User:Battered sav/E-portfolio

Week 1. Introduction
Generic Skills Covered in Unit
 * Communication: Create, express, present, listen, respond and negotiate ideas.
 * Information & Communication Technology: Select and use appropriate information and communication technology to retrieve, manipulate and present information.
 * Social responsibility: Work toward improvement in society, understand economic, political, social, and environmental systems with an international perspective, act in environmentally sustainable ways, accept service to the community as the primary purpose for professional life.

Introduction

 * Motivation is the process that gives behaviour energy and direction.
 * Energy: Behaviour is relatively strong, intense and persistent.
 * Direction: Behaviour is aimed toward achieving a particular purpose or goal.

Specific questions that constitute the core problems to be solved in motivation study
 * 1) What starts behaviour?
 * 2) How is behaviour sustained over time?
 * 3) Why is behaviour directed towards some ends but away from others?
 * 4) Why does behaviour change its direction?
 * 5) Why does behaviour stop?

History of Motivation

 * 1) Will
 * 2) Instinct
 * 3) Drive: Freud’s and Hull’s Drive Theory
 * 4) Incentive, Arousal, Discrepancy
 * 5) Rise of Mini-theories: The active nature of the person, the cognitive revolution and applied socially relevant research
 * 6) Contemporary Era

Summary of Freud’s Drive Theory
 * Drive’s Source: A bodily deficit occurs (e.g. Blood sugar drops and a sense of hunger emerges).
 * Drive’s Impetus: The intensity of the bodily deficit grows and emerges into consciousness as a psychological discomfort, which is anxiety.
 * Drive’s Object: Seeking to reduce anxiety and satisfy the bodily deficit, the person searches out and consumes a need satisfying environmental object (e.g. food)
 * Drives Aim: If the environmental object successfully satisfies the bodily deficit, satisfaction occurs and quiets anxiety, at least for a period of time.

Assessment Details
Textbook chapter Guildlines

Author a free, online, undergraduate\textbook chapter about a specific motivation and/or emotion topic.
 * 1) Topic
 * 2) Location
 * 3) Academic integrity
 * 4) Collaboration
 * 5) Word length
 * 6) Links
 * 7) Images
 * 8) Multimedia
 * 9) References
 * 10) Feedback

Multimedia

Create a five minute instructional video explaining the main content covered by your textbook chapter.

E-Portfolio

Develop an online e-portfolio sharing your reflections about the unit and its learning activities.

Tutorial 1
Our first tutorial of the unit motivation and emotion, involved our tutor, Dr James Neill asking or the participants to partake in a “get to know one another” exercise. This included divided the class in groups of height, thumb size, fast food preference and political party preference. Being a liberal supporter I was in the minority group of the class. Labour and The Greens with the majority of the support. This exercise helped us to pair up in groups with people of similar characteristics and views. After getting to know each other we formed small groups and were told by our tutor to individually define motivation and emotion. Our definitions included:

Motivation:


 * The inner drive behind our actions.
 * Why we do, what we do.
 * Driving force which determines our behaviour

Emotion:


 * State of mind which is determined by thoughts and feelings.
 * Having aroused, purposive or expressive feelings.
 * Our behaviour towards a particular situation.

We then discussed amongst our groups areas of motivation and emotion that are personally interesting. This was an effective approach to help us determine what subject to choose for our chapter summaries. I found intrinsic and extrinsic motivation very interesting because I could relate it to my day to day life. I am currently a part owner/ manager of a restaurant/bar and find it very useful in learning different strategies for motivating staff to do their job proficiently. Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation was an easy choice for my chapter summary, I believed I would be able to learn from it and put it into action, therefore becoming a better manager at my place of work.

Week 3. Brain and Physiological Needs
The Motivated and Emotional Brain

The brain carries out cognitive and intellectual functions, including thinking, learning, remembering, decision making and problem solving. The brain is also the centre of motivation and emotion. It generates cravings, needs, desires, pleasure, and the full range of the emotions. There are three general principles that guide research on the motivated and emotional brain:
 * 1) Specific Brain Structures Generate Specific Motivations: Different brain structures, when stimulated, give rise to specific motivational states. Stimulating one part of the hypothalamus, for instance, increases hunger, while stimulating a different part of the hypothalamus increases satiety.
 * 2) Biochemical Agents Stimulate Specific Brain Structures: Brain structures have receptor sites on them that endow them with the potential to be stimulated. The biochemical agents that stimulate these receptor sites are neurotransmitters and hormones. Neurotransmitters are the communication messengers of the nervous system, while hormones are the communication messengers of the endocrine system, allowing glands to communicate through the blood stream with bodily organs like the heart or lungs.
 * 3) Day to Day Events Stir Biochemical Agents Into Action: Day to day events stimulate the brain into action. If a person deprives themselves of food for a period of time, the ghrelin hormone is stirred into action. This biochemical agent then circulates the bloodstream and once it reaches the brain the stimulated hypothalamus creates the psychological experience of hunger.

Physiological Needs

Physiological needs occur with tissue and bloodstream deficits, as from water loss, nutrient deprivation, or physical injury. If neglected, bodily harm or pathology follows. Hence, physiological needs, when unmet and intense, represent life threatening emergencies. Examples of physiological needs include thirst, hunger and sex.

Week 4. Psychological and Social Needs/Tutorial 2
Psychological Needs

When an activity involves our psychological needs, we feel interest. When an activity satisfies our psychological needs, we feel enjoyment. Playing games, solving mysteries, and undertaking challenges are interesting and enjoyable things to do precisely because they provide an arena for involving and satisfying psychological needs.

Social Needs

Humans acquire social needs through experience, development and socialization.

Table: Incentive That Activate Each Social Need’s Emotional and Behaviour Potential

Tutorial 2.
In our second tutorial we were instructed to come up with a definition within our group on “what are needs”? With a little help from the textbook our group agreed on the most accurate description on:

What are Needs? Any condition within the person that is essential and necessary for life, growth and well being.

The organisation of needs was then shown in Maslow’s hierarchy in needs:



Brain Structure

We were instructed by our tutor to identify specific neural structures and their motivational function - in order to explain the neural bases of as many motivational states as you can. We did this individually then discussed it as a small group, and then shared key points with the class.
 * 1) 	Reticular formation
 * 2) 	Medial forebrain bundle: learning response outcome
 * 3) 	Hypothalamus: feeding, drinking and mating
 * 4) 	Amygdala: threat, danger
 * 5) 	Septal area: socialability, sexuality
 * 6) 	Hippocampus: threat, danger
 * 7) 	Cerebral cortex (Frontal lobes): planning, goals, intentions
 * 8)       Prefrontal Cerebral Cortex: motivational, emotional tendencies

Week 5. Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation / Goal Setting
Intrinsic Motivation

Intrinsic motivation is based in the innate, organismic needs for competence and self-determination. It energizes a wide variety of behaviours and psychological processes for which the primary rewards are the experiences of effectance and autonomy. Intrinsic motivation is the natural propensity to engage ones interests and exercise ones capacities, and in doing so, to seek and conquer optimal challenges. This motivation emerges spontaneously from internal tendencies and can motivate behaviour even without the aid of extrinsic rewards or environmental controls. Intrinsic needs differ from primary drives in that they are not based in tissue deficits and they do not operate cyclically, that is, breaking into awareness, pushing to be satisfied, and then when satisfied, receding into quiescence. Intrinsic motivation is an important motivator of the learning, adaption and growth in competencies that characterize human development.

Extrinsic Motivation

Extrinsically motivated behaviour has an external perceived locus of causality, the individual does it to get an extrinsic reward or to comply with an external constraint. Extrinsic motivation comes from an external source, such as money, good grades or the approval of others. With an external reward or constraint, an instrumentality develops such that the activity becomes a means to an end rather than an end in itself. The behaviour is no longer done because it is interesting, it is something that is done to get an external reward or to comply with an external constraint.The study of extrinsic motivation revolves around three central concepts of incentives, consequences and rewards. Incentives, consequences and rewards that are expected and tangible typically undermine motivation by decreasing autonomy, interfering with the learning process, and undermining peoples development of their own autonomous self regulation.

Goal Setting

A goal is whatever an individual is striving to accomplish. Goals generate motivation by focusing people’s attention on the discrepancy between their present level of accomplishment and their ideal level of accomplishment. Steps in an Effective Goal Setting Program

Sequential Steps within the Goal-Setting Process
 * 1) 	Specify the objective to be accomplished.
 * 2) 	Define goal difficulty.
 * 3) 	Clarify goal specificity.
 * 4) 	Specify the time span when performance will be assessed.

Sequential Steps within the Goal-Striving Process
 * 1) 	Check on goal acceptance.
 * 2) 	Discuss goal-attainment strategies.
 * 3) 	Create implementation intentions.
 * 4) 	Provide performance feedback.

Week 6. Personal Control Beliefs/Tutorial 3
Motivation to Exercise Personal Control

The desire to exercise personal control is predicted on a person’s belief that they have the power to produce favourable results. When people believe that they “have what it takes” to influence their environment, and the environment will be responsive to their influence attempts, then they will indeed try to make things happen for the better. They will be motivated to exercise personal control over life’s outcomes.

The Self

In a motivational analysis of the self and its strivings, four problems take centre stage:
 * 1) 	Defining or creating the self.
 * 2) 	Relating the self to society.
 * 3) 	Discovering and developing personal potential.
 * 4) 	Managing or regulating the self.

In the quest to discover and develop the self, we explore what does and what does not interest us, we internalize the values of those we respect, we strive to create meaning, we seek to discover and develop our talents, and we devote our time to developing some skills and relationships rather than others. In the quest to regulate the self, we reflect our capacities, monitor how well we are accomplishing our goals, and make the self-related adjustments that are needed to achieve enhanced self-functioning.

Six Dimensions of Psychological Well-Being
 * Self Acceptance: positive attitude towards the self, accepts multiple aspects of the self, feels positive about the past.
 * Positive Relations with Others: has warm, satisfying, trusting relationships with others, capable of strong empathy, affection and intimacy.
 * Autonomy: able to resist social pressures, regulates behaviour from within.
 * Environmental Mastery: controls complex array of external activities, makes effective use of surrounding opportunities.
 * Purpose in Life: has goals in life and a sense of directedness, feels there is a meaning to present and past life.
 * Personal Growth: has a feeling of continued development, is open to new experiences, has sense of realizing his or her potential.

Tutorial 3.
In this tutorial we were asked to develop a class map of the main underlying motivation sources for attending University. We found that there were six area’s in which motivation derived from:


 * 1) 	Career/Qualifications - for the degree, so I can get a better job etc.
 * 2) 	Self-Exploration/Learning - for the learning, curiosity, knowledge-seeking etc.
 * 3) 	Social Opportunities - to meet people, make and explore friendships, enjoy social environment
 * 4) 	Altruism - to become better able to help people, help society, help the planet etc.
 * 5) 	Social Pressure - expectations of family, friends, society etc.
 * 6) 	Rejection of Alternatives - better option than doing nothing, working etc.

We were then asked to individually rank your own personal motivational reasons for attending class and completed a University Student Motivation survey. We had to rank from 1-8, 1 being false, 8 being completely true a series of questions. The survey included questions such as:

I study at University...


 * To get a qualification, increase job opportunities, acquire valuable skills, and set up my future career.
 * Because I love learning and I want to explore ideas, improve myself, and gain personal growth by developing myself.
 * Because I want to help others, solve world problems, and contribute to society.
 * Because I enjoy the social environment, social opportunities, and can develop friendships.

Self Constructs
The class was discussed and distinguished the differences amongst self constucts:
 * Self-Esteem, Self Worth (Self Value)
 * Self Efficiacy (Behaviour)
 * Self Concept (Percepton of Self)
 * Self Identity (Groups, Roles, Social Norms)
 * Self Concordance (Agency Goals)

Week 9. Nature of Emotion
Emotions typically arise as a reaction to important life events. Once activated, emotions generate feelings, arouse the body to action, generate motivational states, and produce recognizable facial expressions.
 * 1) 	What is emotion?
 * 2) 	What causes an emotion?
 * 3) 	How many emotions are there?
 * 4) 	What good are the emotions?
 * 5) 	What is the difference between emotion and mood?

What Is An Emotion?

Emotions are multidimensional. They exist as subjective, biological, purposive, and a social phenomena. In part, emotions are subjective feelings, as they make us feel a particular way, such as angry or joyful. But emotions are also biological reactions, energy-mobilizing responses that prepare the body for adapting to whatever situation one faces.

What Causes An Emotion?

When we encounter a significant life event, an emotion comes to life. Encountering a significant life event activates cognitive and biological processes that collectively activate the critical components of emotion, including feelings, bodily arousal, goal directed purpose and expression.

How Many Emotions Are There?

Emotions come in two separate perspectives, biological and cognitive. Biological emphasize on primary emotions such as anger, fear, interest, surprise, distress and joy. The cognitive perspective asserts firmly that human beings experience a greater number of emotions. They point out that several emotions can arise from the same biological reaction. For instance, a single physiological response, such as a rapid rise in blood pressure, can serve as a biological basis for anger, jealousy or envy.

What Good Are The Emotions?

In Darwin’s research, he argues that emotions help animals adapt to their surroundings. Displays of emotion help adaption much in the same way that displays of physical characteristics (e.g. height) do. For example, the dog baring his teeth in defence of its territory helps it cope with hostile situations (by warding off opponents). Such expressiveness is functional, and emotions are therefore candidates for natural selection.

What Is The Difference Between Emotions And Mood?

Emotions emerge from significant life situations and from appraisals of their significance to our well-being. Moods emerge from processes that are ill-defined and are oftentimes unknown. Emotions mostly influence behaviour and direct specific courses of action. Moods on the other hand mostly influence cognition and direct what the person thinks about.

Week 10. Aspects of Emotion/Tutorial 4
Table: Biological and Cognitive Aspects of Emotion

Differential Emotions Theory

The Differential emotions theory takes its name from its emphasis on basic emotions serving unique or different, motivational purposes. The theory endorses the following:
 * 1) 	Ten emotions constitute the principal motivation system for human beings.
 * 2) 	Unique feeling: Each emotion has its own unique subjective, phenomenological quality.
 * 3) 	Unique expression: Each emotion has its own unique facial expression pattern.
 * 4) 	Unique neural activity: Each emotion has its own specific rate of neural firing that activates it.
 * 5) 	Unique purpose/motivation
 * Each emotion generates distinctive motivational properties and serves adaptive functions.

Izard’s 10 Fundamental Emotions Included in His Differential Emotions Theory

Positive Emotions: Interest, joy.

Neutral Emotions: Surprize.

Negative: Fear, anger, disgust, distress, contempt, shame, guilt.

Tutorial 4.
The class was divided into two groups and given a long list of emotions, approximately 150-200 words. We were then subjected to dividing these emotional definitions into sub-groups. After much discussion our group had divided all the emotions into nine different sub-groups. The sub-groups and definitions included:

Happy: cheerful, humorous, playful, grateful, hopeful, glad, perky and proud.

Sad: teary, doubtful, weary, livid, drained, sorrowful, miserable and self pity.

Fear: Qualm, horrified, panicked, rattled, powerless and paranoid.

Surprised: enlightened, distracted, amazed, thrall, fascinated and suspenseful.

Love: surgent, trusting, compassionate, lustful and desirous.

Angry: vexed, jealous, mad, combative, cursed and intrigued.

Cognitive: cheeky, overloaded, courageous, tenacious and eager.

Uncertain: baffled, aroused, puzzled, curious and intrigued.

Attitudes not Emotions: obnoxious, greedy, anomine and indifferent.

Below are some pictures of our emotions Q-sort.





Week 11. Personality, Motivation and Emotion
Individual Differences in Happiness, Arousal and Control

Happiness
 * Extraversion & happiness
 * Neuroticism & suffering
 * Extraverts & neurotics

Performance & emotion
 * Insufficient stimulation & underarousal
 * Excessive stimulation & overarousal
 * Credibility of the inverted-U hypothesis
 * Sensation seeking
 * Affect intensity

Control
 * Percieved control
 * Desire for control

Arousal’s Contribution to Motivation


 * 1) A person’s arousal level is mostly a function of how stimulating the environment is.
 * 2) People engage in behaviour to increase or decrease their level of arousal.
 * 3) When under aroused, people seek out opportunities to increase their arousal levels, because increases in environmental stimulation are pleasurable and enhance performance, whereas decreases are aversive and undermine performance.
 * 4) When over aroused, people seek out opportunities to decrease their arousal levels, because increases in environmental stimulation are aversive and undermine performance, whereas decreases are pleasurable and enhance performance.



Figure 2. Inverted U of arousal.

The Big 5 Personality Traits


 * Neuroticism
 * Extraversion
 * Openness to Experience
 * Agreeableness
 * Conscientiousness

Each of these is measured using 6 facets (traits), these traits are shown in the table below.

Week 12. Unconscious Motivation/Tutorial 5
Psychodynamic Perspective

The psychodynamic approach presents a largely deterministic and pessimistic image of human nature. Psychoanalysis is deterministic in that it holds that the ultimate cause of motivation and behaviour derives from biologically endowed and socially acquired impulses that determine our desires, thoughts, feelings, and behaviours, whether we like it or not. This view conveys that motivation comes across as something that has happened to us, rather than as something one chooses or creates

The Unconscious

Freud believed that the individual must express strong unconscious urges and impulses, though in a disguised form. Believing the unconscious constituted the “primary process” while consciousness was but a “secondary process,” Freud and his colleagues explored the contents and processes of the unconscious in a number of ways, including hypnosis, free association, dream analysis, humour, projective tests, errors and slips of the tongue, and so-called “accidents”. Due to this research, the idea that people have motives and intentions that lie outside of their everyday awareness is readily accepted by motivation researches.

Psychodynamics

Freud observed that people often engaged in behaviour that they clearly did not wish to do. Because people sometimes did what they did not want to do, he reasoned that motivation must be more complex than that which follows intentional violation. Conscious volition must have to wrestle with an unconscious counter-will. Freud’s depiction of the human mind was one of conflict, idea versus counter-idea, will versus counter-will, desire versus repression, excitation versus inhibition, and cathexis (sexual attraction) versus anti-cathexis (guilt). This clashing of the forces is what is meant by the term psychodynamics.

Ego Psychology The neo-Freudians saw ago functioning as the process of maturation, the ego was made independent from its id origins. For Hienz Hartman, the ego, unlike the id, developed through learning and experience. Learning occurred because the child engaged in a tremendous amount of manipulative, exploratory, and experimental activity (such as grasping, walking and thinking), all of which provided the ego with information about itself and its surroundings. With feedback from its manipulative, exploratory and experimental activity, the ego began to acquire ego properties of language, memory, intentions and complex ideas. This facilitated the ego’s ability to adapt successfully to the realities, demands and constraints of the world.

Tutorial 5.
I did not attend this tutorial, by checking on wikiversity i was able to find that the class was giving a Chapter Checklist to help out with our textbook chapter assessment. The Chapter Checklist included:

Does the chapter:
 * 1) 	have a title?
 * 2) 	have an introduction?
 * 3) 	set up some focus questions or specific topics/structure?
 * 4) 	explain relevant theory(ies)?
 * 5) 	explain relevant research?
 * 6) 	provide some examples?
 * 7) 	provide relevant links?
 * 8) 	illustrate the knowledge in an interesting way?
 * 9) 	provide a summary?
 * 10) 	use APA style (as much as reasonably possible in wiki-format)
 * 11) 	use and provide relevant peer-reviewed references

This chapter checklist helped me to format my textbook chapter and for any other questions involving the finer skills of wikiversity which i had never previously used, our tutor, Dr James Neill was always easily contactable and happy to help out.

Week 13. Growth and Motivation
Self Actualization

Self Actualization is an inherent developmental striving. It is a process of leaving behind timidity, defensive appraisals, and a dependence of others that is paired with the parallel process of moving toward courage to create, make realistic appraisals, and achieve autonomous self regulation. According to Roger’s Self Actualisation is “an underlying flow of movement toward constructive fulfilment of its inherent possibilities”. While Maslow believes it refers to an ever-fuller realization of one’s talents, capacities and potentialities.

Maslow: Six Behaviours That Encourage Self-Actualisation


 * 1) 	Make Growth Choices: See life as a series of choices, forever a choice toward progression and growth versus regression and fear.
 * 2) 	Be Honest: Dare to be different, unpopular and nonconformist. Take responsibility for your choices and the consequences of the choices.
 * 3) 	Situationally Position Yourself for Peak Experience: Set up conditions to make peak experiences more likely. Get rid of false notions and illusions.
 * 4) 	Give Up Defensiveness: Identify defences and find the courage to give them up.
 * 5) 	Let the Self Emerge: Perceive within yourself and see and hear the innate impulse voices. Instead of only looking to others to tell you who to become, also listen to your own personal interests and aspirations.
 * 6) 	Be Open to Experience: Experience fully, vividly, selflessly with full concentration and total absorption. Be spontaneous, original and open to experience.

Positive Psychology

Looks at people’s mental health and the quality of their lives to ask, “What could be?” Positive psychology also seeks to build people’s strengths and competencies.

Three Illustrative Personal Strengths

Optimism: A positive attitude or a good mood that is associated with what one expects to unfold in his or her immediate and long-term future. Related to better psychological & physical health, more health-promoting behaviors, greater persistence, and more effective problem solving.

Meaning: A sense of purpose, internalised values, and high efficacy are the motivational means to cultivate meaning in life. The act of creating meaning helps prevent future sickness.

Eudaimonic Well-Being: Eudaimonic well-being is self-realisation. Relatedness satisfaction and pursuit of self-endorsed goals forecast

Tutorial 6.
During our last tutorial of the subject we completed a “Sense of Coherence – Orientation to Life Questionnaire”. Sense of Coherence is “The extent to which one has a pervasive, enduring though dynamic, feeling of confidence that one’s environment is predictable and that things will work out as well as can reasonably be expected.”

It has three components – comprehensibility, manageability, and meaningfulness.

1. A sense of comprehensibility:
 * Do you feel that you can understand things, that things make sense and are not confusing?
 * Do you feel that things are predictable or can be expected? In other words, do you feel like you know what’s going to happen next, or that you know what’s coming?

2.A sense of manageability:
 * Do you feel that things are manageable or within your control, that things can be handled or taken care of?
 * Do you feel you have the skills or ability, the support, the help, or the resources necessary to take care of things?

3. A sense of meaningfulness:
 * Do you feel that things are interesting or fascinating, a source of pleasure or satisfaction?
 * Do you feel that things are really worth it, that there is good reason or purpose to care about what happens?

UC Student item means:

My score:
 * Overall SOC: 4.4
 * Comprehensibility: 4.6
 * Manageability: 4.5
 * Meaningfulness: 4

From these results I was able to conclude that my overall “Sense of Coherence” was slightly above the average mean, while on the other hand, my Meaningfulness was a whole standard deviation from the mean. Leaving the question in my mind whether or not my behaviours and actions towards life are meaningful and for the right cause???

Our tutor, Dr James Neill also discussed elements of our multimedia presentation. I was unfamiliar with the format of this assessment and after a quick chat with James he was able to point me in the right direction. After setting up a twitter account i was able to record my multimedia presetation successfully and without any problems.