Abraham Maslow

• holistic-dynamic theory because it assumes that the whole person is constantly being motivated by one need or another and that people have the potential to grow toward psychological health, that is, self-actualization
• s Edward B. Titchener, a renowned pioneer in psychology who taught all his classes in full academic robes. Maslow was not impressed.
• he worked closely with Harry Harlow, who was just beginning his research with monkeys. Maslow’s dissertation research on dominance and sexual behavior of monkeys suggested that social dominance was a more powerful motive than sex, at least among primates (Blum, 2002).
• First, Maslow (1970) adopted a holistic approach to motivation: That is, the whole person, not any single part or function, is motivated
• Second, motivation is usually complex, meaning that a person’s behavior may spring from several separate motives. For example, the desire for sexual union may be motivated not only by a genital need but also by needs for dominance, companionship, love, and self-esteem
• A third assumption is that people are continually motivated by one need or another. When one need is satisfied, it ordinarily loses its motivational power and is then replaced by another need. For example, as long as people’s hunger needs are frustrated, they will strive for food; but when they do have enough to eat, they move on to other needs such as safety, friendship, and self-worth.
• Another assumption is that all people everywhere are motivated by the same basic needs. The manner in which people in different cultures obtain food, build shelters, express friendship, and so forth may vary widely, but the fundamental needs for food, safety, and friendship are common to the entire species.
• A final assumption concerning motivation is that needs can be arranged on a hierarchy (Maslow, 1943, 1970). Although the most common visual representation of the hierarchy is a pyramid, it is worth noting that Maslow himself never created or argued for a pyramid (Bridgeman et al., 2019). It was first proposed by a consulting psychologist in a business journal nearly 20 years after Maslow proposed the hierarchy (McDermid, 1960; cf. Bridgman et al., 2019).
• hierarchy of needs concept assumes that lower level needs must be satisfied or at least relatively satisfied before higher level needs become motivators.
• The five needs composing this hierarchy are conative needs, meaning that they have a striving or motivational character
• t basic needs of any person are physiological needs, including food, water, oxygen, maintenance of body temperature, and so on. Physiological needs are the most prepotent of al
• When people have partially satisfied their physiological needs, they become motivated by safety needs, including physical security, stability, dependency, protection, and freedom from threatening forces such as war, terrorism, illness, fear, anxiety, danger, chaos, and natural disasters
• love and belongingness needs, such as the desire for friendship; the wish for a mate and children; and the need to belong to a family, a club, a neighborhood, or a nation.
• esteem needs, which include self-respect, confidence, competence, and the knowledge that others hold them in high esteem.
• Self-actualization needs include self-fulfillment,the realization of all one’s potential, and a desire to become creative in the full sense of the word
• , aesthetic needs are not universal, but at least some people in every culture seem to be motivated by the need for beauty and aesthetically pleasing experiences (
• Cognitive Needs Most people have a desire to know, to solve mysteries, to understand, and to be curious.
• , neurotic needs lead only to stagnation and pathology. They perpetuate an unhealthy style of life and have no value in the striving for self-actualization.
• Unmotivated Behavior Maslow believed that even though all behaviors have a cause, some behaviors are not motivated. In other words, not all determinants are motives. Some behavior is not caused by needs but by other factors such as conditioned reflexes, maturation, or drugs.
• Expressive behavior is often an end in itself and serves no other purpose than to be. It is frequently unconscious and usually takes place naturally and with little effort.
• coping behavior is ordinarily conscious, effortful, learned, and determined by the external environment. It involves the individual’s attempts to cope with the environment; to secure food and shelter; to make friends; and to receive acceptance, appreciation, and prestige from others
• Deprivation of physiological needs results in malnutrition, fatigue, loss of energy, obsession with sex, and so on. Threats to one’s safety lead to fear, insecurity, and dread
• Instinctoid Nature of Needs Maslow (1970) hypothesizes that some human needs are innately determined even though they can be modified by learning
• Ruth Benedict and psychologist Max Wertheimer—were so different from average people. To Maslow, these two people represented the highest level of human development, and he called this level “self-actualization
• Rather than asking “What makes Max Wertheimer and Ruth Benedict self-actualizing?” he turned the question around and asked, “Why are we not all self-actualizing?” This new slant on the problem gradually changed Maslow’s conception of humanity and expanded his list of self-actualizing people
• Criteria for Self-Actualization

  First, they were free from psychopathology. They were neither neurotic nor psychotic nor did they have a tendency toward psychological disturbances. This point is an important negative cri terion because some neurotic and psychotic individuals have some things in common with self-actualizing people: namely, such characteristics as a heightened sense of real ity, mystical experiences, creativity, and detachment from other people.
• Criteria for Self-Actualization

  Second, these self-actualizing people had progressed through the hierarchy of needs and therefore lived above the subsistence level of existence and had no ever present threat to their safety. Also, they experienced love and had a well-rooted sense of self-worth. Because they had their lower level needs satisfied, self-actualizing peo ple were better able to tolerate the frustration of these needs, even in the face of criticism and scorn. They are capable of loving a wide variety of people but have no obligation to love everyone.
• Maslow’s third criterion for self-actualization was the embracing of the B-values. His self-actualizing people felt comfortable with and even demanded truth, beauty, justice, simplicity, humor, and each of the other B-values that we discuss later.
• The final criterion for reaching self-actualization was “full use and exploitation of talents, capacities, potentialities, etc.” (Maslow, 1970, p. 150). In other words, his self-actualizing individuals fulfilled their needs to grow, to develop, and to increasingly become what they were capable of becoming.
• self-actualizing people are motivated by the “eternal verities,” what he called B-values.
• B-values are not needs in the same sense that food, shelter, or companionship are. Maslow termed B-values as “metaneeds” to indicate that they are the ultimate level of needs.
• He distin guished between ordinary need motivation and the motives of self-actualizing people, which he called metamotivation.
• Metamotivation is characterized by expressive rather than coping behavior and is associated with the B-values. It differentiates self-actualizing people from those who are not.
• Maslow (1964, 1970) identified 14 B-values include truth, goodness, beauty, wholeness or the transcen dence of dichotomies, aliveness or spontaneity, uniqueness, perfection, completion, justice and order, simplicity, richness or totality, effortlessness, playfulness or humor, and self sufficiency or autonomy