5 Steps to a 5 AP Psychology, 2010-2011 Edition - Laura Lincoln Maitland [100]
Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Motivation
When you do something because you enjoy it or want to test your ability or gain skill, your motivation is usually intrinsic. Curiosity and a desire for knowledge stem from intrinsic needs. Intrinsic motivation is a desire to perform an activity for its own sake rather than an external reward. Extrinsic motivation is a desire to perform an activity to obtain a reward from outside the individual, such as money and other material goods we have learned to enjoy, such as applause or attention. Society is largely extrinsically motivated by rewards such as money. People who are intrinsically motivated by inner desires for creativity, fulfillment, and inner satisfaction tend to be psychologically healthier and happier. When people are given a reward for doing something for which they are intrinsically motivated, their intrinsic motivation often diminishes, resulting in the overjustification effect in which promising a reward for doing something they already like to do results in them seeing the reward as the motivation for performing the task.
Social Conflict Situations
Conflict involves being torn in different directions by opposing motives that block us from attaining a goal, leaving us feeling frustrated and stressed. The least stressful are approach-approach conflicts, which are situations involving two positive options, only one of which we can have. For example, you are accepted to both Harvard and Yale and must decide which to attend. Avoidance-avoidance conflicts are situations involving two negative options, one of which you must choose. Some expressions, such as “Between a rock and a hard place,” or “Damned if you do and damned if you don’t,” and “Between the devil and the deep blue sea,” exemplify this conflict. Approach-avoidance conflicts are situations involving whether or not to choose an option that has both a positive and negative consequence or consequences. Ordering a rich dessert ruins your diet but satisfies your chocolate cravings. The most complex form of conflict is the multiple approach–avoidance conflict, which involves several alternative courses of action that have both positive and negative aspects. For example, if you take the bus to the movies, you’ll get there in time to get a good seat and see the coming attractions, but you won’t have enough money to buy popcorn. If your parents drive you, you’ll have to help make dinner and wash the dishes. If you walk there, you may be late and get a bad seat, but you’ll have enough money to buy popcorn and you won’t have to help with dinner and the dishes.
Theories of Emotion
An emotion is a conscious feeling of pleasantness or unpleasantness accompanied by biological activation and expressive behavior; emotion has cognitive, physiological, and behavioral components. Two dimensions of emotion are arousal or intensity and valence or positive/negative quality. The greater the arousal, the more intense the emotion. Fear, anger, happiness, sadness, surprise, and disgust are examples of emotions. Evolutionary psychologists suggest that emotions persist because of their adaptive value. Fear of people and other animals displaying angry faces, for example, caused humans to focus attention and energize action to protect themselves in ways that enabled the species to survive. Facial expressions seem to be inborn and universal across all cultures. Many areas in the brain, many neuro-transmitter systems, the autonomic nervous system, and the endocrine system are tied to emotions. The amygdala, which is part of the limbic system, influences aggression