Motivation, Art and Motivational Posters

Source: www.millionslink.com
By: Isabel Lopez, Sat Sep 6th, 2008

Motivation is the reason or reasons for engaging in a particular behavior, especially human behavior as studied in economics, psychology, neuropsychology, and philosophy. These reasons may include basic needs such as food or a desired object, hobbies, goal, state of being, or ideal. The motivation for a behavior may also be attributed to less-apparent reasons such as altruism or morality.

A reward, tangible or intangible, is presented after the occurrence of an action (i.e. behavior) with the intent to cause the behavior to occur again. This is done by associating positive meaning to the behavior. Studies show that if the person receives the reward immediately, the effect would be greater, and decreases as duration lengthens. Repetitive action-reward combination can cause the action to become habit.

Intrinsic motivation is when people engage in an activity, such as a hobby, without obvious external incentives. Intrinsic motivation is the motivation that comes from inside the performer. E.g. they compete for the love of the sport. Extrinsic motivation comes from outside of the performer. E.g. The crowd cheer the performer on, this motivates them to do well, or to beat a PB (Personal Best). Another example is trophies or a reward. It makes the performer want to win and beat the other competitors, thereby motivating the performer.

The self-control of motivation is increasingly understood as a subset of emotional intelligence; a person may be highly intelligent according to a more conservative definition (as measured by many intelligence tests), yet unmotivated to dedicate this intelligence to certain tasks.

Goal-setting theory is based on the notion that individuals sometimes have a drive to reach a clearly defined end state. Often, this end state is a reward in itself. A goal's efficiency is affected by three features; proximity, difficulty and specificity. An ideal goal should present a situation where the time between the initiation of behavior and the end state is close. This explains why some children are more motivated to learn how to ride a bike than mastering algebra. A goal should be moderate, not too hard or too easy to complete. In both cases, most people are not optimally motivated, as many want a challenge (which assumes some kind of insecurity of success). At the same time people want to feel that there is a substantial probability that they will succeed.

Some psychologists believe that a significant portion of human behavior is energized and directed by unconscious motives. According to Maslow: "Psychoanalysis has often demonstrated that the relationship between a conscious desire and the ultimate unconscious aim that underlies it need not be at all direct." In other words, stated motives do not always match those inferred by skilled observers. For example, it is possible that a person can be accident-prone because he has an unconscious desire to hurt himself and not because he is careless or ignorant of the safety rules. Similarly, some overweight people are not really hungry for food but for attention and love. Eating is merely a defensive reaction to lack of attention. Some workers damage more equipment than others because they harbor unconscious feelings of aggression toward authority figures.

It is usually worthwhile to consider decorating rooms of children with decorative art. Same applies to the deocation of the office to enhance employee performance via motivational posters. One can use similar visual tools to motivate self via selecting relevant home decoration for perseverance, integrity, persistence, teamwork, imagination, inspiration and so on.