MARK2051 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Neocortex, Drive Theory, Habituation
Lecture 8: Motivation & Emotion
What is Motivation?
Motivation energises behaviour, involves direction and focusing of kinetic energy in
the body
Model of Motivation
Hull’s Drive Theory: Behaviour = f(drive, incentive, habit)
• Drive is the internal state of arousal
o Result of a need (needing to remove the psychological tension which
occurs as there is tension from a need state)
o Hull’s model is a drive reduction hypothesis
o There are multiple needs but we will focus on the one that captures
the most attention (this will determine the strength of the drive and
which behaviour we will take)
o Need dynamics: satisfaction and depreciation of actual state and
learning and maturation of desired state.
• Habit is the strength of a learned response
o Habit affects the ability to perform the response
• Incentive is the external reinforcement
o Affects behaviour due to secondary goals (the incentive)
Types of Motivation:
1. Intrinsic (high drive, low incentive)
2. Extrinsic (low drive, high incentive)
3. Habituation (low drive, high habit, low incentive)
What is Emotion?
Emotion is the experience of a motivational state
• Emotions trigger generalised behaviours (i.e. avoidance or attraction) to
given stimuli
• Adults develop into cognitive situation where reason has more influence over
decisions.
• Emotional response has 3 components that interact to control behaviour
o Arousal: link between emotion and action
§ Automatic, and affects the intensity of an emotion
§ Same type of emotion can exist at different levels (depending
on level of arousal)
§ Approach or avoidance?
o Experience: how you feel (this involves interpretation from the brain),
how arousal and cognitive evaluation interacts
§ How you feel depends on relation of the goal
