Motivation, Learning & Behavior: Theories, Strategies & Conflicts
1. Concept and Theories of Motivation
Motivation has been studied from various perspectives and is closely linked to emotions, but especially to needs. These needs are categorized according to individual requirements, ranging from basic to more complex (culturally determined).
Primary motivations relate to the impulses and dispositions of the organism to maintain basic bodily functions like eating, thirst, and sex. They are closely tied to biological factors and are innate.
On the other hand, stimulant motivations depend on external factors. Their aim is centered on the information needed from the environment, either to understand, manipulate, or adapt to it. Among them are activity, exploration, curiosity, and manipulation. We can also consider contact as a stimulant motivation.
Finally, there are learned motivations, which have been developed through culture and involve complex needs satisfaction, as determined by behavioral patterns and social acceptance within a society. Examples include achievement, contact, power, and affiliation. Behind these learned motivations can be a primary or stimulant motivation, but it is mediated by cultural factors.
Needs involve the body seeking balance or compensation. They can be primary or secondary (like motivations). Hence, a need is experienced as a lack of something. This lack mobilizes the body to get satisfaction, balance, or compensate for the absence. The urge to mobilize or fulfill the need can be understood as motivation. Thus, motivations and needs are closely linked.
2. Characteristics of Motivated Behavior
In general, motivated behavior involves feeling a need, setting goals (short, medium, and long term), and experiencing a sense of reward. Furthermore, it implies and is affected by personal and cultural values, gender, and age, among other factors.
3. Motivational Conflict and Frustration
Motivational conflicts arise from the meeting of two conflicting motives, either in terms of guidance for conduct or by intensity. The moment of choice highlights conflicting motives.
Researchers have identified four types of conflicts:
- Approach-approach conflict: When the individual is attracted by two desirable results.
- Avoidance-avoidance conflict: When the individual must choose between two undesirable activities.
- Approach-avoidance conflict: An activity with both positive and negative elements for the subject (e.g., it gives me pleasure, but I dislike it).
- Multiple approach-avoidance conflicts: Involving multiple options with both positive and negative aspects.
4. Learning Theory
Psychologists have been concerned since the beginning of psychology with how humans learn. Learning is a process that allows for cognitive and affective knowledge acquisition and adaptation to the environment, acquiring new patterns of interaction and behavior.
Because humans do not possess strong survival instincts, our behaviors are not pre-programmed in our genetic code. We are born with few tools, but they are powerful because we can learn new behaviors. Learning must be understood as the acquisition of new patterns of cognitive, affective, and behavioral responses.
For learning to occur, affective aspects must motivate and give meaning to lessons, and cognitive processes must store and conceptualize knowledge, integrating it with previous knowledge. Psychology holds different theories about how we learn, starting with the more basic classical conditioning initiated by Pavlov, then moving to more complex theories like Skinner’s operant conditioning, and later recognizing the role of cognition in learning with Bandura. Thereafter, motivational and affective variables, intelligence, and personality variables have been incorporated into the understanding of human learning.
5. Classical Conditioning
This is the most basic type of learning. The creator of this model is Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist of the early twentieth century.
- The model indicates that an unconditioned stimulus (US) produces an unconditioned response (UR). Both are unlearned; a stimulus X naturally generates a response Y.
- When the US is presented to the subject or organism with a neutral stimulus (NS) for significant periods, an association or connection is formed between the two stimuli. In this way, the presentation of the NS to the organism elicits a response without the presence of the original stimulus (US).
- At that point, the NS becomes a conditioned stimulus (CS), and the response it generates is a conditioned response (CR).
- E.g., The dog (organism) US: food, UR: salivation; NS: the bell, CS (pairing between US and NS): bell, CR: salivation. Here, once the dog has connected the two stimuli sufficiently, the bell can ring without the presence of food, and the dog will salivate. Learning has occurred – classical conditioning.
- In the US, its main representative was Watson, who added to the theory the concepts of generalization, discrimination, and spontaneous recovery.
6. Learning and Motivation
For a long time, learning was associated with intelligence and memory capacity. However, time has shown that effective learning involves all areas of the human constitution. Hence, significant learning leaves a lasting mark (structural) because the individual has assimilated and integrated the experience and knowledge cognitively, affectively, and behaviorally. Learning of this nature may have the strength to change behavior sustainably over time.
In contrast, learning linked only to basic and/or higher cognitive functions can be lost over time since it is not associated with other areas of life and fades due to lack of use.
Rote learning emerged in the past as a way of measuring an individual’s intelligence. Those who remembered the most historical events, performed calculations quickly, recognized parts of a diagram or organization, or handled a large vocabulary were considered “intelligent.” However, this type of learning, while demonstrating knowledge, does not necessarily ensure understanding or appreciation of its use in various fields of life.
Knowledge cannot be taken statically because otherwise, its application and generalization are unlikely. Significant learning often allows for creativity.
Significant learning generates a profound impact on our nervous system, enabling humans to adapt to the environment by achieving better mastery of it, as well as better performance, interpersonal relationships, and quality of life.
In the Field of Education: Learning Strategies
Learning strategies are specific actions consciously and intentionally chosen to learn the content offered and achieve objectives. Three levels of learning strategies can be noted:
- Retention of facts: Involves memorizing content to repeat verbatim what is heard or read.
- Elaborative processing: Applying what is learned, for example, translating information into one’s own words. It relates to verbal skills and the ability to link ideas and events of everyday life.
- Deep processing: Emphasizes critical thinking, allows for abstractions, and knowledge transfer to other disciplines.
- Methodical study: Correlates and builds potential across the three previous types of strategies, as it aims to develop a systematic approach and increase academic curiosity.