Motives and the

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Personality Psychology
Chapter 8 Motives and the Dynamics of Personality
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Needs and Motives Theory Defined

• A theory of personality that asserts that
  personality is best understood as a reflection of
  underlying needs

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Key Components

• Personality revolves around concept of Needs
• Personality is reflected in behavior, which
  results from underlying needs/motives/press
• Very General
• Based on basic aspects of life humans want or
  desire for their well-being
• Very Individualized
• Idiographic

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Key People

• Henry Murray
• Abraham Maslow
• Carl Rogers

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Henry Murray

• Central figure
• Developed wide-ranging theory of personality
  organized by a pattern of needs, motives, and
  press
• Idiographically oriented
• Manifest needs (observable)
• Latent needs (underlying)

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Needs

• Basic desire for something states of tension
  internal state that is less than satisfactory
  (Need for Food)
• Two Types
• Three Combinations
• Thought to be objective

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Motives

• Drives to meet needs and reduce dissatisfaction
  internal states that arouse and direct behavior
  towards goals (Hunger)
• Influenced by needs
• Cognitions with affective overtones, organized
  around preferred experiences and goals
  (emotionally-charged goals)
• Appear in thoughts that pertain to either desired
  or undesired goals
• Subjective overtones
• Leads to behavior directly

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Press

• External events that influence motives (Seeing
  someone eat dessert)
• Environmental influence on motives as opposed to
  biological, internal influences of needs
• Can bring on a motivational state simply through
  environmental exposure
• Both objective and subjective press exists
• Alpha Press (objective environment)
• Beta Press (perceived environment)

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The process of personality in Needs and Motives
Theory

• Underlying need and the external press are
  combined into motives
• Motives influence what behaviors are expressed

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Murrays Understanding of Personality
Need
Motive
Behavior
Press
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Murrays Understanding of Personality
Water
Buy a drink
Thirst
Hot day
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Murrays Hierarchy of Needs

• Needs exist at different levels of strength
• Each need interacts with other needs, resulting
  in interactions, or dynamics within the person
• Varies from person to person, resulting in unique
  patterning of needs, motives, and behaviors
  (individualized)

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Measuring Needs

• Manifest Needs (aka Motives)
• Behavior, self-report
• Latent Needs (True definition of Needs)
• Murray was most interested in pattern of latent
  needs
• Indirect methods
• Applied the term Apperception to mean the
  process of projecting needs onto a stimulus
• Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)

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Most Researched Needs

• Need For Achievement
• Doing Things Better
• Research Findings
• Gender Differences
• Promoting Achievement Motivation

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Most Researched Needs

• Need For Power
• Having Impact
• Research Findings
• Gender Differences
• Health Status and The Need For Power
• War and Peaceand Power

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Most Researched Needs

• Need For Intimacy
• Wanting Relationships
• Research Findings

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Most Researched Needs

• Need For Affiliation
• Motive to spend time with others want to be
  accepted actively make social contacts
• Couples do best when Need for Affiliation is
  similar
• Four sub-domains in terms of the function of this
  need
• Social comparison, Emotional support, Positive
  stimulation, Attention from others

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The Humanism Paradigm The Motive to Self-Actualize

• The Self is the most important being the
  Self is the center of ones universe, second to
  no others
• Humans determine for themselves what their lives
  are to be like Focus on free-will
• Emphasizes the human need for growth and
  realizing ones full potential
• Believes that humans are intrinsically good and
  self-perfecting

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The Humanistic Tradition Maslows Hierarchy of
Needs

• Needs are hierarchically organized
• Needs must be satisfied at the lower levels
  before we proceed to satisfy the higher needs
• Lower needs
• More powerful and pressing, but more primitive
• Deficiency-based
• Higher needs
• Weaker, or subtle, but more human
• Growth-based

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Characteristics of Self-Actualizers According
to Maslow

• Efficient in perceptions of reality
• Accepting of themselves and others
• Spontaneous, natural, authentic
• Philosophical
• Oceanic feelings

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The Humanistic Tradition Carl Rogers

• The Motive to Self-Actualize
• Main Beliefs
• Actualization
• Self-actualization
• Fully-functioning person
• Positive Regard

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Rogers Positive Regard

• Unconditional Offered without prerequisites
• Conditional Offered only on the basis of
  certain requirements
• Conditions of Worth
• Conditional Self-regard

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Rogers as a Self Theorist

• Self-Concept Set of qualities the person views
  as being part of himself or herself made of many
  elements
• Ideal Self Image the person wants to be
• Actual Self Image the person understands him or
  herself to be
• Real Self Who each person acts like from day to
  day

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Rogers as a Self Theorist

• How perspectives on the Self can interact
• Congruence of Self
• Incongruence of Self

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Congruence vs. Incongruence

• Congruence of Self
• Occurs when ideal self and actual self are
  similar when you are whom you want to be
• Occurs when actual self and real self are similar
  when you act like the person you know yourself
  to be
• Both achieved by self-actualization and result in
  a fully functioning person

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Congruence vs. Incongruence

• Incongruence of Self
• Caused by a mismatch of ideal/actual selves or
  actual/real selves
• Caused by conditions of worth
• Leads to anxiety
• Defenses enacted to protect Self from this anxiety

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Rogerian Defenses

• Distortions of experiences
• Perceive event from being different than it is
• Rationalization
• Preventing threats to reach awareness
• Denial of experience
• Avoidance
• Self-handicapping

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Rogerian Client-Centered Therapy

• Focus on the clients topics of discussion
• Clarify feelings
• Restatement of content
• Client is responsible for therapys progress and
  coming to own conclusions, solving own problems

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Rogers versus Maslow

• Rogers began at Maslows social needs level (3rd
  level)
• Maslows Need for Love and Belongingness is
  similar to Rogers Need for Positive Regard
• Maslows Esteem Need is a positive need Rogers
  Conditions of Worth are negative according to him
• Both thought the need for acceptance was stronger
  than the need for self-actualization