AIOU B. Ed General Methods of Teaching (8601) | Solved Assignment 1.
Q.5
Explain different theories of motivation.
DEFINITION OF MOTIVATION
The word motivation is derived from the Latin word ‘movers’ which means to move. Thus; motivation is an external force that accelerates a response or behavior. Motivation is a cause of an organism’s behavior or the reason that an organism carries out some activity. In a human being, motivation involves both conscious and unconscious drives
Motivation is described by different psychologists differently as described below:-
• “The term motivation refers to the arousal of a tendency to act to produce one or
more effect” Allport (1935 )
• “Motivation is constant, never-ending, fluctuating and complex and it is an almost
universal characteristic of particularly every organismic state of affairs.” Maslow(1960 )
• “The process of arousing, sustaining and regulating activity” Crow. L. D.(1953 )
• “The central factor in the effective management of the process of learning.”B.R.
Annandi (1981)
• “Motivation in school learning involves arousing, persisting, sustaining and
directing desirable behavior.” Lepper, Mark R.(1998)
The word motivation refers to getting someone moving. When we motivate ourselves or someone else, we develop incentives or we set up conditions that start or stop the behavior. In education, motivation deals with the problem of setting up conditions so that learners will perform to the best of their abilities in academic settings. We often motivate learners by helping them develop an expectancy that a benefit will occur as a result of their participation in an instructional experience. Motivation is concerned with the factors that stimulate or inhibit the desire to engage in the behavior. It involves the processes that energize, direct and sustain behavior. It can be thought of as an internal process that activates, guides, and maintains behavior over time.
THEORIES OF MOTIVATION
Motivation is a state-of-mind, filled with energy and enthusiasm, which drives a person to work in a certain way to achieve desired goals. Motivation is a force that pushes a person to work with a high level of commitment and focus even if things are against him. Motivation translates into a certain kind of human behavior. It is important to ensure that every team member in an organization is motivated. Various psychologists have studied human behavior and have formalized their findings in the form of various motivation theories. These motivation theories provide a great understanding of how people behave and what motivates them. Motivation is a huge field of study. There are many theories of motivation. Some of the famous motivation theories include the following:
The Behavioural Perspective
According to the behaviorist view of learning, when children are rewarded with praise and a gold star for doing their job correctly, they will look forward to the next mathematics lesson, anticipating another reward. At some time in the past, they must have been rewarded for similar achievements and this experience acts as a motivator for future learning of a similar type.
For behaviorists, motivation is simply a product of effective contingent reinforcement. So, they emphasize the use of extrinsic reinforcement to stimulate students’ task engagement. The reinforcement can take the form of praise, a smile, an early mark, or loss of privileges such as missing out on the sport.
“Almost all teachers use extrinsic reinforcement in some form to motivate students, although they may not realize they are doing so and may not always use such reinforcement effectively.” (Brody, 1992 in Krause, et. al, 2003)
The Humanistic Perspective
The humanist theory of motivation is interesting because it is not only linked to achievement and education but also has implications for students’ welfare and wellbeing through its concern with basic needs. It stresses students’ capacity for personal growth, freedom to choose their destiny, and positive qualities.
There are two theories of motivation from a humanistic perspective:
(a) Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
Maslow (1954) perceived motivation in terms of a hierarchy of needs that can also be conceived as ‘motives’. According to Maslow’s model, once basic physiological needs have been satisfied, efforts are directed toward achieving needs associated with safety, love and belonging, and self-esteem.
Abraham Maslow postulated that a person will be motivated when his needs are fulfilled. The need starts from the lowest level basic needs and keeps moving up as a lower-level need is fulfilled. Below is the hierarchy of needs:
Physiological: Physical survival necessities such as food, water, and shelter.
Safety: Protection from threats, deprivation, and other dangers.
Social (belongingness and love): The need for association, affiliation, friendship, and so on.
Self-esteem: The need for respect and recognition.
Self-actualization: The opportunity for personal development, learning, and fun/creative/challenging work. Self-actualization is the highest level of need to which a human being can aspire.
b) Roger’s motivation theory
Carl Rogers’s ideas are also influential in discussing the nature of motivation and its impact on human lives. Rogers argued that: Behaviour was influenced by the individual’s perception of both personal and environmental factors. People should listen to their ‘inner voices’ or innate capacity to judge what was good for themselves, rather than relying on feedback from external sources.
Carl Rogers (1959) believed that humans have one basic motive, that is the tendency to self-actualize - i.e., to fulfill one's potential and achieve the highest level of 'human being we can.
Like a flower that will grow to its full potential if the conditions are right, but which is constrained by its environment, so people will flourish and reach their potential if their environment is good enough.
However, unlike a flower, the potential of the individual human is unique, and we are meant to develop in different ways according to our personality. Rogers believed that people are inherently good and creative.
They become destructive only when a poor self-concept or external constraints override the valuing process. Carl Rogers believed that for a person to achieve self-actualization they must be in a state of congruence.
This means that self-actualization occurs when a person’s “ideal self” (i.e., who they would like to be) is congruent with their actual behavior (self-image).
Rogers describes an individual who is actualizing as a fully functioning person. The main determinant of whether we will become self-actualized is childhood experience.
The Cognitive Perspective
“According to Santrock (2006), the cognitive perspective on motivation focuses on students’ thought to guide their motivation. It focuses on students’ internal motivation to achieve, their attribution (perception about the causes of success or failure), and their beliefs that they can effectively control their environment. It also stresses the importance of goal setting, planning, and monitoring progress toward a goal.”
(a) Achievement Motivation
John Atkinson and David McClelland described the need for achievement as: “A stable personality characteristic that drives some individuals to strive for success. Students who have a high need for achievement are motivated to become involved in an activity if they believe that they will be successful. They are moderate risk takers and tend to be attracted to tasks where the chances of success are fifty-fifty; since there is a good chance they will be successful. They like to attempt a task, but not if they know there is a substantial risk of failure.” On the other hand, Krause described: “Students who have a need to avoid failure, rather than a need to achieve success, will look for tasks that are either very easy and have little risk of failure, or very difficult so that failure is not their fault.”
(b) Weiner Attribution Theory
Attribution theory is concerned with the way in which an individual’s explanations of success and failure influence that individual’s subsequent motivation and behavior. Students may attribute success or failure to different causes, depending on their beliefs about who or what controls their success or failure. There are three important elements to note regarding the way in which students interpret the cause of the behavioral outcomes. The three important elements are the locus of control, controllability, and stability.
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