PSYC 2230 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: Sympathetic Nervous System, Homeostasis, Evolutionary Psychology

• School: York University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 2230
• Professor: Frank Marchese

Document Summary

The concept of motivation: motivation is the concept we use when we describe the forces acting on or within an organism to initiate and direct behaviour. Intense behaviors are considered to be the result of higher levels of motivation: a highly motivated behaviour will often be persistent even though the intensity of the behaviour may be low. The measurement of motivation: as scientists, we almost never measure motivation directly, we manipulate some stimulus condition and then measure some behaviour in the form of a response. Characteristics of motivation theorists differ in their views of motivation one commonly held characteristic of motivation is its activating properties: activation, activation is the most easily seen in the production of behaviour. In some situations, preference testing is the best way to determine which of several alternatives is most motivating because indexes such as persistence or vigor may not dictate differences. The study of motivation: categories of analysis: nomothetic vs. idiographic.