components, physical arousal and a cognitive label.

Embodied Emotion

The automatic nervous system (ANS) controls arousal. Its sympathetic division mobilizes us for action by directing adrenals to release stress hormones, which in turn increase heart rate, blood pressure, and blood sugar levels, and by triggering other defensive physical reactions. The parasympathetic division calms us after a crisis has passed, though arousal diminishes gradually.

Very high or very low arousal can be disruptive. We perform best when arousal is moderate, though this varies with the difficulty of the task. For easy or well-learned tasks, best performance is linked to high arousal. For difficult tasks, performance peaks at lower levels.

We display similar physiological arousal during fear, anger, and sexual arousal. Observers would have trouble discerning these states from measuring physiological responses alone, but our emotional experiences (and sometimes our facial expressions) differ during these three states.

Using sophisticated equipment, researchers have found linkages between some emotions and minute movements of muscles in the brow (during fear) and cheeks (during joy) and under the eyes (during joy). Brain scans also show increased activity in the amygdala during fear. Differences also appear in the brain's cortical areas. Negative emotions (disgust, for example) trigger more activity in the right prefrontal cortex, whereas positive moods (enthusiasm, for example) register in the left frontal lobe, which has a rich supply of dominate receptors.

The spillover effect occurs when our arousal from one event influences our response to other events. Although not completely undifferentiated, emotional arousal is sometimes general enough to require us to define the emotion we are experiencing. Arousal fuels emotion; cognition channels it.

Emotional responses are immediate when sensory input goes directly to the amygdala via the thalamus, bypassing the cortex, triggering a rapid reaction that is often outside our conscious awareness. Response to complex emotions (such as guilt, happiness, and love) require interpretation and are routed along the slower route to the cortex for analysis.

Expressed Emotion

Most people can detect nonverbal cues, and we are especially sensitive to nonverbal threats. Experience contributes to our sensitivity to cues, as studies of abused children show.

Women generally are better than men at reading people's emotional cues, including those displayed during deception. Women also give more detailed description of their emotional reactions, more readily describe themselves as emotional, and express empathy more often, in words and in their facial expressions. Women surpass men in conveying happiness, but men communicate anger better.

Facial muscles reveal signs of emotion. But lie detection methods based on facial expressions don't yet exist, and most if us have difficulty detecting expressions of deceit. The absence of verbal or emotional cues in e-mails deprives us of an important source of information.

The meaning of gestures varies with culture, but many facial expressions, such as those of happiness and fear, are found all over the world (and among children blind from birth), indicating that these expressions are culturally universal aspects of emotions. Cultures differ, however, in the amount of emotional expression they consider acceptable, in prelinguistic, prehistoric times, emotional expressions could have enhanced survival by enabling survival by enabling communication of threats, greetings, and submission. Some emotional expressions help is to take in more sensory information or to avoid taking in toxic substances.

The facial feedback hypothesis proposes that expression amplify our emotional by activating muscles associated with specific states, and the muscles signal the body to respond as though we were experiencing those states. Thus, when we stimulate the facial expression normally associated with happiness, we may feel happier. Similarly, the behavior feedback hypothesis assumes that if we move our body as we would when experiencing some emotion (shuffling along with downcast eyes, as when sad), we are likely to feel that emotion to some degree.

Experienced Emotion

Carroll Izard's research found the 10 basic emotions of joy, interest-excitement, surprise, sadness, anger, disgust, contempt, fear, shame, and guilt. Some psychologists believe that pride and love may also be basic emotions. Emotions can be placed along two basic dimensions: arousal (high versus low) and valence (pleasant, or positive, versus unpleasant, or negative).

What we learn through experience best explains the variety of human fears. We learn specific fears through conditioning (associating emotions with specific situations) and through observational learning (watching others display fear in response to certain events or surrounding.)

We are biologically prepared to learn some fears (snakes, spiders, height) but not others (fast driving, bombs, electricity). The amygdala plays a key role in fear learning, associating fear with specific situations. The amygdala receives information from cortical areas that process emotions, and it sends information to other areas that produce the bodily symptoms of fear. People differ in the extent to which they are fearful or fearless, and part of that difference is genetic.

Frustrating or insulting actions we interpret as willful, unjustified, and avoidable may evoke anger. Research does not support the catharsis hypothesis- the idea that releasing negative energy will calm aggressive tendencies. Venting rage may calm us temporarily, but in the long run it does not reduce anger and may actually amplify it. Anger is better handled by waiting until the level of physical arousal diminishes, calming oneself, and expressing grievances in ways that promote reconciliation rather than retaliation. When reconciliation fails, forgivingness can reduce one's anger and its physical symptoms.

The feel-good, do-good phenomenon is our increased willingness to help other when we are in a good mood, Research in positive psychology is currently exploring the causes and consequences if subjective well-being (self-perceived happiness or satisfaction with life), supplementing psychology's traditional focus on negative emotions.

Negative emotions is highest just after we wake up and before we go to sleep. Positive emotion rises gradually, peaking about seven hours after we rise, then falls gradually. The moods triggered by the day's good or bad events seldom last beyond that day. Even significant bad events, such as a serious illness, seldom destroy happiness for long, although we tend to underestimate our capacity to adapt.

At a basic level, money helps us avoid pain by enabling better nutrition, health care, education, and science and these in turn increase happiness. Increase in wealth can also increase happiness in the short term. But in the longer term, research does not show an increase in happiness accompanying affluence at either the individual or national level.

The adaptation-level phenomenon is our tendency to assess stimuli (including material possessions) by contrasting them with a neutral level that changes with out experience. The relative-deprivation principle is our perception that we are less well off than other with whom we compare ourselves. Thus, happiness is relative to both our past experience and our comparisons with others.

Happiness is in part genetically influenced, and in part under our own control. Research-based suggestions for improving our won happiness are (1) realizing that enduring happiness doesn't come from financial success; (2) taking control of one's time; (3) acting happy; (4) seeking work and leisure that engage one's skills; (5) exercising regularly; (6) getting adequate sleep; (7) giving priority to close relationships; (8) focusing beyond oneself; (9) being grateful for what we have and (10) nurturing one spiritual selves.