Motive for rejection
The motive of rejection is the disease of rejection, which manifests itself in the fear of being rejected, not accepted.
People with a predominant motive of rejection exhibit self-doubt and constraint in communication situations. The motive for rejection is characterized by the following manifestations:
✓ uncertainty;
✓ stiffness;
✓ awkwardness;
✓ tension.
Motive for rejection. It manifests itself in the fear of being unaccepted and rejected by people significant to the individual. The predominance of this motive leads to uncertainty, constraint, awkwardness, and tension, which creates obstacles in interpersonal communication. People with a dominant motive of rejection are often lonely, cause others to mistrust them, and their communication skills are poorly developed.
The motive of rejection is completely opposite to the motive of affiliation. If the motive of rejection manifests itself in the fear of being unaccepted, rejected by people significant to the individual, then the motive of affiliation in a person gives rise to a style of communication with people, characterized by confidence, ease, openness and courage. On the contrary, the predominance of the motive of rejection leads to uncertainty, constraint, awkwardness, and tension. The predominance of this motive creates obstacles to interpersonal communication. Such people cause distrust in themselves, they are lonely, and their communication skills are poorly developed.
Need for affiliation
affiliation need) The need for affiliation (P. a.) was 1 out of 20 psychol. needs described by G. A. Murray and measured on the basis of the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT). P. a. noted when one or more of the characters in the story compiled by the subject expresses a desire to “establish, maintain or maintain positive emotional relationships with another person.” People with high levels of P. a. on the Goh Adjective Checklist (ACL) describe themselves as friendly, warm-hearted, trusting, talkative, cheerful, kind, loyal, helpful, approving, accepting and generous. These characteristics appear to be more associated with feminine rather than masculine personality stereotypes. S. Miller and K. M. Nardini found, for example, that women, compared with men, scored higher on a measure of affiliative tendency, and Bose, Das Gupta, and Lindgren noted that female students from Calcutta with whom a study was conducted Bengal test (Bengali test), measuring P. a. and the need for achievement (P.d.), received higher scores on it according to P.a. and lower in P. d. than their male classmates. There is ample evidence of a negative correlation between P. d. and P. a., probably due to the fact that these two motives are usually expressed in mutually incompatible forms of behavior. Research generally confirm the hypotheses. on the theory of P. a. Lansing and Haynes, for example, found that P. a. was significantly related to the number of local telephone calls subjects made, although it was weakly related to the number of letters they wrote or visits to distant relatives and close friends. Seed and Lindgren found that female students majoring in education and training had higher scores on the P.A. measure than students specializing in other fields, and that P.a. among women preparing to become mothers was higher than in any other tested group. The idea that the tendency to affiliate is characterized by sensitivity to rejection was examined by Mehrabian, who did not find a significant relationship between these two traits. Both variables were negatively correlated with measures of achievement tendencies, but affiliative tendencies were positively correlated with measures of empathy and arousal-seeking tendencies, whereas rejection sensitivity were negatively correlated with arousal-seeking and social tendencies. desirability. However, Mehrabian concluded that scores on measures of affiliation tendency and rejection sensitivity could be combined to produce a separate measure of dependency. See also Need-Pressure Theory, Prosocial Behavior by G. K. Lindgren
Concept of motive and motivation
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Motives are what the activity is performed for (for example, for the sake of self-affirmation, money, etc.).
The concept of “motive” (from the Latin movere - to move, push) means an incentive to activity, a motivating reason for actions and deeds. Motives can be different: interest in the content and process of activity, duty to society, self-affirmation, etc.
If a person strives to perform a certain activity, we can say that he has motivation. For example, if a student is diligent in his studies, he is motivated to study; an athlete who strives to achieve high results has a high level of achievement motivation; The desire of the leader to subordinate everyone indicates the presence of a high level of motivation for power.
Motivation is a set of motivating factors that determine the activity of an individual; these include motives, needs, incentives, situational factors that determine human behavior.
Motives are relatively stable formations of personality, but motivation includes not only motives, but also situational factors (the influence of various people, the specifics of activity and situation). Situational factors such as the complexity of the task, management requirements, and the attitudes of surrounding people strongly influence a person’s motivation over a certain period of time. Situational factors are dynamic and change easily, so there are opportunities to influence them and activity in general. The intensity of actual (acting “here and now”) motivation consists of the strength of the motive and the intensity of situational determinants of motivation (the demands and influence of other people, the complexity of tasks, etc.).
There are two functionally interconnected sides in human behavior: incentive and regulatory.
Drive ensures the activation and direction of behavior, and regulation is responsible for how it develops from beginning to end in a specific situation. Mental processes, phenomena and states: sensations, perception, memory, imagination, attention, thinking, abilities, temperament, character, emotions - all this mainly provides the regulation of behavior. As for its stimulation, or motivation, it is associated with the concepts of motive and motivation. These concepts include an idea of the needs, interests, goals, intentions, aspirations, motivations of a person, the external factors that force him to behave in a certain way, the management of activities in the process of its implementation, and much more. Among all the concepts that are used in psychology to describe and explain the motivating moments in human behavior, the most general and basic are the concepts of motivation and motive.
The term “motivation” is a broader concept than the term “motive”. The word “motivation” is used in modern psychology in a double sense: as denoting a system of factors that determine behavior (this includes, in particular, needs, motives, goals, intentions, aspirations and much more), and as a characteristic of the process that stimulates and supports behavioral activity at a certain level.
Motivation, therefore, can be defined as a set of reasons of a psychological nature that explain human behavior, its beginning, direction and activity.
The following aspects of behavior require a motivational explanation: its occurrence, duration and stability, direction and cessation after achieving a set goal, pre-setting for future events, increased efficiency, reasonableness or semantic integrity of a single behavioral act. In addition, at the level of cognitive processes, their selectivity and emotionally specific coloring are subject to motivational explanation.
The concept of motivation arises when attempting to explain rather than describe behavior. Detection and description of the causes of sustainable changes in behavior is the answer to the question of the motivation of actions containing it.
Any form of behavior can be explained by both internal and external reasons. In the first case, the starting and final points of explanation are the psychological properties of the subject of behavior, and in the second - the external conditions and circumstances of his activity. In the first case, they talk about motives, needs, goals, intentions, desires, interests, etc., and in the second, they talk about incentives emanating from the current situation. Sometimes all the psychological factors that, as it were, from within a person determine his behavior, are called personal dispositions. Then, accordingly, we talk about dispositional and situational motivations as analogues of internal and external determination of behavior.
Dispositional and situational motivations are not independent. Dispositions can be updated under the influence of a certain situation, and, on the contrary, the activation of certain dispositions (motives, needs) leads to a change in the situation, or more precisely, its perception by the subject.
The behavior of an individual in situations that seem the same appears to be varied, and this diversity is difficult to explain by appealing only to the situation. It has been established, for example, that even to the same questions a person answers differently depending on where and how these questions are asked to him. In this regard, it makes sense to define the situation not physically, but psychologically, as it appears to the subject in his perception and experiences, i.e. the way a person understands and evaluates it.
Motivation explains the purposefulness of action, organization and sustainability of holistic activities aimed at achieving a specific goal.
A motive is something that belongs to the subject of behavior himself, is his stable personal property, which internally encourages him to perform certain actions. Motive can also be defined as a concept that, in a generalized form, represents a set of dispositions.
Of all possible dispositions, the most important is the concept of need. It is called the state of need of a person or animal in certain conditions, which they lack for normal existence and development. Need as a state of personality is always associated with a person’s feeling of dissatisfaction associated with a shortage of what is required (hence the name “need”) by the body (person).
The second concept in terms of motivational significance after need is goal. The goal is the directly conscious result towards which the action associated with the activity that satisfies the actualized need is currently directed.
The motivational sphere of a person from the point of view of its development can be assessed according to the following parameters: breadth, flexibility and hierarchization. The breadth of the motivational sphere is understood as the qualitative diversity of motivational factors - dispositions (motives), needs and goals presented at each level.
In addition to motives, needs and goals, interests, tasks, desires and intentions are also considered as drivers of human behavior. Interest is a special motivational state of a cognitive nature, which, as a rule, is not directly related to any one need that is relevant at a given time.
A task arises when, in the course of performing an action aimed at achieving a specific goal, the body encounters an obstacle that must be overcome in order to move on. Desires and intentions are momentarily arising and quite often replacing each other motivational subjective states that meet the changing conditions for performing an action.
Interests, tasks, desires and intentions, although they are part of the system of motivational factors, participate in the motivation of behavior, however, they play not so much an incentive role as an instrumental one. They are more responsible for the style rather than the direction of behavior.
The concept of motivation as a conscious and unconscious process
The motivation of human behavior can be conscious and unconscious. This means that some needs and goals that govern a person’s behavior are recognized by him, while others are not.
Many psychological problems find their solution as soon as we abandon the idea that people are always aware of the motives of their actions, actions, thoughts and feelings.
In reality, their true motives are not necessarily what they seem.
Psychological theories of motivation
Numerous theories of motivation began to appear in the works of ancient philosophers.
Views on the essence and origin of human motivation have changed repeatedly throughout the study of this problem, but have invariably been located between two philosophical movements: rationalism and irrationalism. According to the rationalist position, man is a unique being of a special kind that has nothing in common with animals. It was believed that he, and only he, was endowed with reason, thinking and consciousness, possessing will and freedom to choose actions. The motivational source of human behavior is seen exclusively in the mind, consciousness and will of a person.
Irrationalism as a doctrine extended mainly to animals. It argued that the behavior of animals, unlike humans, is not free, unreasonable, controlled by dark, unconscious forces of the biological plane, which have their origins in organic needs.
The first actual motivational, psychological theories that incorporated rationalistic and irrationalistic ideas should be considered to have arisen in the 17th - 18th centuries. the theory of decision making, which explains human behavior on a rationalistic basis, and the theory of the automaton, which explains the behavior of animals on an irrationalistic basis. The first appeared in economics and was associated with the introduction of mathematical knowledge into the explanation of human behavior associated with economic choice. Then it was transferred to the understanding of human actions in other areas of its activity other than economics.
The development of the theory of automata, stimulated by the successes of mechanics in the 17th - 18th centuries, was further combined with the idea of reflex as a mechanical, automatic, innate response of a living organism to external influences. The separate, independent existence of two motivational theories: one for humans, the other for animals, supported by theology and the division of philosophies into two opposing camps - materialism and idealism - continued until the end of the 19th century.
Under the influence of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, psychology began an intensive study of intelligent forms of behavior in animals (W. Köhler, E. Thorndike) and instincts in humans (Z. Freud, I.P. Pavlov, etc.). If earlier the concept of need, associated with the needs of the organism, was used only to explain the behavior of an animal, now it has begun to be used to explain human behavior, accordingly changing and expanding the composition of the needs themselves in relation to it.
In the 20s of the 20th century, the theory of instincts was replaced by a concept based on biological needs in explaining human behavior. This concept stated that humans and animals have common organic needs that have the same effect on their behavior. Periodically arising organic needs cause a state of excitement and tension in the body, and satisfaction of the need leads to a decrease (reduction) of tension.
There were no fundamental differences between the concepts of instinct and need, except that instincts are innate, unchangeable, and needs can be acquired and change throughout life, especially in humans.
In the same years (beginning of the 20th century), two more new directions arose, stimulated by the evolutionary teachings of Charles Darwin and the discoveries of I.P. Pavlov. This is a behavioral (behaviorist) theory of motivation and a theory of higher nervous activity.
The research begun by I.P. Pavlov was continued, deepened and expanded by other physiologists and psychologists. Among them we can name N.A. Bernstein, the author of the theory of psychophysiological regulation of movements, P.K. Anokhin, who proposed a model of a functional system that describes and explains the dynamics of a behavioral act, and E.N. Sokolov, who discovered and studied the orientation reflex, which has a large significance for understanding the psychophysiological mechanisms of perception, attention and motivation.
The theory of organic needs of animals developed under the strong influence of previous irrationalist traditions in understanding animal behavior. Its modern representatives see their task as purely physiologically explaining the mechanisms of work and functioning of biological needs.
Since the 30s of the XX century. Special concepts of motivation appear and stand out, relating only to humans. One of the first such concepts was the theory of motivation proposed by K. Lewin. Following her, the works of representatives of humanistic psychology were published, such as A. Maslow, G. Allport, K. Rogers, etc.
The American motivation researcher G. Murray, along with a list of organic, or primary, needs, identical to the basic instincts identified by W. McDougall, proposed a list of secondary (psychogenic) needs that arise on the basis of instinct-like drives as a result of upbringing and training. These are the needs to achieve success, affiliation, aggression, the needs of independence, resistance, respect, humiliation, protection, dominance, attracting attention, avoiding harmful influences, avoiding failures, etc.
A different classification of human needs into hierarchically constructed groups was proposed by A. Maslow. The following seven classes of needs consistently appear in a person and accompany personal maturation: Physiological (organic) needs. Security needs. Needs for belonging and love. Needs of respect (honor). Cognitive needs. Aesthetic needs. Self-actualization needs.
In the second half of the 20th century. theories of human needs were supplemented by a number of special motivational concepts presented in the works of D. McClelland, D. Atkinson, G. Heckhausen, G. Kelly, Y. Rotter. The following provisions are common to all of them: Denial of the fundamental possibility of creating a single universal theory of motivation that equally satisfactorily explains both the behavior of animals and humans. The conviction that stress reduction as the main motivational source of purposeful behavioral activity at the human level does not work, in any case, is not the main motivational principle for him. An affirmation, instead of reducing tension, of the principle of activity, according to which a person is not reactive in his behavior, but is initially active, that the sources of his immanent activity - motivation - are located in himself, in his psychology. Recognition, along with the unconscious, of the essential role of a person’s consciousness in determining his behavior. Bringing conscious regulation of human actions to the fore. The desire to introduce into scientific circulation specific concepts that reflect the characteristics of human motivation. Such concepts were, for example, social needs, motives (D. McClelland, D. Atkinson, G. Heckhausen), life goals (K. Rogers, R. May), cognitive factors (Y. Rotter, G. Kelly, etc.) . Denial of the adequacy for humans of such methods of studying (generating) motivational states that are used at the animal level, in particular, food, biological deprivation, physical stimuli such as electric shocks and other purely physical punishments. Search for special methods for studying motivation that are suitable for humans and do not repeat the shortcomings of the techniques used to study the motivation of animals. The desire to directly connect these methods with the speech and consciousness of a person - his distinctive features.
In Russian psychology, until the mid-60s, according to the unjustified tradition that had developed over decades, psychological research was mainly focused on the study of cognitive processes.
According to the concept of A.N. Leontiev, the motivational sphere of a person, like his other psychological characteristics, has its sources in practical activities. In the activity itself one can find those components that correspond to the elements of the motivational sphere and are functionally and genetically related to them. Behavior in general, for example, corresponds to human needs; the system of activities from which it is composed - a variety of motives; set of actions that form an activity - an ordered set of goals. Thus, between the structure of activity and the structure of a person’s motivational sphere there are relations of isomorphism, i.e. mutual correspondence.
