PREVENTING UNWANTED BEHAVIOR. IS IT WITHIN OUR POWER ?
Just as it is hard to start a new habit, it is hard to stop an old one. In fact, some behaviors are thought to be unpreventable, i.e. beyond our ability to control with "willpower" or self-help techniques. Many feel this way about drinking alcohol; some do about eating, smoking, and even procrastination. When we add an awareness that genetic, metabolic, physiological, unconscious, and environmental factors as well as underlying emotions affect our reaction to drinking, food, smoking, coffee, soft drinks, sugar, etc., it shakes our faith (rightly so) in self-control. There is evidence, for instance, that alcoholics chemically process alcohol differently from nonalcoholics (Heilman, film). Alcoholism is called a "disease," implying that it is an unstoppable physical disorder, treatable only by physicians or a Higher Power? For an extensive discussion and references, see the Addiction section and Stanton Peele's books (Peele & Brodsky, 1991). For the specific steps to take when preventing relapse, go to Relapse Prevention.
Experienced people in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), Overeaters Anonymous (OA), and Emotions Anonymous (EA) say the first step towards recovery is to admit you are powerless over alcohol, food, emotions, or whatever. Then, their 12-step program basically says, (l) abstain (totally in the case of alcohol) by asking for help from friends (in AA or OA or EA who have been in the same situation) and from a Higher Power, (2) admit your "defects of character" and the wrongs you've done, and (3) make amends. AA is often considered the best available treatment for alcoholism, so use it if you need it. Interestingly, AA has a reputation for being successful in spite of little or no outcome research. Unfortunately, AA opposes research (members aren't supposed to disclose what happens at AA meetings) and doesn't directly teach self-control methods. It is known that many people go to AA only a few times and others backslide after hundreds of AA sessions. One study of 90 addicts found that they had, on average, attended 586 AA sessions before relapsing (Chiauzzi, 1989). That is an amazing amount of "treatment" to be followed by failure. So, AA is not a perfect miracle cure. If AA added more self-control beliefs and procedures, especially relapse prevention, to its program, it might be more effective. Only research can tell us. See more references concerning alcoholism at the end of the chapter.
There is also evidence that overweight people adjust their metabolism as they reduce their intake of food so that they tend to stay about the same weight, called their "biological destiny" (Bennett & Gurin, l98?). If that is the case, losing weight may be very hard to do if you have a genetic tendency to be heavy or to crave sweets, etc. It is believed that weight loss efforts work best the first time you try to diet; thereafter, the body loses weight more slowly but gains it back much more rapidly. Also, over-weight people produce more insulin than thin people when they see food and that increases hunger pangs. Heavy people respond more to external cues--smells, sight of dessert, etc. All this (plus the emotions pushing us to eat) makes it hard to lose weight. As most people know, our metabolism is a function of our activity level, so losing weight without exercise is especially hard to do.
No matter what the physiological and emotional processes are and how difficult it is to reduce drinking or overeating, the addict still has the problem of how to stop a harmful habit. Should he/she get professional medical help, psychological help, give up trying to do the impossible alone and turn to God, join a self-help group, take antabuse or diet pills, go to a Mental Health Center or an addiction treatment center, talk to friends, read and try to help him/herself or what? My answer again is, "Try all kinds of treatment until something works."
Is it harder for some people to overcome bad habits than others? Since this is like the question "Do I see blue the same as you do?" we will never know but old habits are hard for everybody to stop. How hard? There is very contradictory evidence. Some treatment programs claim a 90% success rate (during the treatment phase). In general, relapse after treatment of addictive behavior is very high, 50% to 90% (Brownell, Marlatt, Lichtenstein & Wilson, 1986). Two thirds to 3/4's of drug and alcohol abusers relapse within three months after treatment (Chiazzi, 1989). In one study, less than 10% of treated alcoholics abstained for two years (Armor, Polich, & Stambul, 1978). Researchers of weight loss projects also report disappointing results: few stay in treatment, and 80% of those that do, gain any weight loss back within a year. Smokers frequently quit, then relapse. Clients who stay in these treatment programs for various problems are successful (why else would they stay?), but thus far no program enables a high percentage of clients to maintain their gains. So, it is hopeful (we can change) but the final long-term results of today's "programs," even the expensive ones, are not good enough. On the other hand, note that about half of all former problem-drinkers have quit drinking "on their own" (no help from a MD or AA or any treatment). You are not powerless! But I'd recommend getting all the outside help you can, as well as self-helping.
Similarly, Stanley Schachter (1982) reported some interesting but controversial findings: almost 2/3's (63%) of people who tried to lose weight or stop smoking on their own (without professional help) were successful! And they kept it off for years! This implied that self-help was better than professionally run treatment programs. Subsequent studies (Cohen, et al, 1989) showed this was not true; self-quitters (smokers) did no better or no worse than clients in a stop smoking clinic. But over the years, we try to help ourselves a lot more often than we use professional programs. Thus, 85% of those trying to stop are on their own and only 15% join a stop-smoking program. About 1/3 of all smokers have tried to stop within the last year; most failed. Of those trying to stop sometime (or many times) between 1976 and 1986, 48% of the self-helpers and 24% of the treatment clients were successful. Altogether 40 million Americans have stopped smoking, so it is possible. 90% of the successful ones were on their own and most of them had tried again and again. 70-75 million are still smoking. There is no evidence that successful quitters used different behaviorchange methods than the relapsers; they just motivated themselves more and kept on trying (maybe until they found an approach that worked for them). There is hope. Again, I'll remind you: self administered programs (listening to a tape, reading a manual, watching a videotape) have been just as effective as the rapist administered programs (Scogin, Bynum, Stephens, & Calhoon, 1990). The keys seems to be learning to be motivated and maintaining your gains.
Thursday, May 21, 2015
Once we have self-control why do we lose control over some behavior?
ONCE WE HAVE SELF-CONTROL WHY DO WE LOSE OVER SOME BEHAVIOR ?
Baumeister, Heatherton & Tice (1994) do a good job of explaining our failures at self-control, e.g. giving up during the performance of a task, losing control over our thoughts or emotions, and letting some habit (eating, drinking, smoking, buying, etc.) get out of control. Unfortunately, these authors' work is of limited value because it doesn't tell us much about how to prevent the loss of self-control. However, by understanding the process by which we lose control, perhaps science can help us learn how to maintain self-control. You will recognize that "blocks," discussed above, have much in common with "loss of self-control."
Three steps are needed for us to be in self-control. First, we need "standards," i.e. to know what we want to do or should do. Second, we need to be aware if our behavior is failing to meet our standards. Third, we need to be able to correct our behavior when it becomes sub-standard (this is what the ordinary person would often call "will power"). Failure in any of the three steps will lead to poor self-control: if we don't know where we are going, if we don't pay attention to see if we are getting there, and if we don't know how (or don't have the strength--see blocks) to get back on track if we get lost.
Here are some of the more common ways we lose self-control: we set no goals or impossible goals; we lose control or don't pay attention to our goals or to our behavior; we quit because we get tired or stressed and weakened; we attend to our immediate situation and needs overlooking long-range goals; we misjudge what is important to do; we focus on calming our emotions but neglect doing our tasks or solving our problems; we become obsessed with protecting our egos and neglect getting the job done; we let the initial failure lead to a "snowballing" of many failures (see relapse prevention below); we believe in venting our feelings rather than in eliminating the emotions; we decide we are helpless or bad and stop trying in order to avoid further failure.
Solutions to losing self-control? Set goals, monitor your progress carefully, reward desired behavior, and practice self-control and in the process learn as much as possible about the self-help methods that work for you. As Baumeister, Heatherton & Tice explain, one barrier to gaining this self-knowledge is that most people don't really want to know a lot of accurate information about themselves. Our species prefers to be told positive things or, at most, be told negative things they already believe about themselves. We resolutely avoid accurate self-knowledge about our weaknesses. The more we can overcome this I-don't-want-to-know-the-truth trait, the better we can gain selfcontrol.
Baumeister, Heatherton & Tice (1994) do a good job of explaining our failures at self-control, e.g. giving up during the performance of a task, losing control over our thoughts or emotions, and letting some habit (eating, drinking, smoking, buying, etc.) get out of control. Unfortunately, these authors' work is of limited value because it doesn't tell us much about how to prevent the loss of self-control. However, by understanding the process by which we lose control, perhaps science can help us learn how to maintain self-control. You will recognize that "blocks," discussed above, have much in common with "loss of self-control."
Three steps are needed for us to be in self-control. First, we need "standards," i.e. to know what we want to do or should do. Second, we need to be aware if our behavior is failing to meet our standards. Third, we need to be able to correct our behavior when it becomes sub-standard (this is what the ordinary person would often call "will power"). Failure in any of the three steps will lead to poor self-control: if we don't know where we are going, if we don't pay attention to see if we are getting there, and if we don't know how (or don't have the strength--see blocks) to get back on track if we get lost.
Here are some of the more common ways we lose self-control: we set no goals or impossible goals; we lose control or don't pay attention to our goals or to our behavior; we quit because we get tired or stressed and weakened; we attend to our immediate situation and needs overlooking long-range goals; we misjudge what is important to do; we focus on calming our emotions but neglect doing our tasks or solving our problems; we become obsessed with protecting our egos and neglect getting the job done; we let the initial failure lead to a "snowballing" of many failures (see relapse prevention below); we believe in venting our feelings rather than in eliminating the emotions; we decide we are helpless or bad and stop trying in order to avoid further failure.
Solutions to losing self-control? Set goals, monitor your progress carefully, reward desired behavior, and practice self-control and in the process learn as much as possible about the self-help methods that work for you. As Baumeister, Heatherton & Tice explain, one barrier to gaining this self-knowledge is that most people don't really want to know a lot of accurate information about themselves. Our species prefers to be told positive things or, at most, be told negative things they already believe about themselves. We resolutely avoid accurate self-knowledge about our weaknesses. The more we can overcome this I-don't-want-to-know-the-truth trait, the better we can gain selfcontrol.
Behavioral Blocks And Getting Unstuck
BEHAVIORAL BLOCKS AND UNSTUCK
Lipson and Perkins (1990) have a book explaining why we don't do what we would like to do. How is our intended behavior "blocked," such as when we are constantly late, can't lose weight, don't exercise, don't do our best, etc.? First of all, they assume that all of our behavior is the result of many forces, including our will, pulling and pushing us in many directions. However, they don't use the concept of reinforcement and they decry the idea of increasing our "will power." They point out, as I have, that much self-help advice is very simple and unquestionably correct: stop procrastinating by "planning your time," lose weight by "eating less," be successful by "studying more," etc. But such advice is often inane--useless--because it can't be followed, our will power just isn't strong enough to make the changes. Often, though, they say that if you understood the forces that block your good intentions, you could counter those forces and do what you want to do. This is a cognitive (insight) approach to self-control of your behavior. Let's see if it helps to describe five different kinds of blocks.
First, a strong force in the environment may block our intended or desired behavior; it overpowers our will. We often know exactly what these forces are; we recognize them as constant temptations, e.g. a strong attraction to desserts ruins our diet, a desire to have fun keeps us from getting our work done, an angry reaction to someone causes us to say things we shouldn't, an urge to buy clothes overdraws our account, etc. When these forces overwhelm our best intentions, we say, "I'm weak willed," "I'm lazy," "I'm selfish," etc. It may be neat in a way that there are so many strong forces in the world--things we want and enjoy, physical, hormonal, and genetic drives, social needs, compelling emotions, and on and on. But, these forces frequently crush our self-control, and that's not so neat.
This notion of blocks is obvious; however, it isn't easy to assess the strength of the blocks or your "will power." How successful do you feel your will power has been in overcoming the blocks (temptations and distractions)? These authors say will power is frequently weak, usually over-estimated and a false hope. Instead of "will," we have to use our brain--our knowledge of self-help--to devise ways of avoiding or containing these strong forces. There are lots of such methods; most are in this book.
Secondly, in contrast with the forces mentioned above that we are keenly aware of, Lipson and Perkins (1990) contend that some strong forces are hidden from us and, thus, since we can't combat them handily, they easily block our intentional behavior. We know the forces are there because we see the results. Examples: Our hot attraction to someone turns cold (we don't know why but perhaps he/she is coming on too strong or getting too dependent). Our grades in chemistry are D's and F's (we have the ability but maybe we fail because medicine is dad's choice, not ours). We have a short fuse with our spouse without sufficient reason and without knowing why (maybe because we feel taken for granted or got a lousy assignment at work). We don't want to turn cold, fail chemistry, or have a fight. But things like this happen to all of us; hidden forces are the cause. To understand these blocks, we must seriously search for the reasons, the hidden forces. When we think we have found the reasons, we must carefully question and critically assess the explanation (because we are prone to self deception). Are the conjectured forces really there? Are they powerful enough to block our desired behavior? When we accurately see the hidden forces (not easy), we have a better chance of getting back in control.
Thirdly, besides strong forces in the outside world (things we yearn for, fears, reactions of others, etc.), there are strong forces generated by our own self-evaluations. Examples: You may be only 5 or 6 pounds overweight but see yourself as embarrassingly chubby. During a conversation, you may panic thinking, "I don't know what to say, I'll look like a jerk." These thoughts and feelings about ourselves are powerful forces that frequently block us from doing what we would like to do. By observing our internal dialogue and self-appraisals, we can gain better control over these blocks. Examples: Some negative things about ourselves, e.g. 6 pounds or quietness, we can accept as okay, others we can "own," e.g. sarcasm or self-criticism, and take responsibility for changing. Likewise, some of your traits may initially be seen as positive, e.g. being a party animal and excessive drinking, but by recognizing their negative long-term consequences and "disapproving" of the destructive aspects of the traits, we can reduce these blocks to achieving our more important life goals.
Fourthly, many activities can captivate or "enthrall" us: eating, drinking, listening to music, watching TV, socializing, and even cleaning can capture our attention once we get started. Becoming preoccupied with these activities blocks us from doing other things. Enthralling activities may have a relatively weak initial "pull" for us but once we are absorbed in the activity the "grip" can hold us. All of us have wasted evenings watching worthless TV. If we had gotten off the couch and turned off the set for a minute, we almost certainly would have found something better to do. Ask yourself frequently, "What is the best use of my time right now?" Change your environment. Try to develop more fruitful "counter-thralls." Witkin (1988) has a book about controlling these urges.
Lastly, blocks occur when a complex collage of forces pushes us in certain directions, such as when a woman marries the same kind of jerk three times. Another example is the person who is so concerned about being liked that they try too hard to please. As a result, they are seen as weak, "an easy mark," and not respected, which pushes them to try even harder to please. This is called a self-sealing system and this vicious circle occurs in many situations: a person creates more problems drinking to avoid problems, an over-protective parent produces a more and more helpless child, an insecure and jealous lover increases his/her chances of being dumped. Obviously, complex but powerful and mostly hidden forces are pushing these people in disastrous directions. Such people must get an understanding of the complex forces shaping their lives, and then they have a better chance of coping. They need courage to self-explore--maybe in therapy.
This is a nice theoretical summary of blocks. But, removing your specific blocks is not easy. Washton and Boundy (1989) make the point that many of our self-help efforts are directed at the bad habit and not at the block or real underlying problem. For example, it is common to see drinking or smoking or over eating or procrastination or TV addiction as the problem, while, in truth, the more basic problem is the hurt, anxiety, emptiness, frustration, shame, etc. (feelings and thoughts), which the drinking, eating, escaping behaviors attempt to relieve. These unwanted surface behaviors are not the real problems; they are attempted solutions! The underlying feelings are the problems! Having the will power to stop the unwanted habits is not enough. You must reduce the psychological pain inside which causes the bad habits, i.e. our dis-ease. Discovering this internal hurt may be easy; it may be hard even with therapy; it needs to be done (see chapters 14 and 15).
Sidney Simon (1988) describes another set of barriers to changing: (1) Having low self-esteem and feeling unable to change or undeserving of a better life. (2) Failing to see alternatives or feeling you can't make or don't have good choices (see decision-making in chapter 13). (3) Being unsure of what you want and/or are simply going along with someone else's decisions about your life. (4) Finding lots of excuses for doing nothing or "Yes, but-ing" and, thus, reducing your motivation to change. (5) Being afraid to change. (6) Feeling alone and unsupported or "I don't need anyone" or "I shouldn't have to ask for help." (Ask for help anyway!) (7) Demanding perfection. (8) Lacking the determination or "will" to get the job done.
When changing, the first step is the killer. If you haven't exercised in months or have smoked for years, the first day is toughest. You must use willpower (or, if you prefer, motivation or self-talk). You can strengthen a weak will. Simon suggests building your willpower by (a) practicing in more and more difficult self-control situations, (b) taking small successful steps followed by rewards, and (c) planning alternatives to use when major temptations threaten. Besides will power, you need lots of other skills. But the hardest part for many of us will be getting a handle on the underlying emotions causing the inner pain and creating the barriers. This kind of insight comes from gaining more and more knowledge about people and from honestly looking inside your self.
Lipson and Perkins (1990) have a book explaining why we don't do what we would like to do. How is our intended behavior "blocked," such as when we are constantly late, can't lose weight, don't exercise, don't do our best, etc.? First of all, they assume that all of our behavior is the result of many forces, including our will, pulling and pushing us in many directions. However, they don't use the concept of reinforcement and they decry the idea of increasing our "will power." They point out, as I have, that much self-help advice is very simple and unquestionably correct: stop procrastinating by "planning your time," lose weight by "eating less," be successful by "studying more," etc. But such advice is often inane--useless--because it can't be followed, our will power just isn't strong enough to make the changes. Often, though, they say that if you understood the forces that block your good intentions, you could counter those forces and do what you want to do. This is a cognitive (insight) approach to self-control of your behavior. Let's see if it helps to describe five different kinds of blocks.
First, a strong force in the environment may block our intended or desired behavior; it overpowers our will. We often know exactly what these forces are; we recognize them as constant temptations, e.g. a strong attraction to desserts ruins our diet, a desire to have fun keeps us from getting our work done, an angry reaction to someone causes us to say things we shouldn't, an urge to buy clothes overdraws our account, etc. When these forces overwhelm our best intentions, we say, "I'm weak willed," "I'm lazy," "I'm selfish," etc. It may be neat in a way that there are so many strong forces in the world--things we want and enjoy, physical, hormonal, and genetic drives, social needs, compelling emotions, and on and on. But, these forces frequently crush our self-control, and that's not so neat.
This notion of blocks is obvious; however, it isn't easy to assess the strength of the blocks or your "will power." How successful do you feel your will power has been in overcoming the blocks (temptations and distractions)? These authors say will power is frequently weak, usually over-estimated and a false hope. Instead of "will," we have to use our brain--our knowledge of self-help--to devise ways of avoiding or containing these strong forces. There are lots of such methods; most are in this book.
Secondly, in contrast with the forces mentioned above that we are keenly aware of, Lipson and Perkins (1990) contend that some strong forces are hidden from us and, thus, since we can't combat them handily, they easily block our intentional behavior. We know the forces are there because we see the results. Examples: Our hot attraction to someone turns cold (we don't know why but perhaps he/she is coming on too strong or getting too dependent). Our grades in chemistry are D's and F's (we have the ability but maybe we fail because medicine is dad's choice, not ours). We have a short fuse with our spouse without sufficient reason and without knowing why (maybe because we feel taken for granted or got a lousy assignment at work). We don't want to turn cold, fail chemistry, or have a fight. But things like this happen to all of us; hidden forces are the cause. To understand these blocks, we must seriously search for the reasons, the hidden forces. When we think we have found the reasons, we must carefully question and critically assess the explanation (because we are prone to self deception). Are the conjectured forces really there? Are they powerful enough to block our desired behavior? When we accurately see the hidden forces (not easy), we have a better chance of getting back in control.
Thirdly, besides strong forces in the outside world (things we yearn for, fears, reactions of others, etc.), there are strong forces generated by our own self-evaluations. Examples: You may be only 5 or 6 pounds overweight but see yourself as embarrassingly chubby. During a conversation, you may panic thinking, "I don't know what to say, I'll look like a jerk." These thoughts and feelings about ourselves are powerful forces that frequently block us from doing what we would like to do. By observing our internal dialogue and self-appraisals, we can gain better control over these blocks. Examples: Some negative things about ourselves, e.g. 6 pounds or quietness, we can accept as okay, others we can "own," e.g. sarcasm or self-criticism, and take responsibility for changing. Likewise, some of your traits may initially be seen as positive, e.g. being a party animal and excessive drinking, but by recognizing their negative long-term consequences and "disapproving" of the destructive aspects of the traits, we can reduce these blocks to achieving our more important life goals.
Fourthly, many activities can captivate or "enthrall" us: eating, drinking, listening to music, watching TV, socializing, and even cleaning can capture our attention once we get started. Becoming preoccupied with these activities blocks us from doing other things. Enthralling activities may have a relatively weak initial "pull" for us but once we are absorbed in the activity the "grip" can hold us. All of us have wasted evenings watching worthless TV. If we had gotten off the couch and turned off the set for a minute, we almost certainly would have found something better to do. Ask yourself frequently, "What is the best use of my time right now?" Change your environment. Try to develop more fruitful "counter-thralls." Witkin (1988) has a book about controlling these urges.
Lastly, blocks occur when a complex collage of forces pushes us in certain directions, such as when a woman marries the same kind of jerk three times. Another example is the person who is so concerned about being liked that they try too hard to please. As a result, they are seen as weak, "an easy mark," and not respected, which pushes them to try even harder to please. This is called a self-sealing system and this vicious circle occurs in many situations: a person creates more problems drinking to avoid problems, an over-protective parent produces a more and more helpless child, an insecure and jealous lover increases his/her chances of being dumped. Obviously, complex but powerful and mostly hidden forces are pushing these people in disastrous directions. Such people must get an understanding of the complex forces shaping their lives, and then they have a better chance of coping. They need courage to self-explore--maybe in therapy.
This is a nice theoretical summary of blocks. But, removing your specific blocks is not easy. Washton and Boundy (1989) make the point that many of our self-help efforts are directed at the bad habit and not at the block or real underlying problem. For example, it is common to see drinking or smoking or over eating or procrastination or TV addiction as the problem, while, in truth, the more basic problem is the hurt, anxiety, emptiness, frustration, shame, etc. (feelings and thoughts), which the drinking, eating, escaping behaviors attempt to relieve. These unwanted surface behaviors are not the real problems; they are attempted solutions! The underlying feelings are the problems! Having the will power to stop the unwanted habits is not enough. You must reduce the psychological pain inside which causes the bad habits, i.e. our dis-ease. Discovering this internal hurt may be easy; it may be hard even with therapy; it needs to be done (see chapters 14 and 15).
Sidney Simon (1988) describes another set of barriers to changing: (1) Having low self-esteem and feeling unable to change or undeserving of a better life. (2) Failing to see alternatives or feeling you can't make or don't have good choices (see decision-making in chapter 13). (3) Being unsure of what you want and/or are simply going along with someone else's decisions about your life. (4) Finding lots of excuses for doing nothing or "Yes, but-ing" and, thus, reducing your motivation to change. (5) Being afraid to change. (6) Feeling alone and unsupported or "I don't need anyone" or "I shouldn't have to ask for help." (Ask for help anyway!) (7) Demanding perfection. (8) Lacking the determination or "will" to get the job done.
When changing, the first step is the killer. If you haven't exercised in months or have smoked for years, the first day is toughest. You must use willpower (or, if you prefer, motivation or self-talk). You can strengthen a weak will. Simon suggests building your willpower by (a) practicing in more and more difficult self-control situations, (b) taking small successful steps followed by rewards, and (c) planning alternatives to use when major temptations threaten. Besides will power, you need lots of other skills. But the hardest part for many of us will be getting a handle on the underlying emotions causing the inner pain and creating the barriers. This kind of insight comes from gaining more and more knowledge about people and from honestly looking inside your self.
Popular How-To-Be-The-Greatest Books And Programs
POPULAR HOW TO BE THE GREATEST BOOKS AND PROGRAMS
Inspirational, confidence-building books sell by the million. None have ever been objectively evaluated to see the results, but people buy them, probably because they do motivate us, at least for a day or two. They are often written by successful business or sales people or by ministers. Psychologists write in areas related to motivation: assertiveness, self-acceptance, and self-direction or self-instruction, but these writings deal with learning skills, not just getting inspiration.
The popular "success" books take four main approaches:
1. Confidence building. The common belief is that you can't sell a product or love someone else until you believe in yourself or love yourself (Amos & Amos, 1988; Zigler, 1987). So, these books essentially tell you to recognize your strong points and to tell yourself you are the greatest.
2. Setting goals and utilizing time effectively (Lee, 1978; Lakein, 1973). While these are important skills and have been discussed in this chapter and chapter 2, the goals need to be more than vague hopes and an occasional motivational speaker. Some seminars or longer programs about goal setting, however, involve lectures and tapes costing several hundred dollars (Meyer, 1988).
3. Inspirational. These books give many illustrations of exceptional people and unusual successes (Simonton, 1994; Ferguson, 1990; Waitley, 1983; Stone, 1962). Michael Jordan's I Can't Accept Not Trying is a good example. Other writers emphasize the "power of positive thinking" (Peale, 1952; Schuller, 1973). The techniques involve fantasizing about being successful (like in achievement training), modeling and rehearsal, repeating hopeful beliefs (called affirmations), giving your self pep talks, and so on. Of special psychological interest is Lillian Rubin's (1996) Fall Down Seven Times, Get Up Eight which tells stories of people overcoming horrible childhood experiences. I find the caring stories in Canfield & Hansen (1991, 1993, 1995, 1996) to be heart-warming; they make me value goodness and look for it in others; they help me be good.
4. Understanding human needs. Some of these books explain how to present products and ideas so that they meet people’s needs and, thus, sell (Dichter, 1971). Many other books describe how to influence or motivate others--usually for your benefit (Carnegie, 1936).
These popular books are based on one person's experience or hunches, not on research. Don't neglect these books but read them with a lot of skepticism.
Inspirational, confidence-building books sell by the million. None have ever been objectively evaluated to see the results, but people buy them, probably because they do motivate us, at least for a day or two. They are often written by successful business or sales people or by ministers. Psychologists write in areas related to motivation: assertiveness, self-acceptance, and self-direction or self-instruction, but these writings deal with learning skills, not just getting inspiration.
The popular "success" books take four main approaches:
1. Confidence building. The common belief is that you can't sell a product or love someone else until you believe in yourself or love yourself (Amos & Amos, 1988; Zigler, 1987). So, these books essentially tell you to recognize your strong points and to tell yourself you are the greatest.
2. Setting goals and utilizing time effectively (Lee, 1978; Lakein, 1973). While these are important skills and have been discussed in this chapter and chapter 2, the goals need to be more than vague hopes and an occasional motivational speaker. Some seminars or longer programs about goal setting, however, involve lectures and tapes costing several hundred dollars (Meyer, 1988).
3. Inspirational. These books give many illustrations of exceptional people and unusual successes (Simonton, 1994; Ferguson, 1990; Waitley, 1983; Stone, 1962). Michael Jordan's I Can't Accept Not Trying is a good example. Other writers emphasize the "power of positive thinking" (Peale, 1952; Schuller, 1973). The techniques involve fantasizing about being successful (like in achievement training), modeling and rehearsal, repeating hopeful beliefs (called affirmations), giving your self pep talks, and so on. Of special psychological interest is Lillian Rubin's (1996) Fall Down Seven Times, Get Up Eight which tells stories of people overcoming horrible childhood experiences. I find the caring stories in Canfield & Hansen (1991, 1993, 1995, 1996) to be heart-warming; they make me value goodness and look for it in others; they help me be good.
4. Understanding human needs. Some of these books explain how to present products and ideas so that they meet people’s needs and, thus, sell (Dichter, 1971). Many other books describe how to influence or motivate others--usually for your benefit (Carnegie, 1936).
These popular books are based on one person's experience or hunches, not on research. Don't neglect these books but read them with a lot of skepticism.
Positive Addiction
POSITIVE ADDICTION
Addiction to drugs, alcohol, food, smoking, etc. are instances of powerful motivation, but they sap our strength and zest for doing our best. William Glasser (1965) believes there are other addictive activities that give us strength: jogging, meditating, writing a diary, exercising, relaxing, and so on. These are called positive addictions.
Like Ellis and Knaus, Glasser focuses on the emotions underlying our behavior (level II). First, we all want to be loved and to feel worthwhile. When we don't get what we want, we either have the strength to try again or we don't. Thousands of us give up, according to Glasser, by saying, "Why try? I'd just fail" or "It's my parents' fault" or some other similar rationalization.
When giving up and giving excuses don't remove the pain (of not achieving love or worth), we may turn to psychiatric symptoms, such as depression, rebelling, going crazy, psychosomatic complaints, or addiction to drugs, alcohol, or food. Painful as these conditions are, they are less painful than facing the fact that we have failed and given up on obtaining love and self-worth. So, they are another self-con-they make it easier to give up and, at the same time, get some sympathy.
What is Glasser's solution? Positive addictions. It isn't an easy solution nor is it for everybody. It takes six months to a year of activity (jogging, meditating, etc.) one hour every day to develop a strength-giving addiction. The activity must usually be done alone, with no demands or striving for excellence or self-criticism. There are thousands of joggers, bikers, meditators, relaxers, journal writers, exercisers, and other users of positive addictions, along with Glasser, who claim great benefits. They claim to get more results than just feeling better and getting pleasure; they claim greater self-confidence, more energy, better imagination and ideas, more frustration tolerance and so on.
It is an interesting, indirect approach which does not concentrate on dedication to your major life goals. Committing an hour a day directly to loving someone or to studying could have powerful effects too. If I were John, I'd first try to build a real interest and motivation in my studies. There are too many good joggers who are poor students to confidently believe that jogging will make you an "A" student. More research, not more testimonials, is needed to evaluate the effects of positive addictions and to investigate which positive addictions work best with what kind of people and with what problems. But it is an idea.
Addiction to drugs, alcohol, food, smoking, etc. are instances of powerful motivation, but they sap our strength and zest for doing our best. William Glasser (1965) believes there are other addictive activities that give us strength: jogging, meditating, writing a diary, exercising, relaxing, and so on. These are called positive addictions.
Like Ellis and Knaus, Glasser focuses on the emotions underlying our behavior (level II). First, we all want to be loved and to feel worthwhile. When we don't get what we want, we either have the strength to try again or we don't. Thousands of us give up, according to Glasser, by saying, "Why try? I'd just fail" or "It's my parents' fault" or some other similar rationalization.
When giving up and giving excuses don't remove the pain (of not achieving love or worth), we may turn to psychiatric symptoms, such as depression, rebelling, going crazy, psychosomatic complaints, or addiction to drugs, alcohol, or food. Painful as these conditions are, they are less painful than facing the fact that we have failed and given up on obtaining love and self-worth. So, they are another self-con-they make it easier to give up and, at the same time, get some sympathy.
What is Glasser's solution? Positive addictions. It isn't an easy solution nor is it for everybody. It takes six months to a year of activity (jogging, meditating, etc.) one hour every day to develop a strength-giving addiction. The activity must usually be done alone, with no demands or striving for excellence or self-criticism. There are thousands of joggers, bikers, meditators, relaxers, journal writers, exercisers, and other users of positive addictions, along with Glasser, who claim great benefits. They claim to get more results than just feeling better and getting pleasure; they claim greater self-confidence, more energy, better imagination and ideas, more frustration tolerance and so on.
It is an interesting, indirect approach which does not concentrate on dedication to your major life goals. Committing an hour a day directly to loving someone or to studying could have powerful effects too. If I were John, I'd first try to build a real interest and motivation in my studies. There are too many good joggers who are poor students to confidently believe that jogging will make you an "A" student. More research, not more testimonials, is needed to evaluate the effects of positive addictions and to investigate which positive addictions work best with what kind of people and with what problems. But it is an idea.
Humanistic Theories
HUMANISTIC THEORIES
Abraham Maslow (1971) was critical of traditional psychology because it based its theories on emotionally disturbed patients or on laboratory animals. Like other philosophers, he believed in the basic goodness of humans and in their tendency to move to higher levels of functioning as their basic physical needs are met. Maslow described the needs at each level, going from the most fundamental physiological needs to the highest, most noble needs. Every person has the same "hierarchy of needs:"
1. Physiological needs--air, water, food, sleep, elimination, sex, activity.
2. Safety needs--escape fear and pain, physical security, order, physical safety.
3. Belonging and love needs--to love and be loved, have friends, be part of a family.
4. Self-esteem needs--to feel competent, independent, successful, respected, and worthwhile.
5. Self-actualization needs--being one's true self, achieving one's highest potential, wanting knowledge and wisdom, being able to understand and accept oneself and others, being creative and appreciative of beauty in the world. A self-actualized person is happy, realistic, accepting, problem-oriented, creative, democratic, independent, and fulfilling a mission or purpose in life.
What are the implications of this theory for changing behavior? First, the theory says it is necessary to generally satisfy one's basic needs before one can turn to meeting needs higher in the hierarchy. But once a person has taken care of the needs at levels 1 and 2, then one is free, in fact motivated to search for love, then self-esteem, and then finally self-actualization. Thus, if you can't achieve some goal, such as John not being able to study, consider the possibility that some more basic need still hasn't been met and must be satisfied first. For example, John may have to find love or feel secure and liked by his friends before he can study effectively and devote himself to a profession. While thinking in terms of a hierarchy of needs may sometimes help you figure out the real underlying problem, research has not supported the theory that all needs at a more primary level must be satisfied before you can move on to higher needs. So, go for self actualization at 15 or 19, even if you lack confidence and a love relationship.
Also, remember if you make different assumptions about the basic nature of humans, you will surely find different underlying problems. Maslow would find unmet love or self-esteem needs; Freud would find unmet sexual-aggression needs; Adler would find feelings of inferiority to be overcome.
Maslow noted that learning theories (not the more recent Social Learning Theories or cognitive theories) were based largely on hunger, thirst, and pain (needs at levels 1 and 2) in animals, seldom dealing with the higher levels. Maslow's theories are based on the opposite end of the scale (needs at level 5). He studied the best historical specimens of our species he could find, including Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson, Albert Einstein, Jane Addams, Eleanor Roosevelt, Albert Schweitzer, and he interviewed the most outstanding living people available to him at the time. That's where his description of the self-actualized person came from. His was a valuable addition to our knowledge.
Secondly, according to theory, few of us ever achieve self actualization to any significant degree. Maslow assumed it took the most able among us 30 to 40 years to develop self-actualization. Although Maslow believed we became more self-reliant on our own values and judgment as we met more of our needs, and less dependent on rewards and approval of others, he still emphasized the importance of the environment in determining our growth. He felt families and schools and work should be respectful, nonjudgmental, and trusting, i.e. places where one can make his/her own decisions, gain esteem, and use his/her talents. Otherwise, our growth would be slowed or reversed...and we would have problems. Maslow had impact on Humanistic education and on business management. But, he left it to others to discover if it is possible to develop specific methods of speeding up the natural development of self-actualization, such as through self-help techniques. Maybe in 100 years we'll all be self actualizing even as teenagers.
Abraham Maslow (1971) was critical of traditional psychology because it based its theories on emotionally disturbed patients or on laboratory animals. Like other philosophers, he believed in the basic goodness of humans and in their tendency to move to higher levels of functioning as their basic physical needs are met. Maslow described the needs at each level, going from the most fundamental physiological needs to the highest, most noble needs. Every person has the same "hierarchy of needs:"
1. Physiological needs--air, water, food, sleep, elimination, sex, activity.
2. Safety needs--escape fear and pain, physical security, order, physical safety.
3. Belonging and love needs--to love and be loved, have friends, be part of a family.
4. Self-esteem needs--to feel competent, independent, successful, respected, and worthwhile.
5. Self-actualization needs--being one's true self, achieving one's highest potential, wanting knowledge and wisdom, being able to understand and accept oneself and others, being creative and appreciative of beauty in the world. A self-actualized person is happy, realistic, accepting, problem-oriented, creative, democratic, independent, and fulfilling a mission or purpose in life.
What are the implications of this theory for changing behavior? First, the theory says it is necessary to generally satisfy one's basic needs before one can turn to meeting needs higher in the hierarchy. But once a person has taken care of the needs at levels 1 and 2, then one is free, in fact motivated to search for love, then self-esteem, and then finally self-actualization. Thus, if you can't achieve some goal, such as John not being able to study, consider the possibility that some more basic need still hasn't been met and must be satisfied first. For example, John may have to find love or feel secure and liked by his friends before he can study effectively and devote himself to a profession. While thinking in terms of a hierarchy of needs may sometimes help you figure out the real underlying problem, research has not supported the theory that all needs at a more primary level must be satisfied before you can move on to higher needs. So, go for self actualization at 15 or 19, even if you lack confidence and a love relationship.
Also, remember if you make different assumptions about the basic nature of humans, you will surely find different underlying problems. Maslow would find unmet love or self-esteem needs; Freud would find unmet sexual-aggression needs; Adler would find feelings of inferiority to be overcome.
Maslow noted that learning theories (not the more recent Social Learning Theories or cognitive theories) were based largely on hunger, thirst, and pain (needs at levels 1 and 2) in animals, seldom dealing with the higher levels. Maslow's theories are based on the opposite end of the scale (needs at level 5). He studied the best historical specimens of our species he could find, including Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson, Albert Einstein, Jane Addams, Eleanor Roosevelt, Albert Schweitzer, and he interviewed the most outstanding living people available to him at the time. That's where his description of the self-actualized person came from. His was a valuable addition to our knowledge.
Secondly, according to theory, few of us ever achieve self actualization to any significant degree. Maslow assumed it took the most able among us 30 to 40 years to develop self-actualization. Although Maslow believed we became more self-reliant on our own values and judgment as we met more of our needs, and less dependent on rewards and approval of others, he still emphasized the importance of the environment in determining our growth. He felt families and schools and work should be respectful, nonjudgmental, and trusting, i.e. places where one can make his/her own decisions, gain esteem, and use his/her talents. Otherwise, our growth would be slowed or reversed...and we would have problems. Maslow had impact on Humanistic education and on business management. But, he left it to others to discover if it is possible to develop specific methods of speeding up the natural development of self-actualization, such as through self-help techniques. Maybe in 100 years we'll all be self actualizing even as teenagers.
Learned Industriousness
LEARN INDUSTRIOUSNESS
Recent research suggests we can learn to be hard, persistent workers. Those of us who have been rewarded, often starting in childhood, for making strong efforts to achieve our own or assigned goals tend to develop a "work ethic" and a "moral ethic." Likewise, training in persisting or waiting for a worthwhile reward or achievement can help us develop better self-control involving handling delays. So, just as there is "learned helplessness," there is "learned industriousness."
There is a "law of least effort:" we all try to get things (a pay off) the easiest way we can. That's smart and different from being lazy. Some of us take on hard challenges, others don't. You can also see an enormous range in the amount of effort people will expend to achieve a given goal. Of course, the value of a goal differs from person to person, but some people simply work much harder and longer than others. Why? Perhaps, according to Eisenberger (1992), because some have a long history of exerting intense effort and then being praised and well reinforced. In effect, some have been given "effort training" to be industrious, others haven't. One theory is that this training is effective because being repeatedly rewarded following long, hard efforts makes hard work in any situation seem less offensive, less aversive, less awful. Eisenberger has also shown that self-talk ("When I try hard, I do well on all my school work" and "when I don't, I don't") further enhances this "effort training." Both high effort and attention to tedious detail, if reinforced, become less unpleasant and less avoided. Thus, reasonable and challenging-but-demanding work or study experiences may produce harder working employees or more motivated students.
Eisenberger suggests another law, the "law of more effort:" if hard work has paid off for you in the past in many different ways, your effort and self-control will increase more, as compared to individuals who have worked less hard, as the stakes get higher. Likewise, a boss, teacher, or parent who has positively encouraged and reinforced your high performance and hard efforts in the past will provide more motivation to you than a person who is or has been more permissive.
Unfortunately, while "effort training" seems simple at first, a little thought makes you realize that the actual work conditions as well as your attitudes and personality traits are all involved in determining if your hard work is viewed as yielding rewards or punishment. If hard work is seen as stupid and/or obnoxious, then one may develop "learned laziness." Also, our willingness to work hard, regardless of our past experience, is, in part, a function of our needs and the nature of the work, e.g. mental or physical, clean or dirty, cooperative or competitive, social or isolated, all of which may reflect one's reinforcement history (Eisenberger, Kuhlman & Cotterell, 1992). Most important aspects of life are complex.
Another fascinating feature of this program of research is the moral consequences of "effort training." Children required to do hard math problems first, cheated less on a later anagram test than students given easy math problems first. We need to know more about the relationship between industriousness and honesty, caring, and other morals. But there are reasons to doubt that the relationship is simple because in some situations having a high need for achievement increases our tendency to cheat.
Later, we will discuss the harm that can be done to a person's performance, especially on interesting tasks, by extrinsic reinforcement. Eisenberger's research contradicts this; he found that extrinsically rewarding hard work improves performance. Moreover, he says rewarding progressively improving performance (harder and harder effort?) did not reduce intrinsic interest. To me it seems clear that in order to maintain optimal motivation you have to consider both your intrinsic and extrinsic pay offs (see intrinsic satisfaction section). The motivation problem is complicated by the fact that only parts of working or studying are interesting and exciting, other parts are hard and difficult, still other parts are tedious or boring, and so on. You have to cope with all parts of life, so it is important for our work to be satisfying, but a history of hard, rewarding efforts involving long delays of reinforcement may also be important in preparing us for the unavoidably hard and uninteresting parts.
Recent research suggests we can learn to be hard, persistent workers. Those of us who have been rewarded, often starting in childhood, for making strong efforts to achieve our own or assigned goals tend to develop a "work ethic" and a "moral ethic." Likewise, training in persisting or waiting for a worthwhile reward or achievement can help us develop better self-control involving handling delays. So, just as there is "learned helplessness," there is "learned industriousness."
There is a "law of least effort:" we all try to get things (a pay off) the easiest way we can. That's smart and different from being lazy. Some of us take on hard challenges, others don't. You can also see an enormous range in the amount of effort people will expend to achieve a given goal. Of course, the value of a goal differs from person to person, but some people simply work much harder and longer than others. Why? Perhaps, according to Eisenberger (1992), because some have a long history of exerting intense effort and then being praised and well reinforced. In effect, some have been given "effort training" to be industrious, others haven't. One theory is that this training is effective because being repeatedly rewarded following long, hard efforts makes hard work in any situation seem less offensive, less aversive, less awful. Eisenberger has also shown that self-talk ("When I try hard, I do well on all my school work" and "when I don't, I don't") further enhances this "effort training." Both high effort and attention to tedious detail, if reinforced, become less unpleasant and less avoided. Thus, reasonable and challenging-but-demanding work or study experiences may produce harder working employees or more motivated students.
Eisenberger suggests another law, the "law of more effort:" if hard work has paid off for you in the past in many different ways, your effort and self-control will increase more, as compared to individuals who have worked less hard, as the stakes get higher. Likewise, a boss, teacher, or parent who has positively encouraged and reinforced your high performance and hard efforts in the past will provide more motivation to you than a person who is or has been more permissive.
Unfortunately, while "effort training" seems simple at first, a little thought makes you realize that the actual work conditions as well as your attitudes and personality traits are all involved in determining if your hard work is viewed as yielding rewards or punishment. If hard work is seen as stupid and/or obnoxious, then one may develop "learned laziness." Also, our willingness to work hard, regardless of our past experience, is, in part, a function of our needs and the nature of the work, e.g. mental or physical, clean or dirty, cooperative or competitive, social or isolated, all of which may reflect one's reinforcement history (Eisenberger, Kuhlman & Cotterell, 1992). Most important aspects of life are complex.
Another fascinating feature of this program of research is the moral consequences of "effort training." Children required to do hard math problems first, cheated less on a later anagram test than students given easy math problems first. We need to know more about the relationship between industriousness and honesty, caring, and other morals. But there are reasons to doubt that the relationship is simple because in some situations having a high need for achievement increases our tendency to cheat.
Later, we will discuss the harm that can be done to a person's performance, especially on interesting tasks, by extrinsic reinforcement. Eisenberger's research contradicts this; he found that extrinsically rewarding hard work improves performance. Moreover, he says rewarding progressively improving performance (harder and harder effort?) did not reduce intrinsic interest. To me it seems clear that in order to maintain optimal motivation you have to consider both your intrinsic and extrinsic pay offs (see intrinsic satisfaction section). The motivation problem is complicated by the fact that only parts of working or studying are interesting and exciting, other parts are hard and difficult, still other parts are tedious or boring, and so on. You have to cope with all parts of life, so it is important for our work to be satisfying, but a history of hard, rewarding efforts involving long delays of reinforcement may also be important in preparing us for the unavoidably hard and uninteresting parts.
Becoming Motivated to Study
BECOMING MOTIVATED TO STUDY
A recent study by Mihaly Csikzentmihalyi indicates that to become motivated to learn in school, (a) you must learn to genuinely enjoy reading and studying and using the information (usually telling others about it), (b) you must be given support and challenge at home and school so that you willingly take on tough assignments, realizing that you will occasionally not do well or not get done, (c) you must feel competent and be taught or tell yourself that doing poorly on an assignment or a test basically means that you need to work harder or take a different approach or both, and (d) you must, in most cases, believe the information learned is worthwhile (at least for passing the exam).
So, if you were an undisciplined person, like John, how could you become motivated to study and gain self-confidence?
1. Learn "I am responsible"--that the more you study, the more you learn and the better your grades are. Thus, you begin to feel more responsible for what you get out of school. How exactly can you do this? (a) Keep records of how much you study and compare your grades when you have studied a lot with times when you study very little. (b) Prove to yourself that you are in control of your grades, no one else, not the teacher, not the exam, not luck.
2. Learn "I can be in control"--that you are capable of directing your life. How? (a) Schedule more study time and reward your promptness and increased effort. (b) Carefully measure the greater efficiency you achieve, e.g. how much more of the last few paragraphs do you remember when studying intensely ? (c) Remember: doing poorly simply means you should try harder. Take pride in your self control.
3. Learn "I have ability"--that you have more ability than you previously thought. How? (a) Have more success by developing skills, like reading and test taking skills. (b) Get more information about your ability, such as aptitude test results or a respected person's honest opinion. (c) Increase your feelings of competence.
4. Learn "I value learning"--that you can value studying and success in school more. How? (a) Write down all the benefits of doing well in school. (b) Remind yourself that each successful step in school means three things--you are earning a chance to continue, you have what it takes to succeed, and you have done something worthwhile. (c) Make use of what you learn, e.g. tell others, interact with others who can add to your knowledge, apply the knowledge in other classes or at work, etc.
5. Learn "I may deceive myself"--that you, like others, are capable of remarkable self-deceiving and self-defeating thought processes which interfere with many important activities in your life, ranging from doing your best in school to trying out for the track team or asking the smartest person in school for a date. How? (a) Observe your attributions, especially your excuses, and double check their accuracy. (b) Overcome your fears by doing whatever scares you (if it is safe)! (c) Attend closely to your self-concept, including self-efficacy and attitudes about changing, and find the best views for you.
You need to realize that change is possible before you can change. In recent years, a procedure called attribution retraining has been successful in increasing peoples' motivation to do better in school and other settings. In most cases, the experimenter persuaded the subjects that their failure at a task (e.g. grades) was due to a lack of adequate effort. Not surprisingly, later the subjects tried harder and did better. In other studies, seniors told freshmen about their grades improving markedly or a professor described almost flunking out as a freshman, but, with help of a friend, he started to take his studies seriously, eventually excelling in graduate school. By implication or explicitly, these success stories tell us that we too can change and that good grades result from hard work and persistence day by day, not just before exams and during the last week of the semester. Furthermore, the more effort you put in, the more you learn; the more you learn, the more able you are to do well.
Actually, some researchers have reported that the above success stories improved exam scores a week later and even GPA and Graduate Record Exam scores months later. Improvement was greater in students who believed they had little control over their lives However, if students can improve their grades after a couple of effort-improves-grades stories, then why don't the hundreds of you-can-change-your-life stories told by friends and parents or on TV or in the movies, have the same effect on all of us? One possibility is that our belief in our own self-control is very situation specific, i.e. the success story of an average-turned-super insurance salesperson would probably not inspire a high school freshman to study harder.
Studies of female valedictorians and other academically gifted women often find that they "drop out" of college or graduate school. At the very least, almost every very bright woman finds it necessary to frequently deny or hide her intelligence. Men and women find highly able women threatening. You may think sexism is in the past, but being superior is especially hard for women. Walker & Mehr (1993) provide help for gifted women who want to achieve their potential.
A recent study by Mihaly Csikzentmihalyi indicates that to become motivated to learn in school, (a) you must learn to genuinely enjoy reading and studying and using the information (usually telling others about it), (b) you must be given support and challenge at home and school so that you willingly take on tough assignments, realizing that you will occasionally not do well or not get done, (c) you must feel competent and be taught or tell yourself that doing poorly on an assignment or a test basically means that you need to work harder or take a different approach or both, and (d) you must, in most cases, believe the information learned is worthwhile (at least for passing the exam).
So, if you were an undisciplined person, like John, how could you become motivated to study and gain self-confidence?
1. Learn "I am responsible"--that the more you study, the more you learn and the better your grades are. Thus, you begin to feel more responsible for what you get out of school. How exactly can you do this? (a) Keep records of how much you study and compare your grades when you have studied a lot with times when you study very little. (b) Prove to yourself that you are in control of your grades, no one else, not the teacher, not the exam, not luck.
2. Learn "I can be in control"--that you are capable of directing your life. How? (a) Schedule more study time and reward your promptness and increased effort. (b) Carefully measure the greater efficiency you achieve, e.g. how much more of the last few paragraphs do you remember when studying intensely ? (c) Remember: doing poorly simply means you should try harder. Take pride in your self control.
3. Learn "I have ability"--that you have more ability than you previously thought. How? (a) Have more success by developing skills, like reading and test taking skills. (b) Get more information about your ability, such as aptitude test results or a respected person's honest opinion. (c) Increase your feelings of competence.
4. Learn "I value learning"--that you can value studying and success in school more. How? (a) Write down all the benefits of doing well in school. (b) Remind yourself that each successful step in school means three things--you are earning a chance to continue, you have what it takes to succeed, and you have done something worthwhile. (c) Make use of what you learn, e.g. tell others, interact with others who can add to your knowledge, apply the knowledge in other classes or at work, etc.
5. Learn "I may deceive myself"--that you, like others, are capable of remarkable self-deceiving and self-defeating thought processes which interfere with many important activities in your life, ranging from doing your best in school to trying out for the track team or asking the smartest person in school for a date. How? (a) Observe your attributions, especially your excuses, and double check their accuracy. (b) Overcome your fears by doing whatever scares you (if it is safe)! (c) Attend closely to your self-concept, including self-efficacy and attitudes about changing, and find the best views for you.
You need to realize that change is possible before you can change. In recent years, a procedure called attribution retraining has been successful in increasing peoples' motivation to do better in school and other settings. In most cases, the experimenter persuaded the subjects that their failure at a task (e.g. grades) was due to a lack of adequate effort. Not surprisingly, later the subjects tried harder and did better. In other studies, seniors told freshmen about their grades improving markedly or a professor described almost flunking out as a freshman, but, with help of a friend, he started to take his studies seriously, eventually excelling in graduate school. By implication or explicitly, these success stories tell us that we too can change and that good grades result from hard work and persistence day by day, not just before exams and during the last week of the semester. Furthermore, the more effort you put in, the more you learn; the more you learn, the more able you are to do well.
Actually, some researchers have reported that the above success stories improved exam scores a week later and even GPA and Graduate Record Exam scores months later. Improvement was greater in students who believed they had little control over their lives However, if students can improve their grades after a couple of effort-improves-grades stories, then why don't the hundreds of you-can-change-your-life stories told by friends and parents or on TV or in the movies, have the same effect on all of us? One possibility is that our belief in our own self-control is very situation specific, i.e. the success story of an average-turned-super insurance salesperson would probably not inspire a high school freshman to study harder.
Studies of female valedictorians and other academically gifted women often find that they "drop out" of college or graduate school. At the very least, almost every very bright woman finds it necessary to frequently deny or hide her intelligence. Men and women find highly able women threatening. You may think sexism is in the past, but being superior is especially hard for women. Walker & Mehr (1993) provide help for gifted women who want to achieve their potential.
Wednesday, May 20, 2015
The Social - Cognitive Approach
THE SOCIAL - COGNITIVE APPROACH
According to Dweck (1986) and other researchers, there are two basic types of students: (a) learning oriented --those wanting to learn and gain competence and (b) image oriented --those wanting to look smart and/or avoid looking dumb. We all want to build our selfesteem but we try to do it in different ways. While over-simplified, there are clusters of findings crudely associated with these two types. Understanding these types may help the schools help students and each student self-help.
Learning oriented students see intelligence as changeable ("I can learn to learn this stuff" or "I can get smarter"). They enjoy learning, often fascinated with special topics, such as dinosaurs, geography, some phase of history, politics, women's rights, pollution, nutrition, etc. They see low grades as due to a lack of effort or a poor strategy, which they can change. Pride is based on amount of effort they put in, not on looking smart. They work hard. Being unchallenged is boring and offers no chance to test or prove themselves. Thus, even if they don't feel they are real bright, they will take on tough, challenging intellectual tasks, risking failing on an assignment. More boys take this attitude than girls.
Image oriented students see intelligence as permanently fixed. They consider it very important that others see them as smart or, at least, not stupid or naive. Since doing well is assumed to be due to brains and not effort, there isn't much need to work hard. In fact, if a person has to work hard to learn something, that suggests they aren't very smart. And, if you do poorly, there isn't anything you can do about it. You were born that way. Naturally, such a person would avoid difficult challenges if doing poorly seemed likely (especially true of bright girls or women). They tend to be less curious, less interested in new ideas and in learning about themselves. Their pride is based on good impression management, not on honest, careful estimates of their ability. They avoid testing their limits. Thus, the student's level of confidence is shaky--one low quiz score, one criticism of them, one foolish statement by them raises their own doubts about their intelligence. Even high achievers fall into this trap; their worry about their image reduces the intrinsic satisfaction they get out of learning.
Schools have recently attempted to build students' self-esteem, sacrificing perhaps the acquisition of knowledge. Three popular principles guide many teachers: give lots of positive reinforcement, expect students to do well (self-fulfilling prophesy), and build the students' self-esteem. All sound commendable. All may be harmful in certain circumstances. Examples: Expecting and rewarding success on easy assignments does not encourage a student to tackle hard tasks. Being "successful" on easy tasks doesn't build self-confidence, it makes students feel dumber. Children know their limits aren't being tested. Students are being misled if they are subtly taught that it is easy to succeed as a student. That's a lie. It's deceptive because you haven't been encouraged to dig deeply into topics, to feel the delight of uncovering fascinating new knowledge until you know more about a topic than anyone else, to realize the depth and complexity and wonder associated with almost any subject, to interact with others who know more and are also excited about learning in many areas, etc.
The greater the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder.
According to Dweck (1986) and other researchers, there are two basic types of students: (a) learning oriented --those wanting to learn and gain competence and (b) image oriented --those wanting to look smart and/or avoid looking dumb. We all want to build our selfesteem but we try to do it in different ways. While over-simplified, there are clusters of findings crudely associated with these two types. Understanding these types may help the schools help students and each student self-help.
Learning oriented students see intelligence as changeable ("I can learn to learn this stuff" or "I can get smarter"). They enjoy learning, often fascinated with special topics, such as dinosaurs, geography, some phase of history, politics, women's rights, pollution, nutrition, etc. They see low grades as due to a lack of effort or a poor strategy, which they can change. Pride is based on amount of effort they put in, not on looking smart. They work hard. Being unchallenged is boring and offers no chance to test or prove themselves. Thus, even if they don't feel they are real bright, they will take on tough, challenging intellectual tasks, risking failing on an assignment. More boys take this attitude than girls.
Image oriented students see intelligence as permanently fixed. They consider it very important that others see them as smart or, at least, not stupid or naive. Since doing well is assumed to be due to brains and not effort, there isn't much need to work hard. In fact, if a person has to work hard to learn something, that suggests they aren't very smart. And, if you do poorly, there isn't anything you can do about it. You were born that way. Naturally, such a person would avoid difficult challenges if doing poorly seemed likely (especially true of bright girls or women). They tend to be less curious, less interested in new ideas and in learning about themselves. Their pride is based on good impression management, not on honest, careful estimates of their ability. They avoid testing their limits. Thus, the student's level of confidence is shaky--one low quiz score, one criticism of them, one foolish statement by them raises their own doubts about their intelligence. Even high achievers fall into this trap; their worry about their image reduces the intrinsic satisfaction they get out of learning.
Schools have recently attempted to build students' self-esteem, sacrificing perhaps the acquisition of knowledge. Three popular principles guide many teachers: give lots of positive reinforcement, expect students to do well (self-fulfilling prophesy), and build the students' self-esteem. All sound commendable. All may be harmful in certain circumstances. Examples: Expecting and rewarding success on easy assignments does not encourage a student to tackle hard tasks. Being "successful" on easy tasks doesn't build self-confidence, it makes students feel dumber. Children know their limits aren't being tested. Students are being misled if they are subtly taught that it is easy to succeed as a student. That's a lie. It's deceptive because you haven't been encouraged to dig deeply into topics, to feel the delight of uncovering fascinating new knowledge until you know more about a topic than anyone else, to realize the depth and complexity and wonder associated with almost any subject, to interact with others who know more and are also excited about learning in many areas, etc.
The greater the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline of wonder.
The Motivated Underachiever
THE MOTIVATED UNDERACHIEVER
Harvey Mandel and Sander Marcus (1988, 1995) have an interesting view of the "unmotivated" student. They say an underachiever with an "academic problem" is not unmotivated, but in fact is highly motivated to do poorly and get mediocre grades! Why? Because they want to avoid success! Why and how would anyone choose to blow off school work which is clearly connected with what one does for a lifetime? Because they are afraid of achievement and want to avoid responsibility. The underachiever unconsciously utilizes excuses to explain why he/she is doing poorly and why it isn't his/her fault. They say, "The exam didn't cover what the teacher said it would" or "everybody did bad" or "my parents had all kinds of things planned for me the night before the exam." The trouble is they believe they want to succeed and they believe their own excuses. The authors call this self-deception "the crap gap." The underachievers also believe that the situation is beyond their control, that they are innocent victims of circumstances. They aren't uncomfortable enough to fight their way out of the gloomy situation they are in.
Since the underachiever is afraid of achieving, the usual efforts of parents and teachers--e.g. offering rewards, threatening punishment, and being assigned a terrific teacher--are ineffective because these methods don't deal with the self-deception and the fears. These underachievers don't want to look honestly and carefully at themselves, their motives, their values, or their future. Why not? Because being successful and realizing that one has the ability to make "A's," take out the garbage on time, change the oil, pay one's own expenses, choose a career, work full-time, etc., means the person is ready and able to "be on his/her own," to be responsible, to be independent, and to keep on taking care of him/herself for the rest of his/her life. On the other hand, being unable to manage your life (without it being your fault) keeps others from expecting you to be mature and capable. Growing up is scary and some, like Peter Pan, don't want to do it (on a conscious and/or unconscious level).
Since this kind of underachiever is not aware of this self-deception, it may be hard for him/her to help him/herself. So, let's see how, according to Mandel and Marcus (1988), a therapist would close the "crap gap," the difference between what the student thinks he/she wants ("good grades") and his/her actual behavior (mostly avoidance of all responsible behavior through the use of excuses). The critical first step is to simply ask the student how well he/she would like to do in school. Get them to state a specific goal, e.g. a "B" average. Second, the therapist, assuming the role of helper, would find out everything about course requirements and exactly how the student prepares to meet the requirements. Third, ask the student what is the problem in one of his/her courses (actually this usually solicits an excuse). Then get all the facts, e.g. if he/she says, "I study about an hour a day but it doesn't do me much good," the therapist will find out exactly how much and how effectively the student studied yesterday (maybe 10 minutes because TV was on).
Fourth, make sure the student realizes the connection between studying and his/her grade two months later: "What will happen if you continue to only study 10 minutes a day on math?" "I'll probably get another D." Fifth, the therapist asks the student for some solution for this particular problem or excuse. A detailed plan, including how to handle barriers, is worked out by the student, e.g. "I'll put in a full hour every night." Sixth, make sure the student knows exactly what he/she proposes to do before the next therapy session. This is done knowing that the student will probably not follow his/her plan--he/she hasn't done what they intended to do before, so why now? Thetherapist's goal, at this point, is "excuse-busting," i.e. to merely to reduce the "crap gap" by getting the student's views of the situation ("I will study one hour without TV") closer to his/her actual behavior (10 minutes again), to recognize his/her use of excuses, and, eventually, to see his/her role in causing the underachievement.
Seventh, find out if the plan was actually followed. Usually, as expected by the therapist, the student avoids the plan or does poorly for some other reason. Almost always he/she gives the therapist another excuse, e.g. "I forgot my books," "I studied the wrong stuff," or "I tried to study for an hour but friends kept calling," because to stick with the old excuse (TV was on) is admitting that he/she really wants to do poorly (the student is strongly motivated to not recognize this fact). Eighth, excuse after excuse is eliminated by going through steps 3 to 7 with each excuse for not reaching each goal. Gradually, the student begins to see his/her self-conning use of excuses, that he/she is responsible for his/her behavior (and the resulting grades), that he/she has some power to control his/her life. Lastly, as the excuses are striped away and insight gained into procrastination and avoidance of responsibility, the student will want to openly discuss his/her fears, what does he/she really want in life, and how does he/she get there from here. Therapy now becomes a very different process, more nondirective, because the student is responsible, introspective, self-directed, far more emotional and alive but ready to face life as an independent individual, even if scared.
Hopefully, some people will be able without therapy to see that they are lying to themselves by the use of excuses. Then by consciously taking control of their lives (stopping the self-conning), they can help themselves. Others will not be able to see why they are underachievers but they will realize they are not performing up to capacity; they should seek professional help.
Besides the "academic problem" type (about 50% of all underachievers), Mandel and Marcus, especially in their 1995 book written for parents, describe several other kinds of underachievers, usually related to moderately serious psychopathology requiring professional treatment, such as Anxiety Disorder, Sociopathic Disorder (lack of conscience, manipulative), Identity Disorder (confusion about life goals), and Defiant Disorder. Other writers have described the academic indifference of some people as being due to cultural differences, e.g. if you assume that only white middle-and-upper-class students care about getting good grades, and if you aren't in that social-economic group or hate that type of person, then it becomes difficult to take school seriously. Kohl (1995) writes about students who become offended or resentful and say, "I won't learn from you." There may be many ways to be unmotivated. In any case, a wasted mind is a terrible loss to society, but it is even more serious for your own life when it is your mind that is wasted. Do something!
Harvey Mandel and Sander Marcus (1988, 1995) have an interesting view of the "unmotivated" student. They say an underachiever with an "academic problem" is not unmotivated, but in fact is highly motivated to do poorly and get mediocre grades! Why? Because they want to avoid success! Why and how would anyone choose to blow off school work which is clearly connected with what one does for a lifetime? Because they are afraid of achievement and want to avoid responsibility. The underachiever unconsciously utilizes excuses to explain why he/she is doing poorly and why it isn't his/her fault. They say, "The exam didn't cover what the teacher said it would" or "everybody did bad" or "my parents had all kinds of things planned for me the night before the exam." The trouble is they believe they want to succeed and they believe their own excuses. The authors call this self-deception "the crap gap." The underachievers also believe that the situation is beyond their control, that they are innocent victims of circumstances. They aren't uncomfortable enough to fight their way out of the gloomy situation they are in.
Since the underachiever is afraid of achieving, the usual efforts of parents and teachers--e.g. offering rewards, threatening punishment, and being assigned a terrific teacher--are ineffective because these methods don't deal with the self-deception and the fears. These underachievers don't want to look honestly and carefully at themselves, their motives, their values, or their future. Why not? Because being successful and realizing that one has the ability to make "A's," take out the garbage on time, change the oil, pay one's own expenses, choose a career, work full-time, etc., means the person is ready and able to "be on his/her own," to be responsible, to be independent, and to keep on taking care of him/herself for the rest of his/her life. On the other hand, being unable to manage your life (without it being your fault) keeps others from expecting you to be mature and capable. Growing up is scary and some, like Peter Pan, don't want to do it (on a conscious and/or unconscious level).
Since this kind of underachiever is not aware of this self-deception, it may be hard for him/her to help him/herself. So, let's see how, according to Mandel and Marcus (1988), a therapist would close the "crap gap," the difference between what the student thinks he/she wants ("good grades") and his/her actual behavior (mostly avoidance of all responsible behavior through the use of excuses). The critical first step is to simply ask the student how well he/she would like to do in school. Get them to state a specific goal, e.g. a "B" average. Second, the therapist, assuming the role of helper, would find out everything about course requirements and exactly how the student prepares to meet the requirements. Third, ask the student what is the problem in one of his/her courses (actually this usually solicits an excuse). Then get all the facts, e.g. if he/she says, "I study about an hour a day but it doesn't do me much good," the therapist will find out exactly how much and how effectively the student studied yesterday (maybe 10 minutes because TV was on).
Fourth, make sure the student realizes the connection between studying and his/her grade two months later: "What will happen if you continue to only study 10 minutes a day on math?" "I'll probably get another D." Fifth, the therapist asks the student for some solution for this particular problem or excuse. A detailed plan, including how to handle barriers, is worked out by the student, e.g. "I'll put in a full hour every night." Sixth, make sure the student knows exactly what he/she proposes to do before the next therapy session. This is done knowing that the student will probably not follow his/her plan--he/she hasn't done what they intended to do before, so why now? Thetherapist's goal, at this point, is "excuse-busting," i.e. to merely to reduce the "crap gap" by getting the student's views of the situation ("I will study one hour without TV") closer to his/her actual behavior (10 minutes again), to recognize his/her use of excuses, and, eventually, to see his/her role in causing the underachievement.
Seventh, find out if the plan was actually followed. Usually, as expected by the therapist, the student avoids the plan or does poorly for some other reason. Almost always he/she gives the therapist another excuse, e.g. "I forgot my books," "I studied the wrong stuff," or "I tried to study for an hour but friends kept calling," because to stick with the old excuse (TV was on) is admitting that he/she really wants to do poorly (the student is strongly motivated to not recognize this fact). Eighth, excuse after excuse is eliminated by going through steps 3 to 7 with each excuse for not reaching each goal. Gradually, the student begins to see his/her self-conning use of excuses, that he/she is responsible for his/her behavior (and the resulting grades), that he/she has some power to control his/her life. Lastly, as the excuses are striped away and insight gained into procrastination and avoidance of responsibility, the student will want to openly discuss his/her fears, what does he/she really want in life, and how does he/she get there from here. Therapy now becomes a very different process, more nondirective, because the student is responsible, introspective, self-directed, far more emotional and alive but ready to face life as an independent individual, even if scared.
Hopefully, some people will be able without therapy to see that they are lying to themselves by the use of excuses. Then by consciously taking control of their lives (stopping the self-conning), they can help themselves. Others will not be able to see why they are underachievers but they will realize they are not performing up to capacity; they should seek professional help.
Besides the "academic problem" type (about 50% of all underachievers), Mandel and Marcus, especially in their 1995 book written for parents, describe several other kinds of underachievers, usually related to moderately serious psychopathology requiring professional treatment, such as Anxiety Disorder, Sociopathic Disorder (lack of conscience, manipulative), Identity Disorder (confusion about life goals), and Defiant Disorder. Other writers have described the academic indifference of some people as being due to cultural differences, e.g. if you assume that only white middle-and-upper-class students care about getting good grades, and if you aren't in that social-economic group or hate that type of person, then it becomes difficult to take school seriously. Kohl (1995) writes about students who become offended or resentful and say, "I won't learn from you." There may be many ways to be unmotivated. In any case, a wasted mind is a terrible loss to society, but it is even more serious for your own life when it is your mind that is wasted. Do something!
Attribution Theory and Achievement
ATTRIBUTION THEORY AND ACHIEVEMENT
Another related theory to help us understand behavior and motivation, like John's procrastination, is attribution theory. In the 18th century, Hume (1739) argued that assuming there are causes for everything that happens is an inherent part of observing the world, because it makes the world more meaningful. Humans want to know. For instance, if someone bumps into you, you wonder why. You may assume he/she is aggressive, clumsy, flirting, that you are in the way, etc. Obviously, what you assume is the cause of the bumping makes a big difference. Likewise, John might ask himself, "Why do I put off studying?" And answer, "because I am dumb" or "because it is boring." He attributes his procrastination to his slowness or to the dullness of the reading. These kinds of assumptions about causes (we seldom know for sure the real causes) will certainly influence how we behave and how we feel.
Heider (1958) was one of the first modern psychologists to write about how the ordinary person thinks about causality--what causes what, or what is attributed to what. Since 1960, hundreds of studies have contributed to understanding why some are highly motivated to achieve and others are not. According to attribution theory (Weiner, 1980), a high achiever will:
1. Approach rather than avoid tasks related to succeeding because he/she believes success is due to high ability and effort which he/she is confident of. Failure is thought to be caused by bad luck or a poor exam, i.e. not his/her fault. Thus, failure doesn't hurt his/her self-esteem but success builds pride and confidence.
2. Persist when the work gets hard rather than giving up because failure is assumed to be caused by a lack of effort which he/she can change by trying harder.
3. Select challenges of moderate difficulty (50% success rate) because the feedback from those tasks tells you more about how well you are doing, rather than very difficult or very easy tasks which tell you little about your ability or effectiveness.
4. Work with a lot of energy because the results are believed to be determined by how hard you try.
The unmotivated person will:
1. Avoid success-related chores because he/she tends to (a) doubt his/her ability and/or (b) assume success is related to luck or to "who you know" or to other factors out of his/her control. Thus, even when successful, it isn't as rewarding to the unmotivated person because he/she doesn't feel responsible, it doesn't increase his/her pride and confidence.
2. Quit when having difficulty because he/she believes failure is caused by a lack of ability which he/she can't do anything about.
3. Choose easy or very hard tasks to work on because the results will tell him/her very little about how poorly (presumably) he/she is doing.
4. Work with little drive or enthusiasm because the outcome isn't thought to be related to effort.
Obviously, our beliefs about what causes and influences our behavior have a marked impact on our expectations and, thus, our motivation. In chapter 6, we will read about "learned helplessness" which, of course, is associated with little motivation. In chapter 14, we will also learn much more about many cognitive factors that affect our behavior and emotions. Therefore, one way to change our motivation is to change our beliefs--our attributions. For example, we could teach (and prove to) unmotivated, underachieving, and depressed people that they can control life-events by exerting more effort. There have been demonstrations that intentionally "trying harder," say on every other day, actually results in more behavioral changes, but it is hard for some people to exert extra effort. The next section is a case in point.
Another related theory to help us understand behavior and motivation, like John's procrastination, is attribution theory. In the 18th century, Hume (1739) argued that assuming there are causes for everything that happens is an inherent part of observing the world, because it makes the world more meaningful. Humans want to know. For instance, if someone bumps into you, you wonder why. You may assume he/she is aggressive, clumsy, flirting, that you are in the way, etc. Obviously, what you assume is the cause of the bumping makes a big difference. Likewise, John might ask himself, "Why do I put off studying?" And answer, "because I am dumb" or "because it is boring." He attributes his procrastination to his slowness or to the dullness of the reading. These kinds of assumptions about causes (we seldom know for sure the real causes) will certainly influence how we behave and how we feel.
Heider (1958) was one of the first modern psychologists to write about how the ordinary person thinks about causality--what causes what, or what is attributed to what. Since 1960, hundreds of studies have contributed to understanding why some are highly motivated to achieve and others are not. According to attribution theory (Weiner, 1980), a high achiever will:
1. Approach rather than avoid tasks related to succeeding because he/she believes success is due to high ability and effort which he/she is confident of. Failure is thought to be caused by bad luck or a poor exam, i.e. not his/her fault. Thus, failure doesn't hurt his/her self-esteem but success builds pride and confidence.
2. Persist when the work gets hard rather than giving up because failure is assumed to be caused by a lack of effort which he/she can change by trying harder.
3. Select challenges of moderate difficulty (50% success rate) because the feedback from those tasks tells you more about how well you are doing, rather than very difficult or very easy tasks which tell you little about your ability or effectiveness.
4. Work with a lot of energy because the results are believed to be determined by how hard you try.
The unmotivated person will:
1. Avoid success-related chores because he/she tends to (a) doubt his/her ability and/or (b) assume success is related to luck or to "who you know" or to other factors out of his/her control. Thus, even when successful, it isn't as rewarding to the unmotivated person because he/she doesn't feel responsible, it doesn't increase his/her pride and confidence.
2. Quit when having difficulty because he/she believes failure is caused by a lack of ability which he/she can't do anything about.
3. Choose easy or very hard tasks to work on because the results will tell him/her very little about how poorly (presumably) he/she is doing.
4. Work with little drive or enthusiasm because the outcome isn't thought to be related to effort.
Obviously, our beliefs about what causes and influences our behavior have a marked impact on our expectations and, thus, our motivation. In chapter 6, we will read about "learned helplessness" which, of course, is associated with little motivation. In chapter 14, we will also learn much more about many cognitive factors that affect our behavior and emotions. Therefore, one way to change our motivation is to change our beliefs--our attributions. For example, we could teach (and prove to) unmotivated, underachieving, and depressed people that they can control life-events by exerting more effort. There have been demonstrations that intentionally "trying harder," say on every other day, actually results in more behavioral changes, but it is hard for some people to exert extra effort. The next section is a case in point.
Theories About The Need For Achievement
THEORIES ABOUT THE NEED FOR ACHIEVEMENT
The desires to succeed and to excel are called achievement needs. Achievement motivation is basic to a good life. Achievers, as a whole, enjoy life and feel in control. Being motivated keeps us productive and gives us self-respect. Where and how achievement needs are learned are complex, intriguing, and important questions. David McClelland, et al. (1953) and John Atkinson (1981) have contributed greatly to this area of study. They began by developing a measure of the need to achieve. Using the TAT, a test which asks you to make up stories about pictures, they found that persons with high achievement needs can be identified by the stories they tell, namely, more stories about striving for excellence, overcoming obstacles, or accomplishing some difficult goal. Other researchers (Jackson, Ahmed, and Heapy, 1973) suggested that achievement needs are made up of several factors:
1. Wanting approval from experts.
2. Wanting to make money.
3. Wanting to succeed on our own.
4. Wanting respect from friends.
5. Wanting to compete and win.
6. Wanting to work hard and excel.
Thus, one high achiever might strive primarily to make money while another person, equal in overall need to achieve, would concentrate on gaining respect and status from friends, and so on, depending on our past experience.
How do we learn to have a high or low need for achievement? It comes partly from our childhood. Although the conclusions are not certain, Weiner (1980, p. 216-218) says a high achieving male tends to have rejecting parents who expect him to become independent early, make high demands on him, reward his success, and/or punish unsatisfactory behavior (which increases the fear of failure). Rather surprisingly, both loving-accepting (undemanding?) and dominant (overcontrolling?) fathers tend to have less ambitious sons. However, sons of managers and owners have much higher needs to achieve than sons of fathers with routine jobs (Byrne & Kelley, 1981).
Notice in the last paragraph I was talking only about males. What about females? The research in this area for many years found very different results with each sex, so researchers avoided achievement studies with women. More recently this has changed and serious concern has been given to the impact of socially defined sex-roles on behavior. For instance, children's books were found to describe boys as active, effective, and achieving, while girls were described as watching the boys, being a boy's helper, or just tagging along (Weitzman, Eifler, Hokada, & Ross, 1972). Furthermore, an experiment showed that sexist stories actually had immediate impact on the behavior of nursery school children. Girls were more active and persistent in their work if they had heard stories picturing girls that way (McArthur & Eisen, 1976). This is just one minor example. Our needs and goals and self-concepts come from thousands, maybe millions, of experiences.
What are the family backgrounds of females with high needs to achieve? They tend to have nontraditional, permissive parents who reward their achievements. The mother plays a crucial role, as does the father for males. Tenth grade girls who feel most competent (this is related to high career goals but not exactly the same as high achievement needs) had mothers who placed high value on their being independent, successful, and ambitious but low value on self-control and being responsible (Baruch, 1976). More research is needed here. There seems to be a fine line between a parent being very encouraging and being overly dominant. Being over-protective is clearly harmful.
In contrast with the research just cited about what an achiever's parents are actually like, achievement specialists recommend having a somewhat different kind of parent. Johnson (1984) says achievers are produced by parents who let them go on their own, let them set their own goals, and make their own mistakes. These parents encourage high but appropriate goals, respect the child's abilities, take and show great pleasure from the child's successes, and give lots of praise. They let the child try hard on their own before giving suggestions or help, but they give help before the child gives up. They don't do the task for the child nor insist that it be done "my way."
In general, educators believe that high achievers have respectful, praising, optimistic, supportive, hard working parents who are themselves learning and success oriented. These parents expect each person in the household to do their share of the chores and to follow reasonable rules. They talk with each other about their work and studies.
For your purposes, these childhood experiences or the lack of them may be of interest but they occurred in the past and, therefore, are unchangeable (although we might change our reaction to our past). What can you do now that enables us to be highly motivated? How can you be so intent on reaching a distant goal that nothing gets in the way?
Atkinson (1957; 1981) suggested it is much more complicated than just a single need making us do something, although that's part of it. Borrowing a lot from learning theory, he says three factors determine behavior:
A large number of competing motives or needs are striving for expression at the same time, such as the need for achievement, the need for close relationships, the need for power, and the need to be cared for by others. Besides the conflict among many motives, the theory assumes there is a conflict between the hope of success and the fear of failure, i.e. an approach-avoidance conflict over each goal. The fear of failure can keep us from trying in school, just as the fear of rejection can keep us from getting emotionally involved with someone.
The strength of the approach and avoidance tendencies is determined by the relative strength of the needs to achieve and the needs to avoid failure (or success), plus the next two factors.
What we expect to happen if we follow a certain course of action. We observe the situation and, based on our past experience, estimate the likelihood of success and the chances of something bad happening, depending on what we do. Having some hope is necessary, but it is not a simple situation. As discussed in attribution theory later, a highly motivated achiever may utilize complex optimistic or pessimistic cognitive strategies (Cantor, 1990). For example, an optimistic, high achieving student may seek out friends who value and reinforce his/her successes in school, he/she frequently re-lives in fantasy his/her past accomplishments and dreams of the future, and he/she may relax with friends before an exam. This is called "illusory glow" optimism because such a person nurtures and protects his/her selfesteem and confidence. They expect to do very well, they work very hard, they enjoy their successes, and, if they should fail, theyautomatically and immediately apply an "I couldn't help it" defense of the ego (and optimistically take on the next challenge).
On the other hand, Cantor describes the high achieving "defensive pessimist" as defending his/her self-esteem before the test, not afterwards. Such a student expects to do poorly or, at least, anticipates a variety of possible stumbling blocks. He/she works very hard, preparing especially well for the anticipated difficulties. He/she uses the high test anxiety and stress as motivators, not as something to avoid, and then takes an "I expected it" attitude towards the rare failure that does occur (and with anxious excitement systematically attacks the next challenge). This strategy is very different from the pessimistic student who "bad mouths" him/herself after a failure: "I'm such an idiot," "I'm so lazy," etc. Such a pessimist is likely to gradually lower his/her expectations and goals, and perform more and more poorly until eventually becoming a total pessimist who has no hope, expects to fail and, therefore, doesn't try.
Both the "illusory glow" optimist and the "defensive" pessimist are challenged by hard tasks; achieving is important, gratifying, and absorbing for them; they see themselves as having considerable control over the situation and stick with the task, even though it is hard and occasionally disappointing. Compare these achievers with the underachievers described later.
The incentive we feel depends on how attractive the possible outcomes are to us personally (relative to how unattractive the possible risks are to us). Each major task, such as becoming a winning tennis player, learning to play an instrument, completing high school math through Advanced Calculus, asking a really appealing person for a date, getting a BA with honors, going to medical school, or raising two children, provides a enormous range of possible payoffs, some more appealing to us than others. The more likely we feel we are to succeed in #2, and the more appealing, important, the-right-thing-todo, exciting, or wonderful the eventual goal, the more drive and enthusiasm we have about the activity.
In summary ,
How motivated we are depends on (1) the strength of fairly consistent motives or needs inside of us, (2) our expectation of what outcomes certain actions will produce, and (3) how badly at this time we want a certain payoff over all the other wants we have and over the risks we face. The needs, expectations, and incentives are mostly learned; together these factors (our motivation) largely determine what we do and how far we get in life. Although the past experiences related to these factors are unalterable, these factors that influence our lives so enormously can be changed by us. That's the beauty of being human. What does the theory about achievement needs tell us about self-help? Let's consider John, the procrastinator, again.
Parents and teachers train children to be independent and achievers (Winterbottom, 1958) and to fear failure (Teevan & McGhee, 1972). Being rewarded for striving increases our achievement motive; being punished for unsatisfactory behavior--and having our successes disregarded--leads to a fear of failure. To the extent we are selfreinforcing, we could presumably increase our achievement motivation by emphasizing our successes and simply using our failures as cues for us to try harder.
There have been several successful attempts to train people to have higher achievement needs (Burris, 1958; McClelland & Winter, 1969). People were taught to have frequent fantasies of achieving, observe models of successful people like themselves, play games or role-play situations involving taking risks and being a successful competitor. These researchers concluded that they were teaching selfconfidence and that "knowledge gives confidence." You could train yourself in the same ways; schools--and this book--should increase your expectation of success by teaching you skills, self control, reasonable attitudes, and self-awareness.
A high need to achieve is correlated with higher grades (Schultz & Pomerantz, 1974); however, Raynor (1981) has shown it isn't a simple relationship. Considering getting B's or higher as important for future plans and for self-respect was related to grades in school for boys. Raynor also found that students in the high-needs-to-achieve-and-lowtest-anxiety group did well on the important (to them), relevant courses but not as well on less relevant courses. Students with lowachievement-needs-and-high-test-anxiety did about the same as the above group on less relevant courses but much worse on important courses. The points seem to be: (a) your need to achieve and selfconfidence won't do you much good unless you convince yourself that school is relevant to your future and your self-esteem, and (b) a fear of failure produces failure in the more important courses. The next chapter tells you how to reduce fears.
Johnson (1984) summarizes what you can do to keep on striving for your special goals: (a) break your major goals into manageable daily tasks and set aside the time, (b) take pleasure from the work and reward your progress, (c) remember your past successes and imagine how good you will feel when you accomplish your goal, (d) also imagine how bad it will feel to give up or mess up, (e) use competition, especially trying to improve on your best effort thus far, to arouse interest, and (f) seek encouragement and find "heroes" to inspire you.
Don't go around saying the world owes you a living.The world owes you nothing. It was here first. -Mark Twain
One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar. -Helen Keller
Greissman (1987) interviewed over 60 highly successful people and found they had several things in common. They (a) love their work, (b) become highly competent in a specialty, (c) commit themselves to their work, giving it their time--their life, (d) meet most of their needs through their work, (e) long for recognition and self fulfillment, (f) focus on and "flow" with their work--loosing themselves in it, and (g) quickly see and use new ideas and opportunities at work. They pay a price for success, such as few friends, little partying, little travel, and even isolation from their family, but they have few regrets. Talent matters, but devotion determines the winner most of the time. No one can tell you exactly how to become so devoted...or even if it is a good idea.
The desires to succeed and to excel are called achievement needs. Achievement motivation is basic to a good life. Achievers, as a whole, enjoy life and feel in control. Being motivated keeps us productive and gives us self-respect. Where and how achievement needs are learned are complex, intriguing, and important questions. David McClelland, et al. (1953) and John Atkinson (1981) have contributed greatly to this area of study. They began by developing a measure of the need to achieve. Using the TAT, a test which asks you to make up stories about pictures, they found that persons with high achievement needs can be identified by the stories they tell, namely, more stories about striving for excellence, overcoming obstacles, or accomplishing some difficult goal. Other researchers (Jackson, Ahmed, and Heapy, 1973) suggested that achievement needs are made up of several factors:
1. Wanting approval from experts.
2. Wanting to make money.
3. Wanting to succeed on our own.
4. Wanting respect from friends.
5. Wanting to compete and win.
6. Wanting to work hard and excel.
Thus, one high achiever might strive primarily to make money while another person, equal in overall need to achieve, would concentrate on gaining respect and status from friends, and so on, depending on our past experience.
How do we learn to have a high or low need for achievement? It comes partly from our childhood. Although the conclusions are not certain, Weiner (1980, p. 216-218) says a high achieving male tends to have rejecting parents who expect him to become independent early, make high demands on him, reward his success, and/or punish unsatisfactory behavior (which increases the fear of failure). Rather surprisingly, both loving-accepting (undemanding?) and dominant (overcontrolling?) fathers tend to have less ambitious sons. However, sons of managers and owners have much higher needs to achieve than sons of fathers with routine jobs (Byrne & Kelley, 1981).
Notice in the last paragraph I was talking only about males. What about females? The research in this area for many years found very different results with each sex, so researchers avoided achievement studies with women. More recently this has changed and serious concern has been given to the impact of socially defined sex-roles on behavior. For instance, children's books were found to describe boys as active, effective, and achieving, while girls were described as watching the boys, being a boy's helper, or just tagging along (Weitzman, Eifler, Hokada, & Ross, 1972). Furthermore, an experiment showed that sexist stories actually had immediate impact on the behavior of nursery school children. Girls were more active and persistent in their work if they had heard stories picturing girls that way (McArthur & Eisen, 1976). This is just one minor example. Our needs and goals and self-concepts come from thousands, maybe millions, of experiences.
What are the family backgrounds of females with high needs to achieve? They tend to have nontraditional, permissive parents who reward their achievements. The mother plays a crucial role, as does the father for males. Tenth grade girls who feel most competent (this is related to high career goals but not exactly the same as high achievement needs) had mothers who placed high value on their being independent, successful, and ambitious but low value on self-control and being responsible (Baruch, 1976). More research is needed here. There seems to be a fine line between a parent being very encouraging and being overly dominant. Being over-protective is clearly harmful.
In contrast with the research just cited about what an achiever's parents are actually like, achievement specialists recommend having a somewhat different kind of parent. Johnson (1984) says achievers are produced by parents who let them go on their own, let them set their own goals, and make their own mistakes. These parents encourage high but appropriate goals, respect the child's abilities, take and show great pleasure from the child's successes, and give lots of praise. They let the child try hard on their own before giving suggestions or help, but they give help before the child gives up. They don't do the task for the child nor insist that it be done "my way."
In general, educators believe that high achievers have respectful, praising, optimistic, supportive, hard working parents who are themselves learning and success oriented. These parents expect each person in the household to do their share of the chores and to follow reasonable rules. They talk with each other about their work and studies.
For your purposes, these childhood experiences or the lack of them may be of interest but they occurred in the past and, therefore, are unchangeable (although we might change our reaction to our past). What can you do now that enables us to be highly motivated? How can you be so intent on reaching a distant goal that nothing gets in the way?
Atkinson (1957; 1981) suggested it is much more complicated than just a single need making us do something, although that's part of it. Borrowing a lot from learning theory, he says three factors determine behavior:
A large number of competing motives or needs are striving for expression at the same time, such as the need for achievement, the need for close relationships, the need for power, and the need to be cared for by others. Besides the conflict among many motives, the theory assumes there is a conflict between the hope of success and the fear of failure, i.e. an approach-avoidance conflict over each goal. The fear of failure can keep us from trying in school, just as the fear of rejection can keep us from getting emotionally involved with someone.
The strength of the approach and avoidance tendencies is determined by the relative strength of the needs to achieve and the needs to avoid failure (or success), plus the next two factors.
What we expect to happen if we follow a certain course of action. We observe the situation and, based on our past experience, estimate the likelihood of success and the chances of something bad happening, depending on what we do. Having some hope is necessary, but it is not a simple situation. As discussed in attribution theory later, a highly motivated achiever may utilize complex optimistic or pessimistic cognitive strategies (Cantor, 1990). For example, an optimistic, high achieving student may seek out friends who value and reinforce his/her successes in school, he/she frequently re-lives in fantasy his/her past accomplishments and dreams of the future, and he/she may relax with friends before an exam. This is called "illusory glow" optimism because such a person nurtures and protects his/her selfesteem and confidence. They expect to do very well, they work very hard, they enjoy their successes, and, if they should fail, theyautomatically and immediately apply an "I couldn't help it" defense of the ego (and optimistically take on the next challenge).
On the other hand, Cantor describes the high achieving "defensive pessimist" as defending his/her self-esteem before the test, not afterwards. Such a student expects to do poorly or, at least, anticipates a variety of possible stumbling blocks. He/she works very hard, preparing especially well for the anticipated difficulties. He/she uses the high test anxiety and stress as motivators, not as something to avoid, and then takes an "I expected it" attitude towards the rare failure that does occur (and with anxious excitement systematically attacks the next challenge). This strategy is very different from the pessimistic student who "bad mouths" him/herself after a failure: "I'm such an idiot," "I'm so lazy," etc. Such a pessimist is likely to gradually lower his/her expectations and goals, and perform more and more poorly until eventually becoming a total pessimist who has no hope, expects to fail and, therefore, doesn't try.
Both the "illusory glow" optimist and the "defensive" pessimist are challenged by hard tasks; achieving is important, gratifying, and absorbing for them; they see themselves as having considerable control over the situation and stick with the task, even though it is hard and occasionally disappointing. Compare these achievers with the underachievers described later.
The incentive we feel depends on how attractive the possible outcomes are to us personally (relative to how unattractive the possible risks are to us). Each major task, such as becoming a winning tennis player, learning to play an instrument, completing high school math through Advanced Calculus, asking a really appealing person for a date, getting a BA with honors, going to medical school, or raising two children, provides a enormous range of possible payoffs, some more appealing to us than others. The more likely we feel we are to succeed in #2, and the more appealing, important, the-right-thing-todo, exciting, or wonderful the eventual goal, the more drive and enthusiasm we have about the activity.
In summary ,
How motivated we are depends on (1) the strength of fairly consistent motives or needs inside of us, (2) our expectation of what outcomes certain actions will produce, and (3) how badly at this time we want a certain payoff over all the other wants we have and over the risks we face. The needs, expectations, and incentives are mostly learned; together these factors (our motivation) largely determine what we do and how far we get in life. Although the past experiences related to these factors are unalterable, these factors that influence our lives so enormously can be changed by us. That's the beauty of being human. What does the theory about achievement needs tell us about self-help? Let's consider John, the procrastinator, again.
Parents and teachers train children to be independent and achievers (Winterbottom, 1958) and to fear failure (Teevan & McGhee, 1972). Being rewarded for striving increases our achievement motive; being punished for unsatisfactory behavior--and having our successes disregarded--leads to a fear of failure. To the extent we are selfreinforcing, we could presumably increase our achievement motivation by emphasizing our successes and simply using our failures as cues for us to try harder.
There have been several successful attempts to train people to have higher achievement needs (Burris, 1958; McClelland & Winter, 1969). People were taught to have frequent fantasies of achieving, observe models of successful people like themselves, play games or role-play situations involving taking risks and being a successful competitor. These researchers concluded that they were teaching selfconfidence and that "knowledge gives confidence." You could train yourself in the same ways; schools--and this book--should increase your expectation of success by teaching you skills, self control, reasonable attitudes, and self-awareness.
A high need to achieve is correlated with higher grades (Schultz & Pomerantz, 1974); however, Raynor (1981) has shown it isn't a simple relationship. Considering getting B's or higher as important for future plans and for self-respect was related to grades in school for boys. Raynor also found that students in the high-needs-to-achieve-and-lowtest-anxiety group did well on the important (to them), relevant courses but not as well on less relevant courses. Students with lowachievement-needs-and-high-test-anxiety did about the same as the above group on less relevant courses but much worse on important courses. The points seem to be: (a) your need to achieve and selfconfidence won't do you much good unless you convince yourself that school is relevant to your future and your self-esteem, and (b) a fear of failure produces failure in the more important courses. The next chapter tells you how to reduce fears.
Johnson (1984) summarizes what you can do to keep on striving for your special goals: (a) break your major goals into manageable daily tasks and set aside the time, (b) take pleasure from the work and reward your progress, (c) remember your past successes and imagine how good you will feel when you accomplish your goal, (d) also imagine how bad it will feel to give up or mess up, (e) use competition, especially trying to improve on your best effort thus far, to arouse interest, and (f) seek encouragement and find "heroes" to inspire you.
Don't go around saying the world owes you a living.The world owes you nothing. It was here first. -Mark Twain
One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar. -Helen Keller
Greissman (1987) interviewed over 60 highly successful people and found they had several things in common. They (a) love their work, (b) become highly competent in a specialty, (c) commit themselves to their work, giving it their time--their life, (d) meet most of their needs through their work, (e) long for recognition and self fulfillment, (f) focus on and "flow" with their work--loosing themselves in it, and (g) quickly see and use new ideas and opportunities at work. They pay a price for success, such as few friends, little partying, little travel, and even isolation from their family, but they have few regrets. Talent matters, but devotion determines the winner most of the time. No one can tell you exactly how to become so devoted...or even if it is a good idea.
The importance of setting goal
THE IMPORTANCE OF SETTING GOAL
Motivation is trying to reach our goals. But, it isn't just a matter of setting high, noble goals, as discussed in chapter 3, although that is a critical step. It is common to wish for higher goals than we are willing to do the work to attain. We want to be a lawyer but goof off in high school. Many college students with a 2.7 GPA want to become PhD’s. We want to be a star performer but don't like to practice. Even when trying to better ourselves we may lack the motivation. For example, Rosen (1982) found that only half of the people in a self-help program completed the work. Those who stuck with it got good results (overcoming their fears). Similar results have been found in toilet training of children and self-administered treatment for premature ejaculation. Likewise, Schindler (1979) reported that only 17 of 60 subjects made full use of an assertiveness book. What determines these vast differences in motivation among us? Why are some of us fantastic achievers while others take the easy route? We don't know for sure (but see learned industriousness later), but having explicit goals and certain attitudes help.
Life goals set our sails and give us a push, e.g. "I want to help people." People who reach many or most of their life goals are usually calmer, happier, healthier and less stressed or emotional. However, there seem to be certain life goals that harm our mental health, e.g. "I want to have the power to control or impress people." Wanting to be close to and good to others is associated with better emotional health (National Advisory Mental Health Council, 1995). Likewise, seeking to improve your skills ("mastery goals") results in feeling good about trying hard and in increased effort when an obstacle is met. But wanting to beat others ("performance goals"), such as having a winning season in football or being the best student in your math class, result in avoiding tough challenges, giving up when starting to lose, feeling more anxious, and less gain in self-esteem than with mastery goals. This is why enlightened coaches are teaching players to focus on mastering their basic skills, not on their won-loss record. It is also easy to see the connection between mastery vs. performance goals and intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation or satisfaction. The importance of intrinsic satisfaction and the problems with extrinsic rewards are discussed thoroughly later under "Why behavior is hard to understand."
In any area where we are hoping to self-improve, both short-term and long-range goals are needed. If your long-term goals clearly contribute to your most important values and your philosophy of life, they should be more motivating. Good goals are fairly hard--they stretch us--but they are achievable taking small steps at a time. As much as possible, you should explicitly describe your goals in terms of very specific behaviors. Danish, Petitpas & Hale (1995) provide examples of specific behaviors in sports psychology:
· Physical skills--"I'll do 3 more sit ups and 3 more push ups this week than I did last week."
· Cognitive skills--"I'll develop some self-talk that should reduce my fears and improve my batting."
· Gain knowledge--"I'll learn more about exercising to prevent my back from hurting."
· Courage--"I'll practice batting against a very fast pitcher for two weeks, then I'll try out for the school team."
· Social support--"I'll talk to the coach about batting; I'll make friends with guys/girls on the team."
Positive objectives are usually more motivating than negative ones, e.g. "I want to bat over .300" is a better goal than "I'd like to be less scared of the ball." Certainly, the more appealing goals are something you want, not something imposed on you. Mastery-oriented people, realizing success depends on their skills, become more selfdirected, work harder, achieve a higher level of performance, and get more enjoyment out of the activity. In contrast, according to Murphy (1995), "performance"-oriented people are more likely to strive for attention and view beating others as a "life or death" matter (in this case, failure is interpreted as "I don't have the ability" and interest declines).
This book addresses many different aspects of psychological motivation. The needs for food, water, air, sleep, shelter, and even sex are always there but they don't usually dominate our lives. Our socialpsychological needs, instead, dominate most of our lives, such as attention, companionship, support, love, social image or status, material things, power and so on. Also, psychological or cognitive factors, in addition to goals, strongly influence our motivation and attitudes, such as self-confidence in our ability as a change agent (self-efficacy and attribution theory). If we see ourselves as able and in control of our lives, then we are much more likely to truly and responsibly take control.
Sometimes, however, a person's motivation seems excessive. Our goals may be out of reach but we still strive mightily for the goal (as in the movie Rudy). Exceedingly able people are occasionally extremely demanding and self-critical of themselves. Between 1987 and 1990, Steffi Graf was ranked the #1 tennis player in the world; she won 97% of her matches. Yet, she was unhappy with her performance 97% of the time. She was so self-demanding that during practice she frequently had an outburst of self-criticism and broke down in tears. Surely intense motivation and excessive anxiety can sometimes be emotionally detrimental.
To be effective our motivation has to be focused on important tasks. As Covey (1989) cogently illustrates, most of us spend a lot of time doing things that seem urgent at the moment but are really not important in terms of our major mission in life. Also, we waste quite a bit of our life doing things that are unimportant and not urgent, such as reading trash novels, watching mindless TV, etc. So, assuming we do what we are motivated to do, then our motivations are frequently misguided. Covey also emphasizes that our efficiency could be greatlyincreased if we spent more time doing things that are often not seen as urgent but truly are important, e.g. clarifying the major purpose of our life, developing relationships that facilitate efficiency, growth, and meaningfulness, planning and preparing for important upcoming tasks, reading, exercising, resting, etc. He tells a story about a traveler who comes upon a hard working person sawing down a tree and asks, "How long have you been sawing on this tree?" The tired, sweaty worker said, "A long time, seems like hours." So, the traveler asked, "Why don't you sharpen your saw?" The reply was "I'm too busy sawing!" A lot of us are sawing with a saw that needs sharpened. We need to know a lot more about the processes of motivation and selfdirection.
Challenging-but-achievable goals are themselves motivating. On the other hand, easy-to-reach goals are boring and/or demeaning. Impossible goals are frustrating (and there are lots of impossible goals, in contrast with the "if you can dream it, you can achieve it" nonsense). Since challenging but realistic goals require us to stretch and grow, they must constantly be changed to match the conditions and our ability. We are most motivated when we feel capable, responsible, self-directed, respected, and hopeful.
How to get motivated ?
HOW TO GET MOTIVATED ?
Humans are motivated by many things--psychological needs, physiological drives, survival, urges, emotions, hurts, impulses, fears, threats, rewards (money, friendship, status...), possessions, wishes, intentions, values, mastery, freedom, intrinsic satisfaction, self satisfaction, interests, pleasure, dislikes, established habits, goals, ambitions and so on. All at the same time. In the next major sections of this chapter we will deal with questions like: Why don't we do what we want to do? Can we prevent unwanted behaviors, like addictions and bad habits? Why is our behavior so hard to understand? How can we stop procrastinating? In this section, however, we will focus on increasing our drive to achieve our more worthwhile goals,
Changing involves both knowing how (learning) and wanting to (motivation). It is important to see that learning is different from performing. A hungry rat in the laboratory will work diligently to discover how to get food. It learns how and vigorously performs, i.e. eats until it's stuffed, then it stops. The rat's eating behavior, after the initial learning, is determined by its hunger needs. We humans are the same; to grow and develop new behaviors we must learn. But, in terms of how far we get in life--how much we accomplish--motivation may be just as important if not more important than learning. We already know how to lose weight (don't eat) or get A's or give generously to others. A common barrier to accomplishing many goals in life is not wanting the goal enough to give it the necessary time and effort (or conning ourselves into believing we can reach our goal in some easy way).
Occasionally, a person will have enormous determination to achieve something requiring great effort over a period of years. It is emotionally moving to hear about such a person who has overcome great obstacles to achieve an impressive goal. Glenn Cunningham was told as a boy that he would never walk on his badly burned legs; he became a great miler. How do you get the drive to go to college at age 35, work full-time, care for three children, and graduate with honors? The same way Rebecca Lee in 1864 became the first black woman physician: you work to accomplish your dreams. There are many, many inspiring examples of great achievements. Yet, psychology can't, as yet, guarantee high drive or prescribe a cure for laziness.
The Satisfied Man
THE
SATISFIED MAN
F.W.ROBERTSON has said “Whoever is satisfied with what he does has
reached the culmination point-he will progress no more. Man’s destiny is to be
not dissatisfied, but forever unsatisfied.”
One of the
saddest things in life is to see men and women who started out with high hope
and proud ambitions settle down in mediocre positions, half satisfied just
merely to get a living, to plod along indifferently.
Oh, what
tragedy there is in being content with mediocrity, in getting in to state where
one is indifferent to the larger, better things of life!
When your
satisfied with the life your living, with the work you’re doing, with the thought
your thinking, with the dreams your dreaming, satisfied with character your
building, with your ideals, you may be sure that your already beginning to
deteriorate.
There is
little hope for the man who feels satisfied with himself, who does not know
“The noble discontent that stirs the acorn to become an oak.” Man’s ambition to
improve something somewhere every day to get a little further on and a little
higher up then he was a day before, a burning passion for better human things
all along the line, is the of human progress.
Do you
realize, that if the motive were big enough, if you had a very unusual
incentive, you could materially improve upon what you now are satisfied to
consider your best endeavor? As an employee you may think you are doing your
level best, and are conscientious, loyal, true and industrious; and yet, if a
great prize should be offered you to bring your work up to a certain higher
standard for the next sixty days, would you rest until you had succeeded in
very greatly improving what you now think is your best work?
Don’t you
think, you who pride yourself that it would be impossible to better what you
are now doing, that if your name were over the door as proprietor instead of
the name of the company you work for you could up yourself about fifty per
cent; that you would find some way of doing it? Don’t you think you would be a
little more ambitious, make little better use of your time, that you would try
to call out a little more ingenuity and effectiveness, a little more
resourcefulness? Do you think you would jog along in the same halfhearted
manner, thinking more of your salary than of your opportunity to absorb the
secrets of your employer’s success? Do you think you would stand by without
protest and see the merchandised injured, or wasted, when you could stop it; or
that you would be so careless or make so many blunders yourself? Don’t you
think the prize to be gained would make you take a little more interest in
things than you do now; make you a little more alert, more eager for the
success of the business?
It is
deplorable sight to see so many young men and young women apparently so
satisfied with themselves, with what they are going, that they have no great
yearnings, no insatiable longing for something higher and better.
Multitudes
of capable employees are satisfied to plod along in mediocrity instead of
rising of the heights, where there ability would naturally carry them. I have a
friend who has a much superior brain to the man he is working for, and yet for
a great many years he has been on a ordinary salary. He has never married. He
takes life in an easygoing way and whenever I have tried to encourage him he
always says, “Why should I exert myself more or take on greater business
responsibilities? I have nobody but myself to consider. I like to have a good
time, and don’t want any more worry, and anxiety although I know perfectly well
I could do it if I wanted to.”
Of course,
the higher up in the world a man gets the greater his responsibility, but think
of the satisfaction which comes from consciousness that he has made the most of
his talents, that he has no buried any of them in a napkin, the satisfaction
which comes from the feeling that he has made good, that he has delivered his
message to the world and delivered it like a man, that he has full filled his
mission, that he has made the most possible of the material and the
opportunities given him. The feeling that he has no regrets, that he has done
his level best more than compensates for any additional effort and greater
responsibility.
We tend to
become our aspirations. If we constantly aspire and strive for something better
and higher and nobler, we cannot help broadening and improving. The ambition
that is dominant in the mind tends to work itself out in the life. If this
ambition sordid and low and animal, we shall develop this qualities, for our
lives follow our ideals.
Civilization
has its greatest advancement under the stress necessity. Under the leadership
of the great ambition to satisfy the heart’s yearnings for better things
desperately to match our dreams with their reality.
The struggle
of man to rise a little higher, to get in to a little more comfortable
position, to secure a little better education, a little better home, to gain a
little more culture and refinement, to possess that power which comes from
being In a position of broader and wider influence through the acquirement of
property, is what has developed the character and stamina of our highest types
of manhood today. This upward life trend gives others confidence in us.
When we have
attained little success, when we have gained a little public applause, how many
of us think we can relax our efforts, and before we realize it our ambition has
disappeared, our energy evaporated. A sort of sluggish inactivity comes over us
and lulls us into inaction.
First
success, and especially early success, to many act like an opiate (sleep
inducer). They are overcome with inertia which only an unsatisfied and
determined ambition can overcome. It takes more grit and a stronger will to
force ourselves to do our level best after we have demonstrated without doubt
that we have the ability to do what we undertake, than it does to achieve the
actual first success itself.
One of the
greatest enemy of ambition is personal inertia (getting into a rut), and it is
one of the hardest things to overcome. The temptation to slide along the line
of the least resistance, to get in to a comfortable position and take once
ease, is so strong that many allow it to master them. The ambition is not
persistent enough or strenuous enough to shame them out of their inertia, or prod
them on to greater things. Mediocrity is often a premium upon laziness. The
poet tells us,
“He who would the heights sublime,
Or
breathe the purer air of life,
Must not expect to rest in ease,
But brace himself for toil or strife.”
One of the
most discouraging problems in the world is that of trying to help the
ambitionless, the half satisfied, those who have not discontent enough in their
natures to push them on, initiative enough to begin things, persistency enough
to keep going.
If a young
man is apparently satisfied to drift along in a humdrum way, half content with
his accomplishments, undisturbed by the fact that he has used but a very small
part of himself, a very small percentage of his real ability, that is energies
are running to wastes in all sorts of ways, you cannot do much with him, If he
lacks ambition, life, energy and vigor-is willing to slide along the line of
the least resistance and exerts himself as little as possible, there is nothing
upon which to build.
It is the
young man who is not satisfied with what he does, and who is determined to
better his best every day, who struggles to express the ideal, to make the
possible in him a reality, that wins. Activity is the law of growth; effort the
only means of improvement. Whenever men have obeyed their lower nature and
ceased to struggle to better their condition, deteriorated physically, mentally
and morally; while just in proposition as they have striven honestly and
insistently to improve their situation, they have developed a larger and nobler
human type.
When a man
who is said to be the highest salaried official in the United States we asked
to give the secret of his success, he replied, “I haven’t succeeded. No real
man ever succeeds. There is always a larger goal ahead.”
It is a
small man who succeeds in his own estimation. Really great man ever reach their
goal, because they are constantly pushing their horizon further and further,
getting a broader vision, a larger outlook, and their ambition grows with their
achievement.
If you are
getting a fair salary in a mediocre position there is a danger of hypnotizing
yourself, into the belief that there is no need to exert yourself very much to
get up higher. There is danger of limiting your ambition so that you will be
half content to remain a perpetual clerk when you have the ability to do much
better.
This
satisfaction with the lesser, when the greater is possible, often results from
relatives or friends telling you that you are doing well, And that you would better
let well enough alone. These advisors says; “don’t take chances with a
certainty. It is true you are not getting a very big salary, but it is a sure
thing, and if you give it up with the hope of something better you may do
worse.” Don’t let anyone or any conditions make you think you have not the
ability to match your longings, wrapped up in every human being there are
energies which, if unfolded, concentrated, and given proper attention will
develop his highest ideal.
Our longings
are creative principles, prophesies, indicative of potencies equal to the task
of actual achievement. These latent potencies are not given mock us. There are
no sealed orders wrapped within the brain without the accompanying ability to
execute them.
When you
once a glimpse of yourself as you were intended by your maker to be, will all
of your latent possibilities developed into realities; when you once see
yourself as the superb man it is possible for you to be, nothing and no one but
yourself can prevent you from attaining your ambition.
It is only
the man who has stopped growing that feels satisfied with his achievements. The
growing man feels a great lack of wholeness, of completeness. Everything in him
seems to be unfinished because it is growing. The expanding man is always
dissatisfied with his accomplishment, is always reaching out for something
larger, fuller, completer.
Wish you all have a satisfied life - HAKKIM RAJA.S
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