Chapter 7
Read chapter 7. Summarize the chapter. What was the most surprising thing you learned? If you had to rate yourself as high, medium, low, on the various social needs, what would those ratings be? How do those various levels manifest themselves in your life? Choose one social need and discuss how it motivates some of your specific behaviors.
Provide a list of terms at the end of your post that you used from the chapter.
This chapter discusses the quasi-needs and social needs that people need to be satisfied with life. Quasi needs arise situationally and wants and needs arise out of a psychological context. Social needs arise due to the individual's personal experiences and development. The most interesting thing I found is how people can be so avoidance motivated. Some people are so driven by fear that they are motivated to avoid failure of things at all cost. They won't do anything that will or may end up in a failure situation. People who are avoidance motivated change their performance to avoid goals that end in possible failure or end in a mistake. These people suffer from low self-esteem and low psychological well being. I would have to rate myself medium on achievement. I like to be pushed and achieve learning and knowledge in life. I dislike failure and try not to, but I also feel that you learn from your mistakes and that failure makes you stronger. I rate myself medium need on intimacy. I love being around people and I like having that social connection to friends and people. I wouldn't say I need to be around people all the time, but I do like being around others and having conversations and connections toward people. On power I would have to rate myself almost as having low power needs. I personally don't like controlling people and having to force my ideas and thought upon others. The need I picked to discuss is social needs. Social needs are the needs of relationships and the social connections with others. Many people want to engage in warmth, close, and positive relations with others. I like to join social groups and i like to do activities that increase behaviors where I'm associated with others and are working with others.
Terms: social needs, power, intimacy, achievement
This chapter talks about two acquired psychological needs. The two types of needs are the social needs and the quasi-needs. Social needs grow out of ones socialization history. This social history activates emotional responses to a particular need-relevant incentive. So a social need could be the need to achieve something, have an intimate relationship with someone, or have a power need. Quasi needs are situationally induced. These needs affect how we think, feel, and act. They arent considered actual needs yet the affect our cognition, emotion, and behavior so in a sense they are essential.
I thought the most surprising thing was in the social needs area it talked about how adults who have high needs for power had parents who were permissive about sex and aggression. I found that statement just very interesting, I would never have guessed that.
The social needs are achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. I would rate myself medium on achievement because I like to achieve goals I set but I dont stress out and get totally worked up over it if I dont meet that goal. I would rate myself high in affiliation because i care alot about what people think and want to make people happy. I also would rate myself high in intimacy because i like having a secure relationship with people and want to know that everything is going to stay the same. I would rate myself medium in power because I like being a leader but I also like to have someone guide me in directions as well.
Power does have an impact on me though, although I wouldnt say I score a high in it. I want to have an impact on others and if I am speaking about something that means a lot to me or I feel very strongly about I have the motivation to try as hard as I can to motivate those people to follow me. I cant make people agree with me in everyway but I can let them know my view points on things and if I have a strong enough impact then that is a good thing I believe.
Terms: social needs, power, intimacy, achievement, affiliation, and quasi-needs
Chapter 7 was about social needs of achievement, affiliation, intimacy and power. Quasi needs are situationally induced wants and desires that once they are obtained, we no longer need it. For example, if it is raining outside, we need an umbrella. Once it stops raining, we no longer need it. A social need is acquired through experience, development and socialization. Our behavior is activated by situational incentives. Achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. If one has a high need for achievement, they have an approach oriented behavior versus a low need for achievement where we respond with avoidance oriented behavior. When we approach something with avoidance, we have a fear of failure that interferes with our performance, persistence and emotionality. Affiliation is the establishing, maintaining and restoring relationships with others to avoid negative emotions. Intimacy is the engaging in warm, close, and positive interpersonal relationships. Power is the desire to make the world conform to one’s personal image. A leader tends to be aggressive, hold an influential occupation and acquire goals and outcomes more readily.
One surprising thing is that our need for achievement changes as we develop. When we are a child, we hold unrealistic beliefs and do not lower our beliefs even if we fail. We value the approval of others, but don’t care much about achievement. In middle childhood, we tend to pay attention to peer performance comparisons and then in late childhood we rely on evaluations of others to construct our realistic ability beliefs. Our parents and our occupations can place a high or low value on achievement. If one’s parents are strict and requires their child to get all A’s, the child will have a high value on achievement in fear of getting in trouble. If one is a doctor, they will also need a high level of achievement to get through the schooling and solve patient problems.
I would rate myself high on intimacy, medium on achievement and low on power. I tend to want to establish and maintain interpersonal relationships with people. I have had two very close friends since kindergarten and I have come to know personal information and history of their lives. My friends and I stay in contact through facebook and texting and visiting back home. Achievement is in my life because I am a college student seeking to go to graduate school. Therefore, grades, involvement and volunteer experience are essential. This is achievement for the future; what I achieve now will affect my career goals in the future. I am a shy person so I have little need for power. I don’t ever wish to be a leader because I don’t have aggressive tendencies. Leaders tend to be high in power, low in intimacy and high in inhibition.
My social need of intimacy motivates some of my behaviors. I have a small group of friends(dyad), but we have a very strong bond with each other. I am motivated to maintain these relationships because I text, skype or visit my friends on a regular basis. We self-disclose information regularly, listen to each other and have a strong sense of trust because of our contact.I also laugh and smile a lot when conversing with strangers at work or with people I know. I am motivated to do this because it shows that I am listening and that I care about what they are saying. Nothing drives me more crazy than someone texting when you are trying to have a conversation with them!
quasi needs-social needs-achievement-affiliation-intimacy-power-inhibition
Chapter seven talks about our social needs as human beings. Social needs fall under the category of acquired needs because they are believed to something you have to develop within you through socialization and emotional responses to such. Quasi- needs also follow under this category and are defined as needs that are situationally induced and when the need is fulfilled the needs dissipates. Quasi-needs originate from pressures and demands of our environments. Then, the chapter goes back to describe, in detail, the concept of social needs. Social needs, as we know are needs acquired through experience, development, and socialization and are not set in early age and they may emerge and change overtime. These needs motivate our behavior but teaching up the incentive value of the objects around us and the emotional responses associated with them. The chapter goes on to discuss the four major social needs within an individual. The first is the need for achievement or the desire to do well and achieve a standard of excellence. Those who have a high need for achievement respond with an approach-oriented emotion and those with low need for achievement respond with an avoidance-oriented emotion. As we continue to read, we learn about the two theoretical approaches to understanding achievement motivation. The classic way is referred to as the Atkinson's Model. This is an equation of sorts that determines the tendency to achieve. The contemporary model revolves around achievement goals, mastery and performance. Mastery goals encourage people to learn something new and be challenged in order to improve self. Performance goals are those that allow one to prove competence and outperform others as a way of feeling better than others. These two different different approaches then combine to make an integrated model which includes mastery goals, performance-approach goals (people high in need for achievement), and performance-avoidance goals (people high in fear of failure). These performance-avoidance goals can lead to an impaired psychological well-being because of the negative emotions that revolve around failure. Reading on, the chapter begins to discuss the implicit theories. The first sort being entity theorist who believe that people have a fixed about of intelligence, personality, or motivation and they usually adopt performance goals. Second, incremental theorists believe personal qualities are something people gain through effort and learning and usually adopt mastery goals. Finally getting away from achievement, the chapter goes into a discussion on affiliation and intimacy. Affiliation need is the anxious need to establish, maintain, and restore relationships while the intimacy need is to engage in warm, close, positive relationships. Those with a high need for affiliation feel that they need social acceptance and approval while those with a high need for intimacy need warm, close, and enduring relationships. Then the last social need is power: the desire to make the physical and social world conform to ones image or plan. This need has four conditions: leadership (to be in charge or people), aggressiveness (more anger and hostility towards others), influential occupations (to hold jobs that are in a position to exert influence), and prestige possessions (possessions that make one look wealthy and in charge). The most surprising thing I learned was the position held by entity theorist. I feel that its absurd to hold such a view because it is limiting human beings. I feel like there should be no perceived limit to what we are capable of and the thought of such a thing is discouraging and almost a pessimistic way of thinking about learning. I know I want to live with the idea that if I try hard enough I will become a better and more intelligent person. If I had to rate myself on the various social needs I would be high in achievement, medium in affiliation and intimacy, and low in power. Achievement is the need that drives me the most, because I want to learn new things and do very well in all things. I am one who makes mastery goals out of the fact that I want to be informative in a wide variety of things. I try to go strong into anything I do and come out the victor. This motivates me to learn new things, experience new activities and strive for good grades and praise.
Acquired needs, quasi-needs, social needs, achievement, atkinson's model, achievement goals, implicit theories, entity, incremental, affiliation, intimacy, power.
Chapter seven began by focusing on acquired psychological needs, which include quasi-needs and social needs. Quasi-needs are situational induced wants and desires that are derived from an environmental demand. Quasi-needs affect how a person thinks, feels, and acts. Quasi-needs begin from situational demands and pressures, and when a person satisfies their demand or pressure the quasi-need weakens. However, these needs are not necessarily essential and necessary for life, growth, and well-being. An example the book gives is that when we see a store item on sale we need it, but this item is not necessary in our life which makes this a quasi-need and not a social need. We may feel the urgency to buy this item because it is what everybody else is wearing, and we feel an environmental demand to buy and wear the item too even though it is not necessary in our life. A social need arises from the individual’s personal experiences and unique developmental, cognitive, and socialization histories. Social needs act as emotional and behavioral potentials activated by situational incentives. There are four types of social needs: achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence, which means any challenge to a person’s sense of competence that ends with an objective outcome of success versus failure, win versus lose, or right versus wrong. Affiliation is establishing, maintaining, or restoring a positive, affective relationship with another person. The need for affiliation is rooted in a fear of interpersonal rejection, which can make a person come across as “needy.” When people come across as “needy,” their need of affiliation can then be thought of as the need for approval, acceptance, and security in interpersonal relations. Intimacy is the social motive for engaging in warm, close, positive interpersonal relationships that produce positive emotions and hold little threat of rejection. A person with a high need for intimacy thinks a lot about their friends and relationships, engages in frequent conversations, and tends to remember life episodes as those that involve interpersonal interactions. Power is a desire to make the physical and social world conform to one’s personal image or plan for it. People with a high need for power want to impact, control, or influence another person or even the world.
The most surprising thing I learned from this chapter was the meaning of effort. The book states that according to entity theorist, the meaning of effort is “the more you try, the dumber you therefore must be.” This essentially means that high effort means low ability. I cannot say that I agree with this which may be the reason why I was surprised when I read this.
I would rate myself as high in achievement because I always like to do well on my projects and tests, and when I don’t do well I tend to beat myself up about it for awhile. I would say I am medium in affiliation. I do not enjoy being lonely so it is always nice to have somebody I can talk to and hang out with. I would rate myself as high in intimacy. I have a lot of close relationships and this makes me feel secure knowing that I have positive relationships in my life that will always be in my life. I am definitely low in power. I do not have a need to control or influence other’s with my ideas. I would say that achievement motivates me in school and at work. I always want to do my best and when I do not I am not too easy on myself. I am motivated to keep trying even if I fail or do not do the best I think I can.
Terms: acquired psychological needs, quasi-needs, social needs, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, competence.
Chapter 7 focuses on the social needs that motivate us, more specifically on need for achievement, intimacy, and power. Need for achievement is the tendency to want to be successful and reach a certain level of excellence. The need for intimacy is the desire for relationships in your life, more specifically creating and maintaining close relationships with others. The need for power is found in those who strive to be in control and hold leadership positions.
The interesting aspect of this chapter was the typical “leader” description, or someone who has a high need for power, low need for intimacy, and high inhibition. Although a majority of the leaders I know possess these different needs, I think that some of the more effective leaders tend to have a higher need for intimacy. The low need for intimacy seems to drive the typical leader to be aggressive and not necessarily take in to consideration the people they’re supposed to be following. However, the leaders that I tend to respect more and more apt to take directions from, are those that are assertive rather than aggressive and take the time to build relationships in their groups. However, I have had more experiences with those that possess the typical leader motivation style of high need for power, low need for intimacy, and high inhibition.
My personal need for achievement would be moderate to high as I strive to do well in school and hope to set myself up for a successful future. When looking to the future, I set achievement goals, including both mastery and performance goals, that will help create the path to my ideal career. In order to achieve some of these mastery goals, I seek out moderately difficult tasks, that will challenge me, but aren’t too difficult and unobtainable.
My personal need for intimacy would be between moderate and high. I enjoy establishing and maintaining relationships with others, which is why I tend to enjoy student organizations on campus. However, sometimes I’m not the best about keeping in touch with friends, which is why my need for intimacy is the highest.
My personal need for power is at the moderate level. I do seek out leadership positions at work and student organizations, but not to the extent to merit a high need for power. I definitely am not an aggressive person and don’t really define myself by prestige possessions.
My social need of achievement is the most relevant right now in college. As a college student, I am motivated to do well in classes, establish myself in student organizations, and better myself as I prepare for a future career. Right now I’m working towards admission into graduate school, so I’ve set myself an achievement goal of writing a senior honor’s thesis in order to prepare myself for thesis writing as a master’s student. This future achievement orientation has allowed me to stay focused on the goal of being successful in graduate school.
Terms – social need, achievement, power, intimacy, achievement goals, mastery/performance goals, moderately difficult tasks, prestige possessions
Chapter seven focuses completely on social needs. The three main types of social needs are achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. The need of achievement is the desire to do well on a certain standard of excellence. This need motivates people for success because they want to achieve certain goals to become successful and feel good about themselves. To feel achievement one must prove competence by doing challenges that end with the outcome of success. The need of affiliation is that a person needs to socialize and have meaningful relationships with other people so they don’t feel lonely and feel like they have closeness with others. The need of intimacy means a person needs very close loving relationships or one very close loving relationship. Lastly, the need for power is the desire to make the world go along with what one’s personal plan for it is. People like to feel like they can influence others and make the world a better place. They also like others to look up to them so they feel a sense of power, worth, and value to the world.
I found it surprising to learn that peoples’ needs are affected by their parents’ parenting styles. Those with parents who had really high standards tended to need achievement immensely. Those who had parents who praised them often had a higher need for affiliation. And, those who had very permissive parents had a higher need for power. This is interesting to read because I always think of people being born with their certain needs or developing them on their own. It never occurred to me that how a parent acted towards their children can actually develop certain needs in that child.
If I had to rate myself on the four different social needs I would first rate myself as a medium to high level of achievement. I find being successful quite important, but definitely don’t put it over relationships. I would rate myself on a high level for affiliation needs because I am very outgoing and always need others to be around me or I feel bored or lonely. I would also rate myself on a high level for intimacy because I love caring for other people and love when others care for me. I like to have very close relationships with other people and feel more comfortable when those people are around to support me. Lastly, I would rate myself on a pretty high level for power too because I am one of those people who thinks I always have to be right. I also am very organized and like everything to be perfect (even though that’s definitely not always the case). I like when others look up to me and come to me for advice. Sometimes I even realize I can be a bit controlling which is not a good thing, but it’s definitely because I like to feel power and like I’m in control of my life.
When choosing my need for achievement, I realize if motivates me a lot. Because I want to be successful in life and have a high achievement rate, I try very hard in school to get good grades. I make sure I go to class every day and get all of my homework done. When I don’t do well in school or I am last and don’t study, I feel very bad about myself because I feel like I’m not achieving much. Also, I work very hard at any job I’m in because I like to be successful and have others realize this.
This chapter talks about the psychological needs that are acquired. These include a person’s quasi-needs and social needs. The quasi-needs are when the situation that we are in creates wants that are caused by the psychological sense of tension, urgency or pressure in us. These are mostly the day-to-day needs that affect us. Our social needs come from our own experiences, our personal development and how we socialize with the others and environment around us. Social needs don’t come out until our need-satisfying incentives appear. These can active either an emotional or behavioral potential within us. There are four need-satisfying incentives—achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Achievement is the need to do well as compared to a standard. Everyone’s achievement need is different along with all the other social needs since we all develop differently and react different. Our achievement behavior is determined not only by the need for achievement but the fear of failure and the achievement itself. The book then talked about the Atkinson classical model of achievement. It explained that our behavior approach versus avoidance can be calculated using individuals need for achievement and multiplying that with the probability of success and incentive for success as well as the fear of failure, probability of failure, and incentive to avoid failure. There are three types of achievement goals—performance-approach, performance-avoidance, and mastery. Then the book talked about implicit theories. If someone thinks individual qualities are fixed they are entity theorists, and if they think one can mold or increase their qualities they are incremental theorists. The book also explained their views on effort. Entity thinks high effort is unnecessary and incremental value high effort. Affiliation has two main points—need for affiliation and need for intimacy. Need for affiliation is dealing with the rejection or anxiety in a person and need for intimacy is how interested or uninterested one is in creating relationships. The need for power is a desire to have some control over the world as one would want it to be. A high-need for power person may want to have impact, control, and influence. Then the book talked about a few things that can involve and satisfy the need for power such as aggression, occupation, and possessions.
I would say my quasi-needs are medium because I am fairly concerned about my grades and my money situation. My achievement is medium to high. I like to do a good job and know that I can be good at specific things like my golf game. Affiliation for me would be medium because I do like to talk with my friends but I don’t become needy about it and I like my alone time. Intimacy for me would be medium to medium high. The relationships I have are pretty close so that’s why I put it more at the higher end. Power for me would probably be low to medium. I am fairly reserved person and I feel like I would be a good husband since it used that example in the book for the low. Also, medium because of the jobs that I am looking at since their generally give direction to others.
One way social needs motivate me is when I am looking for things to do at my place of work, I tend to look for task that will challenge me more but there is only so much I can do at my job so now I have the feeling that I need to get a new job to satisfy that need.
Terms used: quasi-needs, social needs, need-satisfying incentives, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, Atkinson classical model of achievement, performance-approach, performance-avoidance, mastery, entity theorists, and incremental theorists.
Chapter 7 talked about social needs and quasi-needs. No one is born with the need for achievement, power, or money. We all acquire these needs from personal experiences growing up. The needs that come from situational demands and pressures are referred to as quasi-needs. These needs are consider not being full-blown, once we fulfill these needs they go away. A good way to put this would be that quasi-needs are the needs that we need from the environment in an imperative way. Social needs are acquired through socialization, experience, and development. These needs emerge and change overtime; they are not set at a young age. Achievement is the want to do well relative to a standard of excellence. In this people compete with a task, with the self, and against others. The Atkinson’s model features four variables: achievement behavior, need for achievement, probability of success, and incentive for success. The achievement behavior is how often a person approaches success. Affiliation has both positive aspects and negative aspects. The positive aspects are the need to engage in warm, close, positive relations, which would be the intimacy need. The negative aspects are the anxious need to establish, maintain, and restore interpersonal relations. Power is a desire to make the physical and social world conform to one’s personal image or plan for it. Many people with a high need for power like to be dominate and status.
What I found most surprising was that in the origins of the need for achievement when parents would tell their child that a certain task will be easy for them their need for achievement would be higher when they were older. I feel that if you were to tell a child that a task will be easy for them you may be getting their hopes up. Once the child starts on the task and it is not easy for them I think they would start wondering what was wrong with them. I feel that they would start doubting their abilities and overall end up lowering their self-esteem because the task after all was not easy for them.
I feel that I am high-affiliation-need. I love to help others and be in contact with people. I like to be accepted and included into things. When I am not accepted I don’t feel right. I wonder why people don’t like me. I also don’t like it when I feel I am being judged. I think I am this way because growing up I always had people around me. My parents are very caring and I am very close to my mother. I hated and still hate getting into trouble because I don’t like it when my parents are upset with me. My older sister always called me “goodie-two-shoes”. I also think I am high-achievement-need. I don’t like it when I don’t get a good grade or don’t win in a competition. I like to feel that I am smart enough or strong enough. I think I am like this because growing up my parents always told me I could be anything I want to be. They always pushed me to do my best. I feel that I am medium-power-need. I don’t feel the need to always be in charge. I do like to be in charge sometimes and that’s why I think I am medium. I think this came from experiences in my life. I get nervous when I have to lead a big group of people.
I think that the affiliation and intimacy plays a bigger part in my life than power and achievement. I don’t like it when I feel that people around me don’t like me. I can’t focus about stuff at hand. That is why I try my best to be nice to everyone. I also love to help people. I want to have my own practice of being a marriage and family therapist someday. So when I read in the section that people with high-affiliation-need go into professions that help people that made me realize that I was high-affiliation-need.
Terms: Social needs, quasi-needs, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power
Chapter 7 was about needs that are acquired. Two different types of acquired needs are Quasi needs and social needs. Quasi-needs are situation-induced needs which affect the way we feel, think and act. For example, having a doctor's appointment, but not being able to find your car keys...the need to find your car keys are a quasi need because of the situation of having a doctor's appointment. The second type of need are the social needs. These needs are based off of experiences, and only happen once we encounter something that makes us bring our social experiences into play. Other needs talked about in Chapter 7 were the need for achievement (which is the "desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. p175), the needs for affiliation and intimacy (which deal with our relationships with other people) and the need for power.
One of the most surprising things I learned about was in the sections about the need for power. I have always thought myself to be a leader. As I was reading, it seemed like the book focused a bit on the negative side of having that need for power. For example, the book defines this need as "a desire to make the physical and social world conform to one's personal image or plan for it." (p195). I never really thought that as a leader, people were conforming to what I want. I am a History major, so if I take myself out of the picture, I definitely can understand better the need for power, and how leaders in History have used this power. Adolf Hitler, for example was definitely impacting, controlling and influence a large group of people. He had a reputation known around the world, and dominated as a strong leader in Germany.
Something this chapter which I did not quite understand was the sections on the Atkinson's model. What I got from that chapter was that achievement behavior depends on the difficulty of the task, and whether a person is an approach-oriented person or had a performance-avoidance behavior towards a specific task. If I had to rate myself, I would say I'm a very high achiever (or at least I try to be), because I would rather do a more difficult task and have to work harder at it. I also strive on meeting the set standards of something, but at the same time I set standards for myself (which usually I end up not meeting). Intimacy for me is high to medium, as is affiliation. Power, like I mentioned above would also be high, because I like being in control of my life and certain things in my life. When it comes to school, achievement and power get extra high, because I'm so focused on making sure everything I do is right.
Terms Used: Achievement, Affiliation, Approach-Oriented,Intimacy,Power, Quasi-needs, Social needs, performance-avoidance
Chapter 7 is about social needs, specifically our need for achievement, power, and intimacy. It began by also talking about quasi-needs, which we experience when tension develops to engage in a particular behavior that will reduce the tension. An example of this would be someone asking to see your ID to get into a bar and you realize you cannot find it, so this creates tense energy to engage in the behavior of frantically digging in your purse to try and locate your ID. Social needs are an acquired psychological process that grows out of one’s socialization history that activates emotional responses to a particular need. Examples of this are achievement, power, and intimacy. We vary in our need to experience achievement, power, and intimacy, and whether we are high or low in these needs motivates us to engage in or not engage in particular behaviors. Achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. People with a high need for achievement have approach oriented emotions, such as hope and pride, and they also choose more difficult tasks over easier ones. When parents provide children with independence training, high performance aspirations, and realistic standards of excellence, (not having too high or too low of standards for the ability of the child) then the child is more likely to develop a high need for achievement. Three conditions satisfy the need for achievement, and they are moderately difficult tasks, competition, and entrepreneurship. Mastery goals and performance goals are two types of achievement goals. Mastery goals involve developing one’s competence, improving, and overcoming challenges with effort and not by taking the easy way out. Performance goals involve proving one’s competence, outperforming others, and succeeding with little disappointment because they usually take the easiest route possible to success, so it is unlikely they will fail. There are more benefits to adopting mastery goals instead of performance goals, such as a preference for a challenging task and learning from it, intrinsic motivation, and being more likely to ask for help. Avoidance motivation is where the fear of failure or consequences is regulating a person’s behavior. For example, they will get to basketball practice on time because they are afraid of what the coach will do to them if they are late, and not because they want to be on time. There are also two types of needs for intimacy: Affiliation need and Intimacy need. Affiliation need involves the fear of social rejection, so these people will be driven to interact with others because they fear being alone. Intimacy need is growth- oriented and these people want to be in relationships because they are warm and genuinely care about other people. They desire a close, reciprocal friendship while affiliation need desires social acceptance and reassurance. The need for power is a desire to make the physical and social world conform to one’s personal image or plan for it. People with a high need for this get satisfaction out of influencing others. Conditions that involve this need are leadership, aggressiveness, influential occupations, and prestige possessions. People with a high need for power also more easily acquire the goals they seek because they are more motivated to acquire these goals.
I thought the most surprising thing in this chapter was learning about the two different types of goals involved in need for achievement. I think which type a person is can influence their motivation a lot and cause them to take the easy way out, or the challenging, more fulfilling path. I would rate myself as high on achievement, medium on intimacy, and medium on power. I rated myself as medium for power because I like influencing people in a good way and I see this in my life in the way I want to influence the 8th grade girls I coach, but I am not over the top about it. I rated myself as medium for intimacy because I enjoy being with my friends, but am also fine doing things on my own as well, and it does not cause me any anxiety. I rated myself high on achievement because I work hard to do well in every area of my life, and I enjoy working hard. It makes success feel that much better, and I love the feeling of accomplishing something. This has caused me to get school work done on time, to be successful in sports most of my life, and to be in shape because I run every day. I have always looked forward to challenges and enjoy coming up with a way to solve them.
Terms- social needs, quasi-needs, achievement, power, intimacy, approach oriented emotions, Mastery goals, performance goals, Avoidance motivation, Affiliation need, Intimacy need
Chapter 7 focuses on the two acquired psychological needs which are social needs and quasi-needs. Social needs are the need for achievement, affiliation, intimacy and power. The need for achievement is seen as the desire to do well relative to the standard of excellence. People who think in ways that are achievement related may have higher expectations for success, are more optimistic, and value achievement. Atkinson's model of achievement states that achievement behavior depends not only on the individual's need but also on the probability of achieving this task. Therefore, if they are more likely to be successful of receive some incentive after achieving this task they will be higher in this need. The dynamics action model sees achievement behavior determined by three forces: instigation, inhibition, and consummation. Instigation causes a rise in avoidance tendencies and occurs by confronting stimuli from a past reward. Inhibition causes a rise in avoidance when confronting a past punishment. Consummation refers to the performance of an activity that brings about its own cessation. In addition, high need achievers often seek out positions of entrepreneurship because it offers challenge, independence, and a large amount of responsibility. Two main achievement goals are mastery goals and performance goals. Mastery goals refer to making progress according to a standard we have set for ourselves. Performance goals seek to demonstrate that an individual is capable of outperforming another individual. The need for affiliation is defined as the need for establishing and maintaining affective relationships with another person or persons. Loneliness raises the desire for this need. Therefore, individuals who may be high in the need for affiliation may participate more in extracurricular activities to feel as though they belong to a group and to provide interaction. The need for power is the desire to make the physical and social world conform to one's plan. There are four conditions that satisfy the need for power: leadership, aggressiveness, influential occupations, and prestige posessions. Therefore, a political candidate would be an example of someone who feels a strong need for power by demonstrating his or her beliefs for the country. Quasi-needs are situational needs that reduce the outside pressure or tension. For instance, needing quarters or change for a parking meter. These quasi-needs then disappear once we get what we want. I found some of the jobs associated with the need for power surprising. In addition, if I were to rate myself on social needs, I would say I am high in the need for achievement which was something that was instilled growing up and has caused me to become a perfectionist. Also, I would say I am fairly high the need for affiliation because I do enjoy maintaining and have stable relationships with other individuals. However, I have never had a huge desire to get involved in a career that is involved with "power." These needs manifest in my life because I am faced everyday with some task that makes me strive to achieve whether it be at work or school. In addition, affiliation manifests my life because I go out of my way to make sure that my friendships with individuals from other areas are maintained. If I were to choose one social need to describe in my life it would be the need for achievement. I am saving up for a backpacking trip to Europe next summer which I have wanted to do for a long time now. Therefore, it has caused me to really limit my spendings to necessities. However, it is a bit of challenge but I determined to succeed and remain optimistic because in the end the reward of visiting Europe will be worth it!
TERMS USED: Achievement, affiliation, power, social needs, quasi-needs, Atkinson's model, dynamic actions model, entrepreneurship, mastery goals, performance goals, instigation, inhibition, consummation
Chapter 7 was extremely fun to read and to get lectured on. Chapter 7 discussed two acquired, meaning not born with, psychological needs" social needs and quasi-needs. The chapter starts off describing what social needs are and on page 172, i found a really good quote that i found to be very interesting "Generally, as the mind wanders, our needs have a way of working their way into consciousness to affect our thoughts, emotions, and desires. The thoughts that freely pop into one's mind tell the story of which social needs are particularly important to that person." This really stuck with me because my mind always wanders, and creates extremely weird, off-put stories, and it was interesting learning the reason to all these, what i thought to be random, thoughts. This also pertains to my dreams. The book then defined quasi-needs which are ephermal, situationally induced wants and desires that are not actually full-blown needs in the sense that other needs are, but rather they are so-called needs because they resemble our other needs in some ways. Great examples of quasi-needs that we discussed in class are, "needing to find your keys", "needing and umbrella when it rains", and "needing a vacation when you are stressed." The book says that once it stops raining, you no longer "need" an umbrella, making that particular need a quasi-need because the need did not persist. However, as I read that part in the chapter I did agree that needing an umbrella when it rains is a quasi-need but i did not agree that the "need" just stopped. I view it rather that the need was met, by it ceasing to rain, you were no longer getting wet. The book then goes on to discuss social needs which are defined as "acquired pscyhological needs that are acquired through experience, development, and socialization." The book discusses 4 social needs:acheivement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Learning the difference between low-need achievement people and high-need achievement people was very interesting because I learned that although I have a high-need for achievement, it may be for the wrong reasons. I have lived with extremely life-altering anxiety for several years now which makes me very avoidance motivated. I learned that I need to start hitting my fears head on and pushing through instead of avoiding them if I want to have the best life outcomes. It was a good experience looking back into my childhood and figuring out where some of my anxiety was first developed. It was also neat, kind of contradictory to the book, to find out that your developmental influences, are a good predictor of your need for achievment in the future. I have always been very into school and have always tried to succeed, and usually always have. Both in soccer and for school. At the same time, I have always been very anxious, especially in social situations. I have come to terms that this is because my step-father, whom I love very much and would never be anywhere without, pushed me very hard in childhood and now to succeed (as in outperforming others) adn there was a very bad stimulus for not succeeding. However, I also very well rewarded when I did succeed. I learned from this chapter and lecture, that instead of being performance oriented, my father and sometimes me, should be more worried about mastering the tasks we are doing. While good grades do matter, we should be worrying about the learning that is actually happening within myself and not what others see, because in the end that is what matters and I will see better outcomes that way. The book then discussed affiliation which is the need for social acceptance, approval, and reassurance. This is generally seen as a bad thing from our society, but everyone almost always goes through a high need for affiliation at some point in there life. I had my high-need for affiliatin in middle school and early high school. I was a very big tomboy in elementary school and when I got to junior year, I was teased for my boyish appearance and haircut. After reading this book, I realized that that feeling of isolation triggered my need for affiliation from my classmates. That is when I "needed" to grow out my hair, "needed" to get american eagle jeans, and "needed" to know i was "cool." However, now I realize that it is okay to be me and my true friends will love me for me and I will never have to impress them, we will just always, naturally, be impressed with each other. Which leads me to the next topic discussed in the book, intimacy. Intimacy is the need for interpersonal caring, warm, and loving relationships. Intimacy is a good thing, and I am proud to have so many true friends now that I have grown more into myself and let myself just be me. However, in lecture i learned that people with a high need for intimacy are more likely to remember good memories. I have always had an AWFUL time getting over boyfriends, and i see now that it is because, as a high-need intimacy person, I remember the good times, bot the bad times, making it harder for me to get over both frienships and relationships. The last thing discussed in this chapter was power. People with a high need for power are in low in affiliation need and high in self control. I love being the leader of small groups but because of my anxiety I often shy away from it, not anymore!!
After reading this chapter and attending lecture, I would rank my social need in this order (from highest need to lowest need)- intimacy, achievement, power, and affiliation. And the reasons, I hope i described already in my chapter discussion.
Terms used: social needs, quasi-needs, power, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, mastery, performance goal oriented, and performance-avoidance.
Chapter 7 discussed two areas of acquired psychological needs: social needs and quasi-needs. Social needs are something that is developed over time due to our socialization with others, the environment, and our experiences. Examples of social needs would be achievement, affiliation, power, and intimacy. Quasi-needs are situation based needs, wants, or desires. Quasi-needs have a sense of urgency and originate from situational demands or pressures. Like I need money now or I need my keys now because I have to go!
When looking at social needs, there are primary need-activating incentives. Achievement would be doing something well to show that you are competent, affiliation would be a way of gaining approval or pleasing others, intimacy would be relationship based, and power would be having an impact or influence on others. In regard to achievement, people are different kind of achievers or are motivated by different things. High need achievers respond better with approach-oriented behavior where as low need achievers respond with avoidance-oriented behavior, hope versus fear of failure. High need achievers usually prefer a challenging task, are more likely to ask questions, and persist longer than do low need achievers.
With an achievement state there are three achievement based goals. Performance-approach, performance-avoidance, and mastery. Performance based achievers display competence, a high ability, and strives to outperform others. Performance-avoidance may have a high fear of failure and that is what motivates them to do well in a class. Mastery achievement strives for improvement, progress, effort, and learning, works hard, competence, and will ask questions.
Those who have intimacy motivation think about relationships with others a great deal and they are important to them. They may have great listening abilities, and are able to remember the good memories better. An affiliation need is a deficiency-oriented need, they may feel insecure, and need social acceptance. Those who have a power need strive for leadership, recognition in small groups, may be aggressive, and may have influential occupations.
The most surprising thing I learned was how much of what we feel we need is shaped by our socialization from our environment and the people in it. Depending on how you grew up or what type of environment you lived in could determine your own need for achievement to some extent. Makes me think how I could have been different if my socialization could have been different or the same for some of my friends.
If I rated myself on the social needs, I would give myself a medium-high for achievement, being successful is very important to me. I want to have a good career and be competent in doing it. For Affiliation I would rate myself medium, I do like to maintain my relationships with my friends and family, but I don’t do it because I am lonely, I do it because they are important people to me. I would rate myself high on intimacy because I do like being around people and caring for them, that in turn produces positive emotions for me. For power, I would rate myself medium. The example in class today about “who would be the leader of the group” I am usually the first to volunteer to be the leader for group projects because someone has to be and I enjoy doing it. I am organized and have had jobs where I was the one in control most of the time. Although I try to be very mindful of this, I had a very controlling parent growing up and I know that I could have learned that behavior and I do not want to be that controlling over others as I did not enjoy it. So I think my previous history with a controlling parent motivates my “power” behaviors so I don’t do certain things or am more aware of how I act in regard to being controlling or overuse my power.
Terms: Social needs, quasi-needs, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, need-activating incentives, acquired psychological needs, high need achievers, low need achievers, performance-approach, performance-avoidance, mastery.
Chapter seven addresses Social Needs, which are needs that are not innate but are acquired by way of our experiences, socialization, and development. Social needs are a system of values and preferences that are exhibited through our thoughts, emotions, actions, and lifestyles. Our need for achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power differ greatly from person to person, and therefore the ways in which we go about meeting these needs is diverse as well.
For those with a high need for achievement, emotions such as pride and hope lead people to be approach-oriented, whereas people with a low need for achievement may experience anxiety, defense, or fear of failure, which leads them to be avoidant. Either way, our need for achievement affects the choices we make, latency in beginning a task, the amount of effort we put into it, our persistence in sticking it out, and our “willingness to take personal responsibility for successes and failures.”
The subtleties of Affiliation and Intimacy are found in their qualification as either approach or avoidant. Affiliation involves interaction with others as a way to avoid negative emotions associated with rejection or disapproval, which often lead to anxiety and/or loneliness. Intimacy is a desire for the positive emotions that often emerge from meaningful relationships – beyond just the need for superficial approval or simply NOT being alone.
The need for power – or to have influence over those around us – often manifests itself in roles of leadership, desire for recognition, impulses of aggression, “trophies,” and a low need for intimacy.
The most interesting thing I learned was that our Social Needs (and the feelings of pride and shame) are essentially entirely learned. I would think that we would have some degree of innate needs for power (autonomy), intimacy (relatedness), and achievement (competence). To think that we develop our sense of “degree of need” of each of the 4 main areas of Social Needs makes the role of parents and the environments they choose for their child to be surrounded by even more crucial. Public Education’s tendency to structure learning in a “performance goal” setting also sets up our society to achieve only relative to the competition, as opposed to a more intrinsic desire for true learning and discovery, self-improvement, and creative thought processes. (Can I use this explanation of higher education’s disinterest in Mastery to explain my unimpressive GPA to admissions???)
My need for Achievement is by far the strongest of my social needs. I’ve always been very competitive, especially in school and sports. I remember practicing my flashcards in second grade because I wanted to be better than everyone else – especially the boys (to impress them…little did I know that men do not like to be outdone by a girl!). In 6th grade, I remember being so disappointed by being chosen second (after Jessica Miller) for kickball during gym or recess. In high school, I came home crying after Jenny Butson won the vote for class secretary. And in college, my humility kept me from bragging about the fact that I studied for no more than two hours and still got a high score on my GRE (just sayin’). Even at work I often wonder who makes the highest percentage in tips on average. It’s probably me. (No, I don’t really think that…or DO I?)
I’d say my needs for affiliation and intimacy are both high, but I experience a deficit in both areas. I catch myself wanting approval, to be associated with certain people, and to be included in certain social circles and activities, and at times I ask myself “Why?” I’d much rather have meaningful, intimate relationships, but those are not easy to come by. Affiliation is often a cheap substitute for intimacy, but intimacy cannot be forced. What does a person do when they are trapped between the realization that affiliation is meaningless (rock) but intimacy is not available or guaranteed (hard place)? The result is that I sit at home dissatisfied, somewhat jealous of the relationships my “friends” have with each other, but choosing to be alone rather than dipping my toes in the shallow waters of superficial friendships.
My need for power has evolved as I’ve aged. I certainly have a higher need for power than most people, but I’ve also learned when to just let go and let whatever will be to be. I DO NOT like to be under the control of someone else, especially when they are not very intelligent or are heavy-handed or unreasonable. As a perfectionist, I often have an idea of how things “should” be, and I do my best to influence others to agree. I am generally aggressive, drive fast, and make my own rules based on logic. (For instance, when driving late at night and no headlights can be seen in ANY direction, do you REALLY need to wait for the light to turn green before you can safely proceed? No.)
Terms: innate, socialization, values, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, approach-oriented, avoidant-oriented, latency, persistence, autonomy, relatedness, competence, performance goal, intrinsic, mastery goal
Chapter 7 introduced the idea of social needs. Social needs are aquired through socialization processes. These processes instill the need for achievement, affiliation, intimacy and power. Achievement is a motivating social need. Achievement can arise from various influences. Socialization, cognitive, and developmental influences work together to determine what type of achievement goals we develop. These influences must be present under the right conditions. Moderately difficult tasks, competition, and entrepeneurship all satisfy and involve the need for achievement. There are two different types of achievement goals. Mastery and performance goals each value different aspects of achievement. Mastery goals involve developing competence, making progress, improving the self, and overcoming difficulties. People with mastery goals in mind will see mistakes as part of the learning process. Performance goals involve proving one’s competence to others, displing ability, and outperforming others. People with performance goals will see mistakes as setbacks and anxiety inducing. Those who adopt mastery goals instead of performance goals will work harder, persist longer, and perform better. In contrast, the fear of failure can act as avoidance motivation. When we fear failure, we begin to develop performance-avoidance goals. These goals lead to low self esteem, personal control, vitality, life satisfaction, and psychological well-being.
Intimacy and affiliation are social needs that could be seen as closely related. They also appear similar to relatedness. Intimacy is the need for close, interpersonal relationships. Intimacy differs from relatedness in the fact that it is acquired through social experience. Affiliation is the need to be liked and included by others. Affiliation strives less for meaningful relationships and is driven mostly by fear of rejection or anxiety.
Power strives to impact, control, and influence others. The need for power can be satisfied by leadership, aggresiveness, influential occupations, and prestige possessions. Power can incrfease approach tendencies and people who have a high need for power can find reaching their goals easy. Leaders that have been studied seem to fit the same pattern. On average, they have a high need for power, low affiliation, and high self control.
I found quasi-needs to be the most suprising things in this chapter. Unlike social needs, quasi-needs are situationally induced. These wants create tension that motivates us to action. For example, if we are checking out at the grocery store and are looking for our wallet. This could also occur if we were late to work and couldn’t find our keys.
I would rate myself as having a high need for achievement and intimacy, a medium level of affiliation, and a low need for power. My high need for achievement has made me always want to do well in school and on tests. I’ve always had just a few close friends that I like to keep in touch with. I also have a few friends that I only hang out with occassionally. This manifests my high level of intimacy and my medium level of affiliation. I have never wanted to be in charge of other people which is why I have a need for power. My high need for intimacy motivates a lot of my social decisions. On the weekends and after school I prefer going out with my close friends. If I get a weekend off of work, I like to go home and spend time with my family.
Terms: Quasi-needs, social needs, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, mastery goals, performance goals, avoidance motivation
Chapter 7 discussed the four social needs: acheievement, affilation, intimacy and power. It also briefly discussed quasi-needs. Quasi-needs are sitiualtional needs that are gone once the need is met. An example of a quasi need would be wanting an umbrella when it rains. The thing that all social needs have in common is that they are developed from experience and socialization. Unlike physiological and psychological needs, we are not born with social needs. The need for achievement is the desiring to do well in relation to a standard of excelence. Socialization, cognitions and development all influence our need for achievement. People may either have a tendancy to approach success or avoid failure. Within the need for achievement, incremental theroists believe that people may tent to adopt mastery goals and strieve for making improvement and progress. Entity theroists believe that acheivement is defined through performace goals of outperforming others. Affiliation is another social needs. Affiliation is developed from a fear of rejection and becoming lonely. Intimacy is the need to develop close, loving relationships. Lastly, the need for power is characterized by a desire impact, control, and influence others. Leadership, occupation and possessions can all be effects by a persons need for power. Correlations between the need for power and aggressiveness have sometimes been noted.
The most surprising thing I learned in Chapter 7 was the relationship between power and affiliation with the probability of engaging in war. When a presidents power rose or affiliation decreased then war was more likely. When affiliation rose or power decreased then war was less likely.
I would rate myself medium to high on the need for achievement. I do not like competitions, but I am willing to face difficult tasks. I would not say that I prefer difficult tasks, but when I am faced with them I work on developing my skills further so that it is no longer difficult. I would say that I am more focused on mastery goals then performance goals. I persist through challenges in hopes of improving my own goals. I am less concerned about being the best at something. If I do something to the best of my abilities then that is enough satisfaction for me.
I would rate myself medium on the need for affiliation. I am a people-pleaser and I do not like it when others are upset. I do not like rejection, but I do not go out of my way to make sure I am in contact with my close group of friends at all time. I think what makes some of my friendships for high school strong is the fact that we can go months without seeing each other and then when we finally reunite we pick up right where we left out.
I would rate myself high on the need for intimacy. I seek to develop and maintain my friendships. I love being around people and am most happy in long-term, secure relationships.
I would rate myself low on the need for power. I am not concerned with dominance and status. I would much rather be well-liked than be in control of others.
Terms used: quasi-needs, social needs, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, incremental theorists, entity theorists, mastery goals, performance goals,
Chapter seven discusses the broad topic of social needs. Social needs are encompassed in all individuals. Three categories summarize acquired needs into the context of: quasi-needs, social needs, and how social needs motivate behavior. Quasi-needs are situational in the sense we do not always feel these needs for long periods of time. Quasi-needs are often short and spur of the moment cognitions. As college students we often are overcome with quasi-needs. We may become overwhelmed with our academic workload when we realize we have an upcoming test we haven’t started studying for. This presents a situational pressure that elicits our quasi-need to start studying, and study fast. Once our test is over, our anxiety decreases and the quasi-need diminishes. Social needs maybe a learned experience, but most commonly come from change. We experience social needs through achievements, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Social needs play an important role in our behavior. They help us to understand why under certain circumstances we feel different emotions.
Another important topic in social needs is seen in our achievements. Having a desire to do well and succeed. Social influences such as parents or guardians often help us to grow as independent individuals. Social influences help set standards for achieving excellence and excelling. We become behaviorally motivated to reach our potential. This may also relate to developmental concepts that influence our achievements. It is often time easy to start out with unrealistic goals. For example: trying to become the next big star in the NBA. As we continue to develop throughout life, the more we set high but reasonable standards for ourselves. There are people who are high achievers. They are motivated to outperform others. With high need for achievement, motivation is not as influenced by outperforming on tasks that are too easy, or the low need achievers. There is more positive reactions and emotions when overcoming something moderately challenging. This is true for many things including sports. In order to gain achievement gratification, athletes satisfy their need for achievement when the game is moderately challenging, because it gives a sense of urgency to win.
Power is one of the last main topics discussed in chapter seven. Power is an important factor in social needs. When I think of power, I immediately think of presidents or rulers of countries. They exemplify a high desirability to control and influence us as small groups of people. Individuals high in power seek out more attention and control over a situation, they make the executive decisions. People who are high in power are highly motived.
The most surprising thing I learned from the chapter was that affiliation is correlated with a fear of rejection. I learned that people can experience anxiety because of fear of loneliness so they try to stray away from negative emotions. This is why some people are extremely motivated to engage in relationships, because they have this fear.
I would rate myself as fairly high on need for achievement. When working toward graduating from college I have a strong desire to succeed and perform to the best of my ability. I have always been competitive, so when I win at something, I feel I have accomplished something. I would rate myself as medium on intimacy. I enjoy having social relationships with my friends and family, so in that perspective I rate high. At the same time, I enjoy my alone time and being able to do my own things at times. My need for intimacy sometimes depends on the situation. My need for power is probably at the medium level as well. I like to be in charge of some things and be able to have others respond to my orders when I want to really accomplish something. Other times, I am fine with people taking the lead role on things, such as school projects or group presentations. By letting somebody else have the power, I feel less anxiety and feel I am not held the most responsible if something goes wrong.
A social need that motivates my behaviors the most would have to be in achievement. This is what I rated as my highest social need. As time goes by and I continue to mature, I realize the importance that is placed on achievement. I want to graduate college, and graduate with decent grades. I want to have a successful future and be able to accomplish my goals in life. I encourage these behaviors by staying focused on my goals. I show up for class, I study, I do my homework assignments, and if it requires extra time on academics and less on social activities then I do it.
Terms: quasi-needs, social needs, social influences, developmental influences, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, high and low need achievers, fear & anxiety.
Chapter seven discusses the broad topic of social needs. Social needs are encompassed in all individuals. Three categories summarize acquired needs into the context of: quasi-needs, social needs, and how social needs motivate behavior. Quasi-needs are situational in the sense we do not always feel these needs for long periods of time. Quasi-needs are often short and spur of the moment cognitions. As college students we often are overcome with quasi-needs. We may become overwhelmed with our academic workload when we realize we have an upcoming test we haven’t started studying for. This presents a situational pressure that elicits our quasi-need to start studying, and study fast. Once our test is over, our anxiety decreases and the quasi-need diminishes. Social needs maybe a learned experience, but most commonly come from change. We experience social needs through achievements, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Social needs play an important role in our behavior. They help us to understand why under certain circumstances we feel different emotions.
Another important topic in social needs is seen in our achievements. Having a desire to do well and succeed. Social influences such as parents or guardians often help us to grow as independent individuals. Social influences help set standards for achieving excellence and excelling. We become behaviorally motivated to reach our potential. This may also relate to developmental concepts that influence our achievements. It is often time easy to start out with unrealistic goals. For example: trying to become the next big star in the NBA. As we continue to develop throughout life, the more we set high but reasonable standards for ourselves. There are people who are high achievers. They are motivated to outperform others. With high need for achievement, motivation is not as influenced by outperforming on tasks that are too easy, or the low need achievers. There is more positive reactions and emotions when overcoming something moderately challenging. This is true for many things including sports. In order to gain achievement gratification, athletes satisfy their need for achievement when the game is moderately challenging, because it gives a sense of urgency to win.
Power is one of the last main topics discussed in chapter seven. Power is an important factor in social needs. When I think of power, I immediately think of presidents or rulers of countries. They exemplify a high desirability to control and influence us as small groups of people. Individuals high in power seek out more attention and control over a situation, they make the executive decisions. People who are high in power are highly motived.
The most surprising thing I learned from the chapter was that affiliation is correlated with a fear of rejection. I learned that people can experience anxiety because of fear of loneliness so they try to stray away from negative emotions. This is why some people are extremely motivated to engage in relationships, because they have this fear.
I would rate myself as fairly high on need for achievement. When working toward graduating from college I have a strong desire to succeed and perform to the best of my ability. I have always been competitive, so when I win at something, I feel I have accomplished something. I would rate myself as medium on intimacy. I enjoy having social relationships with my friends and family, so in that perspective I rate high. At the same time, I enjoy my alone time and being able to do my own things at times. My need for intimacy sometimes depends on the situation. My need for power is probably at the medium level as well. I like to be in charge of some things and be able to have others respond to my orders when I want to really accomplish something. Other times, I am fine with people taking the lead role on things, such as school projects or group presentations. By letting somebody else have the power, I feel less anxiety and feel I am not held the most responsible if something goes wrong.
A social need that motivates my behaviors the most would have to be in achievement. This is what I rated as my highest social need. As time goes by and I continue to mature, I realize the importance that is placed on achievement. I want to graduate college, and graduate with decent grades. I want to have a successful future and be able to accomplish my goals in life. I encourage these behaviors by staying focused on my goals. I show up for class, I study, I do my homework assignments, and if it requires extra time on academics and less on social activities then I do it.
Terms: quasi-needs, social needs, social influences, developmental influences, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, high and low need achievers, fear & anxiety.
Chapter seven discusses the broad topic of social needs. Social needs are encompassed in all individuals. Three categories summarize acquired needs into the context of: quasi-needs, social needs, and how social needs motivate behavior. Quasi-needs are situational in the sense we do not always feel these needs for long periods of time. Quasi-needs are often short and spur of the moment cognitions. As college students we often are overcome with quasi-needs. We may become overwhelmed with our academic workload when we realize we have an upcoming test we haven’t started studying for. This presents a situational pressure that elicits our quasi-need to start studying, and study fast. Once our test is over, our anxiety decreases and the quasi-need diminishes. Social needs maybe a learned experience, but most commonly come from change. We experience social needs through achievements, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Social needs play an important role in our behavior. They help us to understand why under certain circumstances we feel different emotions.
Another important topic in social needs is seen in our achievements. Having a desire to do well and succeed. Social influences such as parents or guardians often help us to grow as independent individuals. Social influences help set standards for achieving excellence and excelling. We become behaviorally motivated to reach our potential. This may also relate to developmental concepts that influence our achievements. It is often time easy to start out with unrealistic goals. For example: trying to become the next big star in the NBA. As we continue to develop throughout life, the more we set high but reasonable standards for ourselves. There are people who are high achievers. They are motivated to outperform others. With high need for achievement, motivation is not as influenced by outperforming on tasks that are too easy, or the low need achievers. There is more positive reactions and emotions when overcoming something moderately challenging. This is true for many things including sports. In order to gain achievement gratification, athletes satisfy their need for achievement when the game is moderately challenging, because it gives a sense of urgency to win.
Power is one of the last main topics discussed in chapter seven. Power is an important factor in social needs. When I think of power, I immediately think of presidents or rulers of countries. They exemplify a high desirability to control and influence us as small groups of people. Individuals high in power seek out more attention and control over a situation, they make the executive decisions. People who are high in power are highly motived.
The most surprising thing I learned from the chapter was that affiliation is correlated with a fear of rejection. I learned that people can experience anxiety because of fear of loneliness so they try to stray away from negative emotions. This is why some people are extremely motivated to engage in relationships, because they have this fear.
I would rate myself as fairly high on need for achievement. When working toward graduating from college I have a strong desire to succeed and perform to the best of my ability. I have always been competitive, so when I win at something, I feel I have accomplished something. I would rate myself as medium on intimacy. I enjoy having social relationships with my friends and family, so in that perspective I rate high. At the same time, I enjoy my alone time and being able to do my own things at times. My need for intimacy sometimes depends on the situation. My need for power is probably at the medium level as well. I like to be in charge of some things and be able to have others respond to my orders when I want to really accomplish something. Other times, I am fine with people taking the lead role on things, such as school projects or group presentations. By letting somebody else have the power, I feel less anxiety and feel I am not held the most responsible if something goes wrong.
A social need that motivates my behaviors the most would have to be in achievement. This is what I rated as my highest social need. As time goes by and I continue to mature, I realize the importance that is placed on achievement. I want to graduate college, and graduate with decent grades. I want to have a successful future and be able to accomplish my goals in life. I encourage these behaviors by staying focused on my goals. I show up for class, I study, I do my homework assignments, and if it requires extra time on academics and less on social activities then I do it.
Terms: quasi-needs, social needs, social influences, developmental influences, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, high and low need achievers, fear & anxiety.
This chapter was all about the social needs of a human. These needs include achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. Affiliation (a deficiency-oriented motive) is derived from deprivation of social interaction, social isolation, and fear. A person with a high affiliation need can seem “needy” or “clingy”. Intimacy, on the other hand, is a growth-oriented motive. A person with a high intimacy need seems to be warm and loving, with close, reciprocal, and enduring relationships. There are also quasi-needs, which are strong, but only situational wants that create tense energy to engage in behavior to reduce the build-up tension. An example of a quasi-need would be the need to find the car keys in order to leave for work. This need isn’t constant, and thus isn’t considered a “full-grown” true need.
A surprising thing I learned is that there are two types of achievement goals: mastery goals and performance goals. Though I’ve written all kinds of goals (for personal choice, and for course assignments and projects) I hadn’t realized the difference between the two types. Mastery goals are the ones we should be striving to set, and achieve. In achieving master goals, one works harder, persists longer, and performs better. Development of one’s competence and improvement of the self are also advantages to adopting mastery goals.
Achievement: I would have to rate myself as medium-high on achievement need. I am the person in a group situation who tends to get the ball rolling on projects. I set very high standards for myself. I grew up with high standards set for my behavior and efforts in school. Though I knew my parents always set high expectations for my scholarship, I think I set an even higher standard for my performance in school—this could be in part because my sister is a high-achiever, and so were all of my close friends growing up.
Affiliation: I would rate myself as being low on affiliation need. I was probably higher on this in high school and middle school though. Once in a while, when my relatedness, and intimacy are feeling like they are lacking, my affiliation need goes up a little bit. I like to have close, deep relationships with others though, and I feel like someone who has a higher affiliation need would value quantity of friendships over the quality of them.
Intimacy: I think I am a high rating on intimacy need. I need to have close relationships in my life. I need to feel loved, and want to give others the same feelings. I often think of my friends and family (sometimes this results in some pretty interesting dreams…haha) and take my close relationships with others very seriously. I know they take time and effort, and I am willing to give that to others, but need that in return. I am still very close to my best friends from childhood.
Power: I am low in the need for power. Though I have had several leadership positions over the years, it’s mostly to satisfy relatedness and competence needs—I like to be involved, and I like knowing what’s going on in the organization I am involved in. I do not like to be the center of attention and have very low aggression.
My need for intimacy motivates me to communicate with my close friends on a regular basis. I try to get together with my friends in the area a few times a month to catch up on important on-goings in their life, do activities, and to support each other. This semester, I wanted to make sure I saw a few of my girl friends every week, so I suggested that we all take a yoga fitness class together. We carpool to the class, and soon we are going to start having dinner together before the night yoga class.
Terms from chapter used: social needs, quasi-needs, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, relatedness, mastery goals, performance goals, competence, and aggression
Chapter 7 talks about social needs such as achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Each of these belongs to the social need category because they are all needs that we acquire through our experience, development, and socialization. The chapter contrasted social needs with quasi needs. Quasi needs are those needs which we feel because the situation induces certain wants and desires. These needs are not the same as psychological, physiological, or social needs because they are not exactly essential or necessary for our life, growth, or well-being. The chapter then went into more detail about the four different components to social needs. The thing I found most interesting from this chapter was the impact that fear of failure can have on a person’s life. The chapter discussed how fear of failure can lead to avoidance behaviors and these avoidance type behaviors lead to poorer well-being, personal control, self esteem, vitality, and life satisfaction. I personally am very competitive and I have noticed that there are times when I try to avoid doing things that I am not the best at because I fear being embarrassed or failing. I just didn’t realize that this can impact my life in more ways that just not participating in that one thing; it can actually affect my emotions and self image. I also found entity theory and incremental theory interesting. I’m not sure really which side I agree with because for some traits I would agree with the entity theorists that “you either have it or you don’t”. BUT I think other traits or talents can be malleable, like what incremental theorists believe. I think personality is something that is typically more along the lines of an endowed and fixed quality. Whereas talent in things like sports can be changed or improved with practice.
Before I read this chapter I probably would have thought I was high in affiliation because I thought it was more like what intimacy was described as in this chapter. I thought affiliation would just mean having a lot of relationships and friends. What I didn’t realize is that I am actually very low on my need for affiliation. After reading this I realized I have a high need for intimacy; I like having a lot of friends and close relationships but I am always myself no matter who I am around and this is reflected in the fact that if someone doesn’t like me, screw them. Intimacy does not require that everyone like me or approve of me, it simply means I have people who DO like and approve of me and that fulfills my need for intimacy. The book pointed out that the need for intimacy does not fear rejection is the key factor that separates intimacy from affiliation.
I think would rank extremely high on the need for achievement because I always want to do my best and be the best at whatever I do. HOWEVER, I would probably rank really really low on approach-oriented emotions and behaviors. It almost never fails for me to have an ANXIETY attack before doing any sort of competitive thing. I literally cannot control my heart rate, my hands shaking, my sweating, or my emotions when I am about to start something where there is competition. These negative side effects often push me towards avoidance tendencies. Typically, I only feel these emotions when I feel threatened that someone else will outperform me. If I feel like I am the best at the task, I usually don’t get anxious or fearful.
As for power, I would say that I am somewhere in the middle but it depends on the situation. Typically, if I feel competent in an area I will always take charge. However, I feel like someone in the group/community is more competent in the area than I am, I would probably not attempt to have the power in that situation. I would say that typically in the classroom, I exhibit a high need for power. I like to do things the way I like to do them, and I typically try to take charge on who is going to do what. I think that my need for power is a positive need because I am definitely a people person; I like to listen to others and help them out as much as possible. So, I think that my need for power is more just about me having the control to influence and help others, rather than it being about controlling others or being aggressive towards people who don’t agree with me. I am actually the opposite; I LOVE to argue with people and debate issues, especially ones that I am competent and passionate about. I will never turn down an opportunity to hear someone else’s side or opinion on a matter.
Specifically, I would say that my need for achievement motivates me to do anything that involves competition. I always challenge my friends to arm wrestle me. I beat my boyfriend’s roommate last year! (and yes, it’s a guy!) Need for achievement also specifically motivates me to study my ass off so that I get all A’s. Last semester was my first 4.0 so this semester my need for achievement is definitely pushing me to try and get it again. Intrinsically, I just want to continue to do my best because I enjoy the satisfaction of knowing that I accomplished a 4.0.
Social needs, quasi needs, need for achievement, intimacy, power, and affiliation, motivation, intrinsic motivation, avoidance behaviors, approach behaviors, entity theories, incremental theories, aggression
Chapter seven discussed two categories of acquired psychological needs: quasi-needs and social needs. Quasi-needs come from the demands and pressures of a situation. These originate from day to day circumstances that we inquire. Social needs, however, are attained through our personal experiences, our development over time, and through the socialization that we encounter. There are four social needs which are achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. These needs change over time as a person grows older. First, achievement is desire to excel in the activities one partakes in. In achievement, there are three influences that drive this need (socialization, cognitive, and developmental). A person can satisfy these needs by three conditions: moderately difficult tasks, competition, and entrepreneurship. Through achievement goals, we can see why a person expresses certain achievement behavioral responds to a certain situation. They can respond by adopting a mastery goal or adopting a performance goal approach. By using the mastery approach, a person improves them by understanding the material to the best of their ability; whereas, the performance goal approach is used to trump an opponent. Secondly, intimacy and affiliation work hand in hand with each other. They are the need to uphold positive relationships with one another. Intimacy differs in the fact that it is growth oriented, interpersonal, and has a reciprocal friendship. Affiliation is deficiency oriented, is in fear of social isolation and often needs approval and reassurance. Power is the final social need. Power is the desire to obtain “impact, control and influences over another person, group or world at large.” Leadership, aggressiveness, influential occupations, and prestige possessions are four ways that the need for power can be satisfied.
The most surprising thing I learned was that social needs change over time. I assumed that social needs were set and constant throughout life. However, when I reflect back on my life, I can see a change in my life personally in almost all three of social needs.
I would rate myself as medium-high on all of the levels. For achievement, I strive to do well in whatever I am doing, and it is excited when I do extremely well on something. However, I am not overly compelled to have a great achievement that I over exert myself; although, this has started to increase as time has passed. Intimacy and affiliation often play off of each other. I don’t like to make people unhappy or upsets, but I don’t stress over being accepted by others. I also love making friends and meeting people, but I tend to keep our relationships at a distance because I am not good at self-disclosure or discussing significant life experiences. I think my need for power has changed over time. I use to love to be in charge of people and direct things; however, over time I have slowly started to lose that need becoming less dominate in my thoughts and more passive.
I think all of these have an impact on my life. One in particular that has had a huge impact this year is achievement. Achievement has definitely been a motive to strive to do well in school already this year. I got extremely behind within the first two weeks of school and have struggled to catch up. Without this motivation, I wouldn’t have had the discipline to work as hard as I have to attempt to catch up instead of saying “o well” and never doing it.
Terms: quais-needs, social needs, achievement, power, affiliation, intimacy, mastery goals, performance goals
Chapter 7 focuses on our “acquired needs”, which can be divided up into either “quasi-needs” or “social needs”. Quasi needs are needs that are short-term and situationally based (such as finding your car keys for a car, or needing money during a shopping trip). Social needs are needs that grow out of one’s socialization history and relate to one of four needs (achievement, affiliation, intimacy and power).
Our need for achievement is a desire to do well and adhere to a standard of excellence (a challenge to an individual’s level of competence that ends with an outcome of either success or failure). The chapter states that psychologists often times try to study how this need comes up within individuals, and it is thought that it can be created through either socialization influences, cognitive influences or developmental influences. It is thought that the factors leading to the development of our need for achievement through socialization influences includes; parents’ value of independence, parents’ value of school performance and parents having a realistic standard of excellence for their children. Cognitive influences on creating a need for achievement include high expectations for success, mastery orientation, optimistic attributional style and a strong value of achievement held by the individual. Developmental influences include achievement-related values, and since children do not necessarily value achievement as much as they do values put on them through family and peers, in order to foster a high need for achievement in children it is under the responsibility of the parents to place (or choose not to) those sort of achievement values onto the child. Within the chapter, the three types of achievement goals within an achievement situation are discussed. These three types of goals include performance-approach, performance-avoidance, and mastery. A high need for achievement is often shown to have a high amount of performance-approach goals and a high level of competence in mastery orientation and a low amount of performance-avoidance goals (having a low fear of failure).
Aside from our need for achievement we also have social needs of affiliation and social needs of intimacy. Our need for affiliation involves maintaining and restoring relationships with individuals in order to escape feelings of loneliness and disapproval (deficiency oriented). Those with a high need for affiliation often times have a high need for social acceptance and approval. Our need for intimacy is much deeper than that of affiliation in the sense that it is growth-oriented towards wanting to establish close, warm and positive relationships with individuals that often times hold a very low threat of rejection. Those with a high need for intimacy are often times more likely to spend their time around a close-knit group of friends (not necessarily having a wide variety of friends) and in social groups. Their relationships are usually characterized as being long-lasting and full of self-disclosure.
An individual whom has a high need for power, often times wants to have an impact on the world around them. They want the social world around them to conform to how they view it (whether good or evil). Those with high-needs for power tend to take leadership roles in groups. Leadership (variant of the need for power) individuals usually show a high-need for power, a low-need for intimacy and a high amount of inhibition. Those whom have a high-need for power often go after jobs with very prestigious positions or very influential positions. I would have to say the need for power was the most surprising thing for me to have learned in this chapter. I was very shocked at first to see that those with a high-need for power also had a low-need for intimacy. I thought that individuals with a high-need for power would also have a high-need for intimacy in order to form tight and close relationships with other individuals in order to move up and obtain more prestigious positions. It wasn’t until I gave it some more thought that a low-need for intimacy makes sense since it allows people not to be held back from others in achieving these positions. It wasn’t until I thought about the situation like this that I also started to realize that I might have a higher-need for power than I had previously thought.
I believe that if I had to rate myself as high, medium and low on the different social needs that I would first off be high on my need for achievement. I believe this, because I often times spend quite a bit of time practicing an instrument for mastery in it. This need guides a lot of my behaviors because I am constantly trying to seek competency in my musical skills and am constantly trying to perform challenging tasks in order for myself to achieve these skills. I would have to say that I also believe that I hold a low-need for affiliation and a low-need for intimacy – I just don’t mind spending much of my time alone. I wouldn’t say that I am a very lonely individual (low need for affiliation), but I am perfectly fine in not seeking out relationships with other individuals. This has led me to think that I must be somewhat higher than I previously thought in my need for power. I don’t really care about holding any sort of prestigious job or career, but I would like to leave a positive influence on the world before I die and that is something I have always wanted to do (and since I now know that individuals with a high-need for power also have a low-need for intimacy, it all happens to make sense now!).
Terms
Acquired Needs
Quasi Needs
Need for Achievement
Need for Affiliation
Need for Intimacy
Need for Power
Performance-Approach Goals
Performance-Avoidance Goals
Mastery
Chapter seven is about the psychological needs. These needs include quasi-needs and social needs. Quasi-needs are induced situationally by wants and desires. This arises out of tension and urgency to meet environmental demands. Social needs come from an individual’s personal experience, unique developmental, cognitive, and socialization histories. Social needs can act as emotional and behavioral potentials that are activated by situational incentives. We also have a need for achievement. That is when you want to do something good to a standard of excellence. You can have a high need for achievement which people are usually responding with approach-oriented emotions or you can have a low need for achievement with people normally are avoidance-oriented. There are also three types of achievement goals. There is performance-approach, performance-avoidance, and mastery. Other needs include affiliation, intimacy, and power. Power is when you want to make the physical and social world conform to your personal image for it. You can have a high need for power which makes you want to be the leader and you can have a low need for power which makes you shy away from it.
I think the most surprising thing was how our achievements change and grow as we develop. When we are young we have goals or beliefs that are unrealistic. We may fail but they don’t change. When we are kids we seek our parent’s approval, but as we grow up we try to get more of our peers approvals. Also how are parents are about grades will affect our achievement goals. If they want you to get good grades and you do not you will get in trouble. So you try and get good grades to avoid being in trouble. Or if you are rewarded for good grades you will try to get good grades so you can be rewarded.
I would rate myself high on intimacy and low on power. Intimacy is the social motive for engaging in warm, close, positive interpersonal relationships that produce positive emotions and hold very little threat of rejection. I have a few friends that I have been friends with since grade school. I do not care to have lots of friends; I care to have lots of close friends I can feel comfortable with. I am low on power because I have no desire to be a leader. I am more of a follower. I do not like to take charge because I am too quiet and shy.
My need for intimacy has motivated me to keep a few really close friends. I have friends from preschool that I will still touch bases with at least every week. Even though we have gone on to new places and we do not live near each other I still fill her in on my life and she fills me in on hers. I am also really nice and polite to strangers.
Terms: quasi needs, social needs, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power, mastery, performance goals
Chapter 7 discusses Social Needs. Social Needs are an acquired psychological process that grows out of someone's history. Quasi-Needs resemble true needs in some ways. For instance, need for umbrella when rains, need money in the store, need key for the car. In turn, social needs are those we learned through our lifespan. Socials needs include: achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Achievement- we want to do well, we have our own standard of excellence. There are many aspects that can influence on our achievement, or motivate us such as socialization influences cognitive ( high expectation of success, perception of high ability, mastery orientation), and developmental influences.
There are conditions that involve and satisfy the need for achievement such as moderately difficult task, competition, and achievement goals. With the achievement goals we have two category: mastery goals; we make progress, and improve the Self, and performance goals that display high ability. As a mastery goal we want classes that will challenge us, we want understand the material, not just do well on the test. In performance approach, the goal in this class is to get a better grade than most students in this class.
Affiliation Need, we have deficiency oriented motive when we are afraid of people, and we isolate ourselves from social life, yet we still need social relations to not feel lonely. Social isolation and fear arousing conditions are two situation that increase a person's desire to affiliate with others.
Intimacy Need growth oriented motive- people who socialize with others, need that intimacy relationships, they are caring, warmth, love people.
Power- to have an impact on others, control and influence them.Leadership, Aggressiveness, Prestige Possession, and influential Occupations are the conditions that involve and satisfy the need for power.
if I would have to rate myself on those three social needs I think the highest would be Need of Achievement then medium Power and low Intimacy.
Need of Achievement definitely the highest among those two others because I do like to have goals and reach them There are many reasons and influences why do I do some things, or why do I want to achieve something; school I do this for better future, sport gives me personal satisfaction but also other people influence on this, such as coaches, family, school.
The level of Intimacy Need is pretty low, I do have couple close friends but I do not need many friends to socialize with.
Terms: Quasi Needs, Social Needs, Achievement, Affiliation, Intimacy, Power.
Chapter 7 introduced social needs and what they all encompass. It first thoroughly explains the difference between Quasi-Needs and Social Needs. Quisi-Needs are situational. That means that depending on the situation the needs may be different. An example would be if an individual goes to pay for the groceries and they can’t find their money. This would create a tense energy which causes the person to be driven towards the behavior of finding their money. Social Needs on the other hand are acquired and learned throughout time. They will tend to grow and change during socialization and life. Another key point about social needs is that they are reactive. The book then goes into detail about the four main social needs. These include: Achievement, Affiliation, Intimacy and Power. Achievement is the natural desire to strive for a given standard of excellence. One’s achievement can be influenced by socialization, and cognitive and developmental influences. Next is affiliation and intimacy. Although they seem similar on the surface, the underlying message is completely different. People that strive for affiliation do so because they do not want to have interpersonal rejection. They constantly monitor and keep track if people disprove of them. Intimacy refers to people who genuinely want close nit relationships with other people on a very deep level. People high in intimacy need usually are good listeners, are warm and loving. Finally is Power. This refers to the desire to impact, control and influences other people. Power oftentimes gets a bad rap, but it is actually very important. People that hold jobs such as police officers and people involved in politics are very important. If no one strived for power, nothing would get done! The chapter basically talked about the four types of social needs and differentiated between social needs and quasi-needs.
The most surprising thing I learned was probably the difference between affiliation and intimacy. Because both of the definitions focus on relationships, I figured they were pretty much the same thing. It was nice to see that affiliation is not necessarily a good thing since it is driven by the fear of disapproval. Also, I liked how the book gave an example of what a person with high intimacy motivation might look like. It really made it very clear.
I would probably rate myself medium on achievement. Growing up my mom set reasonable standards of excellence but also did not criticism me if I did not meet these set standards to the t. However, I believe I could improve my achievement goal. I would probably rate myself as medium for affiliation. In high school I would have definitely been high on this need. Coming from a small school it was very important to me to be approved by my peers. However, now that I go to college I realize that it doesn’t even matter anymore about people think. That is why I would rate high on Intimacy. I have created several relationships that are based on positive affect and reciprocal dialog. I am also a very good listener and my friends always tell me how nice it is to have someone they can confide in. Lastly, I would rate myself as low/medium on power. If given the choice, I prefer to sit back and let other makes decisions. On the other hand, I have learned in college while doing group work, some people just don’t care about projects or assignments as much as me. In this case I will definitely step up and have more of a power need.
I would say that intimacy motivates some of my behaviors. Because I am studying psychology as my minor, I really want to peruse my master’s degree in family, couple and marriage therapy. I feel like since I have a high need for intimacy this is a good career choice because I like to listen and create close bonds with people and having that attribute might help me be a better therapist.
TERMS: Social Needs, Quasi-Needs, Achievement, Affiliation, Intimacy, Power, Interpersonal Rejection, Standard of Excellence
The main points of this chapter were about social needs, whether purely social or quasi. Quasi needs are acquired needs, needs not planted in your genetic make-up for your survival. They are needs that arise due to the situation you come to be in: umbrella for rain, money to buy things, etc. Once we receive the thing we needed, the need decreases in your brain. Achievement, intimacy and power are the social needs we find ourselves looking after to become who we are. The need to do well, succeed, etc. is associated with achievement. The need to belong and have friends is intimacy. Power needs come to those who need to feel in charge and have control. There are both positive and negative feelings that associate with social needs; as anything can bring on hope and but fear and anxiety as well.
I found myself quite intrigued with the standards of execellence. I have great pride in the things that I do, and sometimes go off the deep end in order to do my best at everything. When I get bored, I find myself looking for more of a challenge and I feel that is my standard of excellence, because I tend to excell when I'm under stress. I would rate myself high in the need for acheivement, high in the need for intimacy and medium in the need for power. If I'm faced with a group project where no one will step into the leader's shoes, I'm likely to take it, though I may not want it. I find myself needing people to like me, and tend to get my heart stomped on because people take advantage of the giver in me. I have always been motivated to do well - achieve- in everything I do: I was honor roll in high school, participated in a lot of activities, was enrolled full-time in college while in high school, always trying to excell at work, etc. Even as a child I always wanted to do more, and get better. Now, as an adult finishing up college, I find myself trying even harder. I am taking maximum credit hours, looking into grad schools and jobs and trying to figure out what I want to do with the rest of my life. As a child, I didn't have much and I had a rough childhood, but I find that to be my biggest motivator. I never want to go back to what I had, and I want to provide more for my children, and I feel that is the best motivation I could ever have. I have many goals that I have added on my bucket list over the years, and I plan on crossing them off.
Terms: standard of excellence, intimacy, power, achievement, social needs, quasi needs
There are two type of acquired psychological needs: social needs and quasi needs. Both social and quasi needs have social origins. Quasi needs deal with situational wants such as wanting a hat when its snowing or an immediate need for money to pay a car payment. Quasi needs end when the need has been satisfied. Quasi needs stem from pressures and demands in our environment, but are not essential to life, growth, and well being. For example, I always misplace my school bag, so I develop this quasi need to find my school bag every morning before driving to school. Trying to find my school bag creates tension due to the pressure of my college environment because I need to have my school bag in order to turn in my homework. However, finding my school bag isn’t a full blown out need because my school bag doesn’t sustain my life, growth, or well being. Social needs are created through development, socialization, and experience, and create a part of our personality. People rely on their personal knowledge of their social needs to lead them to environments that will satisfy those needs. The three social needs discussed in the chapter are the need for achievement, the need for affiliation, intimacy, and the need for power. The need for achievement is expressed after an individual is energized by an encountered standard of excellence that will produce a meaningful evaluation of competence. People who have a high need for achievement choose moderately difficult tasks, are quickly engaged, and display more effort. Affiliation needs deal with the desire to be with others. Deficiency by a lack of social interaction is what drives the need for affiliation. So, loneliness, separation etc. raise people’s desire to be with others. The need for intimacy is derived from interpersonal concern, warmth, commitment, and love. The need for power is described as a desire to make the physical and social work conform to a personal image or plan. In other words, it’s the need to have control over another person/group.
In regards to myself, I have a high need for achievement. My high need for achievement is mainly present in school. In regards to school, tests are a way to display my competence. Although tests cause me a lot of anxiety, they also motivate me to study and learn the material so that I can do well. I’ve noticed that as I take more classes dealing with my major that I’m self motivated to do the readings and assignments because I have a desire to learn more about topics of interest. I’ve also noticed that I get more enjoyment from moderately difficult tasks because it feels good to overcome a challenge and makes me feel intelligent. I would also say that I have a high score on the need for power. I like to have full control over every aspect in my life, which sometimes requires control over other people. The main area where my need for control is expressed is at work. My need for power gravitated me toward my job that allows for a lot of autonomy. For example, I get to work one on one with mentally ill individuals, but my employer allows me to choose which clients I see each day and at what time. I can also choose when I want to take my lunch break . I also have control over my clients because I inform them of the times I have available to meet with them, schedule their appointments, and I’m in control of their finances. My high need for control motivates me to plan out every day. I write in my planner on a daily basis so I can record everything that I need to accomplish that day and then determine what time I will accomplish the task. Having my day planned out gives me a sense of control over my life. I would say that I have a low need for affiliation because I am around people all day, so I actually prefer to be alone when I have free time. My need for intimacy is a medium level. My need for intimacy can be displayed in my friendships because I get a lot of satisfaction from listening to friends and self disclosing.
Social needs, quasi needs, need for power, need for affiliation, need for intimacy, need for achievement
Chapter 7 is about the two acquired psychological needs that everyone has. These two psychological needs are social needs and quasi needs. Both of these needs are not something you are born with, they come with personal experiences, socialization, and demands. A social need is defined in the book as an acquired psychological process that grows out of one’s socialization history that activates emotional responses to a particular need. Examples of a social need is achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. A quasi need are situationally induced wants and desires that are not actually full-blown needs in the same sense that physiological, psychological, and social needs are. An example of a quasi need is when you are running late and you can’t find your keys to your car; your keys are a quasi need.
The most interesting thing that I learned was that power isn’t always a bad thing. I have always associated power with something negative; someone who just wants to control everything, mean, bossy, etc. But, a person craving power doesn’t have to be negative. People want power so they can have influence over others. That can sometimes be bad, but it also can be good.
I would rate myself medium in achievement. I have worked extremely hard to be where I am right now. I graduated high school, I studied abroad in a foreign country where I didn’t know the language, I am about to graduate college, and I am now setting the goal of going to and graduating graduate school. But, I still have a lot to learn and a lot more that I am striving to achieve. I would rate myself low in affiliation. As I have gotten older, I feel less and less like trying to make everyone like me. I am not a mean person by any means, but if someone doesn’t like me, I don’t catch myself loosing too much sleep over it. Intimacy is something that I would rate myself high in and has definitely impacted me. I have a great group of friends and an awesome family. I love being with all of them and they are all a great support system in my life. I am a very loyal person, so I surround myself with loving, loyal people. Power is something that I would rate myself medium in. I don’t necessarily like to take care, but I will if no one else is standing up.
I would say that my goals for achievement really are what motivate me. I am not naturally really good at school but I have definitely set mastery goals to get to the point to where I am at now. I have to try really hard and study a lot to actually learn all the material, but the high of a good grade doesn’t get much better for me. I am motivated by achievement because I know that all of the homework assignments, readings, and hours at the library will be worth it.
Terms used: psychological needs, social needs, quasi needs, achievement, affiliation, power, intimacy, mastery goal
The chapter focused on Social Needs including: social, achievement and quasi-needs. It also looked at affiliation and the need for power. All of these combined showed the breakdown of the characteristics for people with and without power and how anxiety will motivate us to set goals to either master a skill or avoid a situation like talking to an audience.
The most surprising part to me was at the end with the Leadership Motive Pattern. The fact that they tend to show a low need for intimacy and/or affiliation just seemed off to me. These tend to be people who rely on others for their position in office to begin with. I just kind of always thought they would want to keep people happy. Tells you how much I know about politics.
How I would rate myself on the various social needs would be: Achievement: medium. When I get to choose subjects for the papers I write for class I tend to want to add in as much as I actually know about the subject and not just what I find in articles. It is hard to do this when you can’t remember what source you get if from. Affiliation: very high. I don’t see myself as much seeking approval as I so try to be as helpful as possible at times. Even if that means putting up with my sister so my Mom can have a quite birthday and not have her shows interrupted. Intimacy: medium? I tend to very at times. But I think for the most part I have friends but we aren’t as close compared to the friends I had in high school. Power: low? Power comes with a lot of responsibility and work. I have enough as it is, even if it is a small amount.
The social need achievement I know has played a big part in my life in the past couple of years. And not just in my drive to comprehend both of my majors and how I can incorporate them into the career I plan to have one day. The biggest part it has played in my life though started years ago when I first started college. When I decided that I wanted to go into law enforcement, I did some research and found that there are physical requirements that officers have to reach to pass the academy and keep their jobs once they are hired. One of them is to run 1.5 miles in 15 minutes. Two problems: (1) I never really played sports in high school so I was never really in shape and (2) I hated running with a passion. But because I have this goal, I started a running/workout regimen so that I could get better at running and one day accomplish that 1.5 in 15 goal.
List of terms: social needs, achievement need, quasi-needs, affiliation, power, intimacy, motivation.
This chapter focus on the social needs involved in motivation. These needs are for power, intimacy, and achievement. The need for power involves wanting to influence people and be noticed. The need for intimacy is similar to the psychological need for relatedness, and involves wanting to have a close bond with someone and share a warm, positive relationship. The need for achievement is similar to the need for competence, and involves wanted to succeed and master or 'win' at something. I was surprised by the differences in need for achievement, between the performance-approach and performance-avoidance goals. To see that individuals can strive for achievement but have completely opposite motivations is intriguing. You typically think of somewhat with a need for achievement as positive, like a valedictorian student studying hard and enjoying the challenge. After reading about it, it is more easily to see the average high achiever as someone afraid of the consequences of not doing well, and working hard to avoid disappointing their family or ruining their chances at their future career plans.
I would have to honestly say that I fall into the performance-avoidance area, at least for classes that don't hold my interest. Otherwise I do love to achieve in topics I enjoy, so I would rate myself high in achievement. Unfortunately I think I might fall into the area of achievement known as performance goals, where I am more concerned with competing with others and succeeding with little effort than I am with mastering something. I think this comes from years of school with no other intrinsic motivation being inspired or suggested. This makes me want to speak up in class, take a leadership role in team assignments, and brag about not trying hard despite doing well. I know now that these behaviors fall into a category of achievement I don't want to be in, and would like to work to get out of.
I am definitely more intimacy oriented than affiliation oriented. I prefer warm, loving, caring relationships where I trust the other person, and I don't feel the need to have social acceptance, reassurance, and approval from all of my friends and acquaintances. This has manifested in my life as a strong sense of self that has confidence but not rivalry or defiance. I like being myself and trusting that my relationships are strong, and don't worry about the affiliation side of intimacy.
In the need for power, I really do enjoy having influence over people and being in a leadership role. That shows up in my life in my past role as a leader in my church youth group, where I organized youth events for the Midwest area and served at the head youth planner for the events, taking responsibility and credit. I really enjoyed that work, and try to find ways to continue to enjoy it.
social needs, power, intimacy, achievement, performance-approach goals, performance-avoidance goals, high achiever, competing, affiliation oriented, influence, leadership.
Chapter 7 discusses two acquired sets of needs: quasi needs and social needs. Quasi needs are situationally induced wants and desires that are not actually full blown needs in the same sense that physiological, psychological, and social needs are. (Reeve, 2009) Quasi needs are similar to full-blown needs in that they effect how we think feel and act but they are different in that they disappear as soon as we get what we want. It is not a condition that is essential and necessary for life, growth, and well-being. (Reeve, 2009) Social needs are needs that are acquired through experience, development, and socialization. (Reeve, 2009) Social needs activate emotional and behavioral responses to instances in life that could possibly satisfy and need. For example, depending on an individuals acquired social needs, a blind date might bring emotional fear and behavioral avoidance. But maybe for another person, a blind date might bring emotional excitement and behavioral approach.
The next big part of the chapter discusses our need for achievement. The need for achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. (Reeve, 2009) A standard of excellence is basically a test of someone's competence that ends with either success or failure. Someone with a high need for achievement will be positively energized when facing standard of excellence and it might bring emotional excitement, hope, and anticipatory success. Adversely, a person with a low need for achievement will be negatively energized and the standard of excellence might bring on emotional distress and anxiety with behavioral avoidance. The chapter describes some possible origins for the need for achievement and then goes onto describe affiliation and intimacy. Early definitions of affiliation were described as "establishing, maintaining, or restoring a positive, effective relationship with another person or persons" (Atkinson, Heyns, and Veroff, 1954) The book describes the need for affiliation as being based in a fear of interpersonal rejection instead of in extroversion and popularity. The intimacy motive reflects a concern for the quality of ones social involvement; a willingness to experience a warm, close, and communicative exchange with another person. (Reeve, 2009) The last thing this chapter reviews is the need for power which is a desire to make the physical and social world conform to one's personal image or plan for it. (Reeve, 2009)
I was surprised to learn that the book describes a need for power. Doesn't a need for power come from the society we are socialized in? If I was raised in an aboriginal tribe would the need for power be as apparent as opposed to living in america?
Quasi needs in my life would be like, when I see something I want in the store I need to have it or when I'm playing a video game I need to beat it. Once I satisfy the need it disappears. The social needs in my life would be like when I have a test, because of my set of social needs, I feel the emotion of anxiety and behavioral avoidance.
My need for achievement causes to me to be positively energized when competing in sports and video games. The concept of achievement for the future plays a part when I participate in tournaments. If I win one game not only do I feel accomplished, but then i get to move on to the next game, and possibly win a prize.
Achievement for the future
Social Needs
Quasi Needs
Avoidance motivation
Need for Affiliation
Need for intimacy
Need for power
Full-blown needs
Chapter 7 discusses our social needs. Social needs, along with quasi-needs, are two categories of psychological needs. These are all acquired needs; in other words these needs are not in born, we develop them from our environments and the people with whom we socialize. Quasi-needs are wants that are brought about by situations we are in. Quasi-needs are temporary; that is they seem like true needs in some way, but when the pressure or stress is resolved the need goes away. An example of this is when you can’t find your car keys. You have a need of finding the keys, and experience stress when searching for them. But once you find the keys the need is resolved. Therefore while the quasi-need seems to be real, when the situational demand goes away the quasi-need goes away as well. Social needs, on the other hand, are not temporary. These social needs are not innate, but are learned through socialization and experiences with our environments. These needs are emotionally and behaviorally activated by incentives. These incentives are achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. People vary in how high they are in each incentive. For example, one person may have high power incentive and low achievement incentive, while another may have high affiliation incentive and low power incentive. These incentives motivate behavior in order to satisfy one’s social needs.
The most surprising thing I learned was the idea of quasi-needs. I had never really thought hard about those moments where I feel immense pressure to do something. I have a lot of those moments though, when I’m searching frantically for my cell phone, being stressed about being able to afford items before my pay check comes, and driving as carefully as I can to the gas station with my tank almost completely empty. So to think carefully about these events for the first time, I was surprised to learn that in fact these are needs. I need to find my cell phone, I need money, and I need gas before my car dies. Even today I was thinking about this concept while at work, realizing that I was experiencing the quasi-need of ringing customers up as fast as possible before my shift ended. So from now on hopefully when I can’t find my car keys when I’m running late, I will take a moment to realize that this stress is only temporary, that it is an ephemeral need that will dissipate in a minute when I remember where I last put my keys.
When it comes to the four social needs incentives of achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power, I have varying levels of each. I am very high in achievement incentive, which is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. I am high in affiliation, high in intimacy, and low in power.
As I said above, I am very high in achievement incentive. I have always been strongly motivated to do well in classes and in my schoolwork. Ever since middle school I expect nothing less than an A from myself in all classes. When I don’t achieve an A in a class I am very disappointed. This was not influenced much by my parents, for they while they encouraged me to do what makes me happy, they never pushed me to do well in school. In fact they are always surprised by how hard I push myself to achieve highly, because they didn’t do so themselves when they were in school. Being high in achievement can be very stressful at times when I have very high expectations, but getting the A’s at the end of the semester are worth it, and I have a high GPA to show for it.
Terms: Social needs, quasi-needs, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power
Most of chapter 7’s information was social needs and the four concepts achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. In addition to those needs the book mentioned quasi-needs which are situational needs that occur for a period of time and a lot of our main focus. For example, when we are looking for our keys, which is the need and finding them is the task to perform to achieve that need. Social needs are acquired through experience, development, and socialization. Achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. The origins of achievement are broken down into socialization influences, cognitive influences, and developmental influences. Socializations influences are strong and resilient desires to do better by the influences of outside sources (e.g. parents, bosses, and friends). Cognitive influences are that in our thoughts we belief we can achieve our goals with persistence, putting confidence in ourselves, and mastering tasks to take on even harder tasks. Developmental influences are the things we have grown up around that has influenced us on how we perform tasks, our beliefs, and our way to achieve. Affiliation is how we interact with others to avoid negative emotion. For instance, someone who is always paranoid if someone does not hangout with them or get back to them on something they assume they are mad at them and makes them crazy and clingy. Intimacy motivation is by giving attention to the social motive for engaging in warm, close, positive interpersonal relations that hold little fear of rejection. Power is the desire to make the physical and social world conform to one’s personal image or plan for it. People in the high need for power desire to have “impact, control, or influence over another person, group, or the world at large.
The most surprising thing was how people can be an affiliated because it seems like too much work to be worried about everyone else and just care that much about things because there are far worse things in the world than people not liking or getting along with you. I would say I’m a medium because I enjoy socializing with people I have fun with, but I have very little affiliation because I live in a world of not caring unless it’s actually worth a damn and being a crazy clingy person just isn’t me. Intimacy of finding a person to date or good friends is a high level, and power I would say because I enjoy being in the leader role. Well, I would say that achievement is one of my biggest strives because my current goal is to go far with my education and achieve my goal of becoming a family counselor or therapist. Currently, I’m just trying to finish my BD and then my next goal is to get into graduate school, and I feel I can achieve it, if I just pushing and being persistent.
Terms: social needs, quasi-needs, achievement, social influences, cognitive influences, developmental influences, affiliation, intimacy, power.
Chapter seven is all about acquired needs. Acquired needs have two main categories quasi-needs and social needs. Quasi needs arise from situations and the environment around us and they differ from psychological, physiological, and social needs. Quasi-needs are things like our need for money, finding your keys if you’ve lost them, or needing clothes that are in style. Quasi-needs tend to cause high amounts of anxiety and once they have been satisfied they are unlikely to return unless the environment changes. Social needs are also acquired from the environment but are much longer lasting than quasi-needs. These needs are arise from development, socialization, and personal experiences. Social needs are the need for achievement, affiliation and intimacy, and power. People who have a high need for achievement like to perform tasks that have an objective way to measure outcomes in terms of success versus failure, winning versus losing, etc. High achievers will take on tasks with an approach orientation will have a low periods of latency, high amounts of effort and persistence, and they are willing to take responsibility for both success and failure of their efforts. People with avoidance orientation will have a high period of latency (procrastinate), low amounts of effort and persistence (they return to a latent state faster), and tend to not take personal responsibility for their actions choosing instead to blame them on the environment. Affiliation and intimacy have to do with an individual’s relationship with other people. Affiliation is a deficiency oriented motivator. The individual who acts out of need for affiliation feels socially isolated and fearful that they will be rejected. They are in need of more social acceptance, approval, and reassurance than someone who is motivated by intimacy needs. Intimacy is a growth oriented needs. Individuals motivated by intimacy seek to cultivate warm, caring, deep, and meaningful relationships with other people. They are more likely to spend time talking with another individual one on one, whereas someone motivated by affiliation prefer group settings. The last social need is power. Power is the ability to change the world as the individual sees fit. They want to be able to impact, control, and influence those around them. People with a high need for power seek out positions of leadership, influence, and prestige, and they have a low need for affiliation and high amounts of self-esteem.
The most surprising thing that I learned was that people will perform best on a task when they see it as optimally challenging. According to the Atkinson Model when perceived probability of success is .5 a person performs at their peak. I would have thought that a person would do their best when something was perceived as either extremely easy or relatively difficult (not very difficult because I would expect anxiety to play a factor and decrease their ability to perform). So all in all if a person has a high need for achievement in the task, they believe they have a good probability of success (however not without a challenge), and there is a large incentive to achieve success the person will perform the best that they can under the conditions.
I would rank myself as being relatively high in the need for achievement. I set goals for the future and use a combination of performance and mastery goals, as is only possible since most classes are performance based. I would say that the main reason I am this way is because my parents positively valued things like going to and graduating college.
My need for intimacy is much higher than my affiliation need. I rarely find myself anxious about the state of my friendship with my peers. Instead I seek out meaningful relationships with people around whom I feel comfortable and supported. I do my best to offer support, listen to, and have meaningful conversations with my friends.
My need for power is low. I rarely feel the need to change the world around me or influence others actions. Even though I am interested in psychology I do not wish to become a clinical psychologist and have no interest in shaping the lives of others. When in groups I do not seek recognition and don’t compete in sports that often.
My social need for achievement is easily the most prevalent to me at this time in my life. As a college student, the majority of my energy is on achieving a degree and moving on to graduate school. Because of this focus I am motivate to attend class regularly, read chapters from textbooks, do research, write papers, and many other scholastic activities.
Terms used: quasi-needs, social needs, affiliation, intimacy, power, achievement, Atkinson Model, approach orientation, avoidance orientation, mastery goals, performance goals, fear, anxiety, latency, effort, persistence, growth oriented
This chapter discusses social needs. Included in the beginning of the chapter are quasi-needs. A quasi need is a situational need, such as trying to find your car keys when you’re late for class or work; it isn’t necessary for well-being and life in general. There are four major social needs talked about, achievement, intimacy, affiliation, and power. Achievement is the one described most in depth. To satisfy the need for achievement (which is a fairly self explanatory term), there should be moderately difficult tasks, competition, and entrepreneurship. When doing well and achieving highly in any of those three categories, the achievement need is fulfilled more than in many other ways. Mastery goals are the best ways to achieve need fulfillment by learning and developing competence by making progress and learning from mistakes. Those who reach achievement fulfillment by mastery are better off and have a greater chance of internalizing their motivation. Performance goals are broken into two areas; approach and avoidance. Performance-approach would be the desire to prove competence and perform better than others. Performance-avoidance is motivated by fear or anxiety to perform well in order to avoid embarrassment or poor performance by not attempting difficult, challenging tasks.
Affiliation and intimacy are closely related terms. Affiliation would be deficiency oriented and rooted in a fear of rejection and need for approval. Intimacy, on the other hand, would be the desire to engage in positive, close, personal relationships without fear of rejection. Both are also closely related to the psychological need of relatedness. People more greatly desire to fulfill these two social needs during anxious conditions. To fulfill intimacy, people maintain and nurture warm, close relationships. To fulfill affiliation, people tend to maintain close relationships and attempt to avoid conflict. Power is the last of the four social needs. To satisfy the need for power one should obtain leadership, aggressiveness, influential occupation, and/or prestige possessions. Those high in power tend to have low affiliation and high self-control as well. They also tend to get what they want more often because they approach others more.
The most surprising and interesting things I read were in the intimacy and affiliation section. The study done that showed high intimacy individuals used “more positive adjectives when describing others and they avoid talking about others in negative terms”. Also, the emotions associated with fulfillment of affiliation being more similar to relief instead of the joy for intimacy fulfillment.
Personally, I would rate myself as high on achievement, high on intimacy, medium on affiliation, and medium on power. I do believe I fall medium on affiliation because I fall into some of the criteria but opposite on some as well. I really do not like conflict; I go out of my way to avoid my roommates if they’re doing something upsetting (such as washing dishes half-assed). Sometimes I feel the desire for social acceptance though I wouldn’t consider myself “needy”. Very high in intimacy, I prefer smaller groups or one on one interaction and really value my closest relationships. When having stress in my life, I seek out the comfort of a friendly hug and some time to just sit and talk it out.
Terms: social needs, quasi-needs, achievement, mastery goals, performance-approach, performance-avoidance, intimacy, affiliation, power
Chapter seven discussed two categories of acquired psychological needs: social needs and quasi-needs. Social needs are an acquired psychological process that grows out of ones socialization history that activates emotional responses to a particular need-relevant incentive, including achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Because social needs grow out of our socialization history, they develop overtime through our socialization. Social needs are mostly reactive in nature and lay dormant within us until we encounter a potentially need-satisfying incentive that brings the social need to the front of our attention in terms of our thinking, feeling and behaving. where as quasi-needs are ephemeral, situationally induced wants that create tense energy to engage in behavior capable of reducing the built-up tension. An example would be being in a situation where you are running late and cannot fine your keys, a situation where you feel pressure and demand to fine the keys in order to make it on time.
Chapter seven also talked about achievement and power. The need for achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. Motivates people so seek success in competition with a standard of excellence, where a standard of excellence is any challenge to a person's sense of competence that ends with an objective outcome of success versus failure. Children develop a relatively strong achievement striving when their parents provide independent training, high performance aspirations, realistic standards of excellence, etc. the need for power is the desire to make the physical and social world conform to one's personal image or plan for it. Such power strivings often center around a need for dominance, reputation, status or position.
The most surprising thing I learned while reading this chapter was the definition power, how power doesnt always have negative connotations. Examples of power include leadership, people with a high need for power seek recognition in groups and find ways for making themselves visible to others.
If I had to rate yourself as high, medium, low, on the various social needs, I would rate myself as high need for achievement, high to medium for power, and I would rate my need for affiliation as a low. I would say I have a high need for achievement because I feel the need to do well on projects and exams. If I dont do well on a particular assignment I strive to do my best the next time. I rated my need for power as medium because I like being a leader and when I need to be I can handle leadership well, but I dont mind sharing leadership positions with others. And I would rate my need for affiliation as low because I dont particularly need to please others nor gain their approval.
terms: standard of excellence, intimacy, power, achievement, social needs, quasi-needs affiliation
Chapter 7 deals with social needs and quasi needs. This chapter explained a quasi need as situational induced wants. Quasi needs are not essential to one’s well being. This chapter described a social need as “an acquired psychological process that grows out of one’s socializations and history that activates emotional responses to a particular need”. Examples of a social need include: achievement,intimacy,affiliation and power. Achievement is the desire to do well and to meet or exceed the standard of success that was established. Intimacy involves interpersonal relationships. Affiliation involves social acceptance along with close bonds between others. Power is explained as to having control, influence and/or impact over other’s decisions and actions.
The thing that surprised me in this chapter was that those who are high-need achievers often display the behavioral pattern of entrepreneurship. This surprises me because I believe that I am a high-need achiever. However, entrepreneurship does not interest me in the least bit.
If I were to rate myself on the different social needs I would be achievement: 8, intimacy: 8, affiliation:7, power:8. As one can see I would give myself pretty high ratings for each of the social needs. These ratings are displayed in my life just by the way I live. For example, my power need is met by the different jobs I have as director of an after school program and student director of Teen Trust. Another example would be my achievement level being shown in my GPA and that my standards are always on the rise. One can see how the social need of power motivates some of my actions throughout the day. For example, if I am in a group setting, I am usually the one that takes charge with taking notes, being the voice for the group and volunteering to be the leader. Another example of how power motivates my actions throughout the day would be when I am at work where my job is to be the director of an after school program. Through this job I have the power to influence the lives of the students that come to the after school program.
Achievement, power, intimacy, affiliation, quasi needs, social needs,
Chapter 7 discusses social needs and quasi-needs. These are acquired psychological needs: we are not born with them. Social needs include the need for achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence; affiliation is the desire to please and gain the approval of others; intimacy is the desire to have warm, secure relationships others; and power is the desire to influence and impact others.
Quasi-needs are more ephemeral wants that are based on the situation. An example of an quasi-need would be a Kleenex when your nose is running. Quasi-needs create tense energy within the individual to take action and do something to satisfy the need, but they're not true needs because they do not represent conditions which are essential or necessary for life, growth, and well-being.
The most surprising thing I learned was just the existence of quasi-needs. After the last few chapters, I'd gotten used to "needs" being persistent states related to some lofty concepts: life, growth, and well-being. It turns out needing a Kleenex also motivates us in a way, albeit a less impressive one.
As far as social needs, I think I am medium for achievement, medium-low for affiliation, fairly high for intimacy and medium for power. My affiliation need has dropped significantly as I have grown older and become more secure in myself. I am motivated somewhat by achievement and by power needs, as I am drawn to try and perform well academically and at my jobs. I am also somewhat drawn to leadership roles, or at least, I'm the person to speak up in that group of people working on a project when no one will take the initiative.
My need for intimacy is the highest of all. "Warm, loving, sincere, nondominant" is basically me in a nutshell. This need motivates me to go out of my way to do things for my friends and family, whether it's driving a long distance to visit just because or setting aside my own tasks to help them with work, problems, etc. For example, I get really excited about my loved ones' birthdays and put a lot of thought into planning surprises for them. In high school, I staged an elaborate surprise birthday/going away party for my best friend because it was important to me to maintain that bond after she left for college.
Terms: social need, quasi-need, power, affiliation, achievement, intimacy, performance-approach, performance-avoidance, performance goals, mastery goals, high need achievers, low need achievers
There are two types of needs talked about in this chapter. There are quasi-needs, which ar situationally induced wants that arise out of context and seem urgent. Some examples would be needed a band-aid after a cut, or needing your keys to drive. These situations make these needs much more urgent than they really are.
The other type of need discussed throughout this chapter is social needs. Needs are developed based on a person’s developmental, cognitive, and social history. These needs act as emotional and behavioral potentials activated by situational incentives. The four types of needs are achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power.
Achievement is the need to do well based on a standard of excellence. Each person has a different standard of excellence, which is a person’s sense of competency that ends with an objective outcome. A person’s need for achievement Is based on socialization influences, such as parents setting a bar for their children; cognitive influences, such as setting goals for yourself based on what you think is important; and developmental influences, which is based on how your idea of what is possible changes over time.
A person’s need for achievement, and how much they pursue it, is also based on a number of factors, such as the probability of success or failure.
Affiliation and intimacy are similar to each other. Affiliation needs are based on establishing and restoring relationships with others to avoid negative emotions, such as rejection; therefore, affiliation needs are usually associated with negative things. Intimacy is the need to maintain close, emotionally invested and warm relationships. This could be anything from close friends to spouses.
Finally, the need for power is the need to be in a position of authority or to influence others. This is also a need for the world to conform to one’s personal image for it. High-Power-need individuals usually seek attention and leadership roles. While this can be associated with negative things, like aggression, these can also be a good thing; many position in society, such as politicians and teachers, are high-power-need satisfying.
I did not find anything particularly that surprising in this chapter, especially because I can relate very well to all of these needs. One thing I did find of note was the difference between affiliation and intimacy. I would have thought of them as the same thing, but once they were explained, I can see a big difference. When making real life comparisons, I can see the big difference in people that I know; the people who have mediocre or “surface” friendships, mostly for fear of not fitting in, versus the people who actually take the time to make deeper and lasting relationships.
I would say I am actually very high in all of them. Growing up, I developed a high need for affiliation. Throughout the majority of my childhood, I felt like I did not fit in, so I would try to do anything I could to do so. I even went as far as not trying in school, because when I was younger, bad grades were the “cool” thing.
Now that I have matured, I would say I still have a high need for achievement, intimacy, and power.
For achievement, I have been a very high striver ever since high school. In fact, I set standards for myself that may be much higher than a lot of other people my age. These are cognitively influenced, because no one puts these pressure on me buy myself. My mom even makes sure that my parents aren’t giving me pressure to do so well, and I assure her that it is self-driven. With my high need of achievement it is good, because I continue to perform well academically and stay very involved (like being student body VP), but it can also be bad, because I often am rarely satisfied and feel like I could be doing even better.
Intimacy is perhaps the most important social need for me. I place a lot of emphasis on my personal relationships. I try to be very outgoing yet sincere. I am willing to share a lot of personal things, and I rarely prioritize anything above building stronger relationships. This is generally a good thing, but also means that I can be a people pleaser sometimes.
Finally, I have to admit, I also have a high need for power. I enjoy striving to be a positive influence on others. I love being able to be a leader in any context, and love being influential. I have to keep myself in check and make sure this need is not overdone, because I do not want to let it get me in the ways of my values of love and service to others.
I find it interesting that my high need for power and my high need for intimacy can sometimes be contradictory. A good example of this is when I campaigned for VP last year (sorry I keep bringing it up, I just usually works as an example.) during a campaign, you have to be focused on the greater good and being able to influence others. This can be tough, because candidates receive a lot of criticism, which directly hurts my need for intimacy and my desire to please others.
There are two types of needs talked about in this chapter. There are quasi-needs, which ar situationally induced wants that arise out of context and seem urgent. Some examples would be needed a band-aid after a cut, or needing your keys to drive. These situations make these needs much more urgent than they really are.
The other type of need discussed throughout this chapter is social needs. Needs are developed based on a person’s developmental, cognitive, and social history. These needs act as emotional and behavioral potentials activated by situational incentives. The four types of needs are achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power.
Achievement is the need to do well based on a standard of excellence. Each person has a different standard of excellence, which is a person’s sense of competency that ends with an objective outcome. A person’s need for achievement Is based on socialization influences, such as parents setting a bar for their children; cognitive influences, such as setting goals for yourself based on what you think is important; and developmental influences, which is based on how your idea of what is possible changes over time.
A person’s need for achievement, and how much they pursue it, is also based on a number of factors, such as the probability of success or failure.
Affiliation and intimacy are similar to each other. Affiliation needs are based on establishing and restoring relationships with others to avoid negative emotions, such as rejection; therefore, affiliation needs are usually associated with negative things. Intimacy is the need to maintain close, emotionally invested and warm relationships. This could be anything from close friends to spouses.
Finally, the need for power is the need to be in a position of authority or to influence others. This is also a need for the world to conform to one’s personal image for it. High-Power-need individuals usually seek attention and leadership roles. While this can be associated with negative things, like aggression, these can also be a good thing; many position in society, such as politicians and teachers, are high-power-need satisfying.
I did not find anything particularly that surprising in this chapter, especially because I can relate very well to all of these needs. One thing I did find of note was the difference between affiliation and intimacy. I would have thought of them as the same thing, but once they were explained, I can see a big difference. When making real life comparisons, I can see the big difference in people that I know; the people who have mediocre or “surface” friendships, mostly for fear of not fitting in, versus the people who actually take the time to make deeper and lasting relationships.
I would say I am actually very high in all of them. Growing up, I developed a high need for affiliation. Throughout the majority of my childhood, I felt like I did not fit in, so I would try to do anything I could to do so. I even went as far as not trying in school, because when I was younger, bad grades were the “cool” thing.
Now that I have matured, I would say I still have a high need for achievement, intimacy, and power.
For achievement, I have been a very high striver ever since high school. In fact, I set standards for myself that may be much higher than a lot of other people my age. These are cognitively influenced, because no one puts these pressure on me buy myself. My mom even makes sure that my parents aren’t giving me pressure to do so well, and I assure her that it is self-driven. With my high need of achievement it is good, because I continue to perform well academically and stay very involved (like being student body VP), but it can also be bad, because I often am rarely satisfied and feel like I could be doing even better.
Intimacy is perhaps the most important social need for me. I place a lot of emphasis on my personal relationships. I try to be very outgoing yet sincere. I am willing to share a lot of personal things, and I rarely prioritize anything above building stronger relationships. This is generally a good thing, but also means that I can be a people pleaser sometimes.
Finally, I have to admit, I also have a high need for power. I enjoy striving to be a positive influence on others. I love being able to be a leader in any context, and love being influential. I have to keep myself in check and make sure this need is not overdone, because I do not want to let it get me in the ways of my values of love and service to others.
I find it interesting that my high need for power and my high need for intimacy can sometimes be contradictory. A good example of this is when I campaigned for VP last year (sorry I keep bringing it up, it just usually works as an example.) During a campaign, you have to be focused on the greater good and being able to influence others. This can be tough, because candidates receive a lot of criticism, which directly hurts my need for intimacy and my desire to please others.
Chapter 7 discussed social needs in relation to our lives. Also, it differentiated social needs from quasi-needs. A quasi-need is something that you only need at the specific moment, and is dependent on the situation. For example, I went through the entire evening thinking it was Wednesday night. It wasn’t until after midnight that I realized it was Thursday, which meant I had a post due. Usually, I always have my textbook with me to help with these posts. Right now, my book is in a friend’s room. This would be a mild example of a quasi-need as I need my book to write my blog, but it’s too late to go get my book. Another, more noticeable, example is when you’re in line buying something at Wal-Mart and you realize you don’t have enough money. A social need is more enduring and is dependent on your personality and your environment. Achievement, affiliation, intimacy and power are all social needs.
I have relatively high achievement need. For example, I don’t like not being able to do something well. If I want to do it, I want to be good at it. I also don’t like to be beaten, but I’d rather know that I did my best and I still did it well.
I used to have a really high need for affiliation. That was in high school. And it was different with the friends. My best friends I wasn’t like that at all, but my next inner circle I tended to feel left out if I didn’t get invited and was always hinting that they should invite me to do things. Toward the end of high school, I stopped caring and just focused on building my relationships with the friends that mattered. This leads me to believe I have a high need for intimacy. I spend a lot of time trying to help my friends and if one of the friends in my inner circle is upset I tend to think about how to help solve their problems. I also start thinking about birthday/Christmas presents for them months in advance. I don’t really understand it, but my friends are of the utmost importance to me.
Unfortunately, I also have a relatively high need for power which is a little contradictory with my need for intimacy. I really enjoy being involved and knowing what’s going on with any student organization or on campus in general. I like being a leader, though I hate the spotlight. I generally just like helping make decisions and making things happen. I’ve been told I can get a tad aggressive when arguing my beliefs, but that’s also because I’m fairly stubborn and opinionated. While I admit to having a need for power, I do believe that my need for intimacy is higher. I would never do something towards a friend that would advance me in any way, shape or form at their expense. I also don’t care for material possessions as the book mentioned some needers of power are.
Again, the MOST applicable social need for me is intimacy. As I mentioned earlier, my friends are my life. Part of my need for power is in relation to that, I like having influence sometimes so I can use it to my friends’ advantage if need be. I know there were several times in high school I could use my influence with the teachers and administrators to back up a close friend if the situation called for it. I don’t like not being able to help when asked, so I sometimes feel the more leadership positions I have the more I can help my friends. Though, lately, this is clashing with the whole time factor. And interestingly enough, my friends still come first. I could have a few hours of homework when I get back after work or meetings, and if one of my close friends was in need of a life chat or just someone to listen I have done that for a few hours and then moved on to my homework. I still don’t regret that. Friends are more important than homework for me anyways.
Quasi-needs, social needs, achievement, power, intimacy, affiliation
Chapter 7 was one that seemed confusing in many parts, but when taken in as a whole made a lot more sense. This chapter was about our social needs, which are very similar to our psychological needs, except that social needs arise because of our individual experiences and differences. These are different for everyone because of this. The chapter begins by briefly discussing quasi-needs. These needs are ones that arise because of a particular situation. They are quick, originated by demands and pressures, and disappear when the need is met. Since our social needs are acquired as we develop, they are activated by situational incentives. The biggest difference between these and psychological needs is that psychological needs are present from the earliest age, while social needs change over time and may even emerge at a later age. There are four major social needs discussed.
The biggest focus is on achievement needs. This is the need and desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. People may have an approach-oriented response, high need, or an avoidance-oriented response, low need. Since these needs are based on our social history, each situation may induce either response in different people. The book talks about how an upcoming test may produce an approach-oriented response in one person and an avoidance-oriented response in another, based on how well they have done on tests in the past. There are two theories to achievement motivation. The first is the classical view, or the Atkinson model. This model was a tad confusing. In an easy way to understand it, the person’s tendency to approach or avoid situations is based on the individual’s need for achievement, perceived tendency to fail or succeed at the task, and the perceived incentive of that task. The best situation for achievement is when the tendency to succeed is in the middle. Based on a confusing calculation, if the task is too easy, it will not generate an incentive to succeed, thus achievement motivation will be minimal; if the task is too difficult, motivation will be minimized. In this theory, there is also the dynamics-of-action theory. This basically says that achievement behavior occurs as an ongoing behavior. It varies and latency to begin an achievement task and persistence on a task depends on the strength of the motive. The person must have a higher achievement need in order to begin achievement tasks sooner and stick with it than someone with low achievement need. The second model is the contemporary one, or the achievement goals theory. There are two main achievement goals, mastery goals and performance goals. Those who have mastery goals want to develop competence, make progress, improve themselves, and overcome challenges through strong and persistent effort. These goals are fitted against a self-set standard. In contrast, performance goals exist when the person tries to prove competence, display high ability, seek to outperform others, and succeed with little apparent effort. This simply means the person’s goal is to do better than someone else. This is not internalized like mastery goals. It is important for teachers to promote mastery goals and not performance goals, because mastery goals are associated with positive and productive ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving. They are much healthier and help the individual in the long run. Combining these two theories creates three goals: mastery goal, performance-approach goal, and performance-avoidance goal. They discussed implicit theories as well. You are either an entity theorist, meaning you think in terms of “you either have it or you don’t”, or an incremental theorist, meaning you think that people are endowed with malleable, changing qualities. Entity theorists are associated with performance-avoidant goals while incremental theorists are associated with mastery goals. They also view the meaning of effort differently. For entity theorists, trying harder means you are dumber, since you have to try harder. For incremental theorists, effort is a tool to take advantage of skills and abilities.
The second need is affiliation and intimacy. Affiliation need is expressed as a deficiency-oriented motive because it is based on deprivation from social interaction. Conditions such as rejection, separation, and loneliness raise the need to be with others. In contrast, a need for intimacy is expressed as a growth-oriented motive because it is based on the need for warmth and commitment, interpersonal caring and concern, emotional connectedness, reciprocal dialogue, congeniality, and love. Both of these combine to create the full picture of affiliation strivings. Some situations that increase the desire to affiliate with others are social isolation and fear-arousing conditions. In order to avoid anxiety and fear, people seek others out. A good example of this from the book is alcoholism support groups. People want others who feel the same negative emotions they do so they can see how they cope and internalize them. Those with a high need for intimacy seek out and develop close, long-lasting relationships with others. They will usually develop those relationships within dyads instead of groups. Those in high need for affiliation will go out of their way to avoid conflict. They will do what they can to please others and seek approval.
The last need discussed is the need for power. This is the desire to make one’s world conform to the way they see that it should be or how they plan it to be. Those high in the need for power desire to have three things: impact, control, or influence over others. Impact allows people to establish power, control allows them to maintain power, and influence allows them to expand or restore power. Those in high need for power want to become leaders. They are forceful and have a take-charge style. These individuals prefer group relationships over dyads. Men who have a high need for power usually do not do well in intimate relationships. Women do not see these problems. It depends on what they use to satisfy their power needs. Usually, these people try to get others to follow their plan even if it is detrimental to the group; therefore, they are not seen as having contributed the most to group projects or producing good decisions. Aggression is associated with power, but is diluted because society inhibits this. Those with high needs for power report more feelings of aggression and an impulse to act on them. Alcohol is often associated with those in high need of power because it allows them to get a release from societal inhibition of aggression. People with high need for power seek jobs that allow them to control others. Some speak to and influence audiences, some have inside information they use to influence others, and some have a job that allows them to tell others what to do. High needs in power also exhibit themselves with possessions that show prestige. They will have nicer things that make them look powerful. Power increases approach tendencies and decreases inhibition tendencies. Leaders most likely show a combination of a high need for power, low need for intimacy/affiliation, and high inhibition. You can look at previous presidents and predict who did the best based on these three needs.
I think the most surprising thing was that achievement motivation can be explained using an algebraic calculation. This was confusing when they were going through each variable and how they are calculated, yet was more easily understood at the end when they gave a general overview. I also was surprised that these needs, which seemed very similar to psychological ones, were so involved. I thought they were just like the psychological ones we discussed; however, further explanation of them proved that they are much more complex and involved. The need for affiliation and intimacy is much different than it sounds like at first. Learning these changes how I would assume my needs would be. If I were to rate myself, I would rate my need for achievement as high. The one thing that is difficult for this need, at least for me, is that I feel like I have a high need for both mastery and performance goals. On one hand, I will admit, I do like doing things better than others, and it makes me feel good. This sometimes drives my motivation to do things, such as tasks at work or even homework sometimes. At the same time, I want to do homework a lot of times because I love learning new information and it makes me feel good about myself. If there was a goal that combined these, it would be perfect for me. The one thing that differed is that the book says those who are performance-avoidant are procrastinators. I am a procrastinator but do not feel like this is due to a performance-avoidant frame of mind. I don’t procrastinate because I am afraid of failing or anything; I do simply because I would rather wait. I seem to do very well in crunch time, and am more on task when it is due soon. I have tried to change this often, because I am motivated to get it done and do well, yet for some reason I just can’t get myself to do it at a certain time, until it is almost due. I think my high need for achievement has clearly come from growing up with this socialization. I can see how this need is a social one. For the need of affiliation/intimacy, I also feel like I would rate high. At first, I thought that I would rate low-medium; however, after understanding this need more, I feel it is much more. I have a high need to please others and I do often fear not being liked or accepted. I think this has led me to have the personality that I do, where I will do just about anything for anyone. I always have known I am like that, now I understand more of why I am. I also have a high need for intimacy. I would much rather prefer a few really good friends than a group of friends. When I am close with someone, I definitely display a high need for intimacy. I feel I am a great listener and I do a lot of self-disclosure, even when I try not to! I have always felt that I try so hard to be a good friend that I sometimes come across as needy, as the book described, even when I know this and try to avoid it. I now understand why this is. I, unfortunately, have high fear of rejection, have high anxiety in close relationships, and often seek out reassurance from others. When it comes to the need of power, I feel like I am medium to high. I do seem to have a need for power and control; however, I do not seek out leadership many times in groups. I am shy and would rather follow someone else in many situations. Other situations, however, cause me to seek out a leadership role, so I can understand how this is very much a social need. The reason I want to be a professor is because I want to impact others the way my professors have. I didn’t realize this was pretty much one of the definitions included in the need for power. I also do tend to have some impulses for aggression and do get into arguments with those closest to me because I want to be right and have that power. Overall, this chapter made me feel pretty crappy about myself. I realized a lot about myself and my social needs that I did not like. It was hard for me to rate myself, because I know how I am, but do not want to admit it. It was definitely an eye opener.
Terms used: social need, quasi-need, achievement need, approach-oriented, avoidant-oriented, Atkinson Model, dynamics-of-action, achievement goals, mastery goal, performance goal, performance-approach, performance-avoid, implicit theory, entity theorist, incremental theorist, effort, affiliation, intimacy, deficiency-oriented, growth-oriented, power, impact, control, influence
Chapter 7 is about social needs. Social needs are learned and change throughout the lifetime. There is another type of needs humans have called quasi-needs. These are wants and desires that are influenced by our environment. Quasi-needs are not required to live as social and physiological needs are, but they affect how we think, act, and feel. Examples of quasi-needs are cars, shoes, and good grades. While each thing is important to keep us satisfied, we don’t need to it live.
As stated before, social needs change throughout our lifetime. What we needed socially during childhood is often drastically different from what we require in adulthood. The four main social needs are: achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Achievement is the need to do well when compared to a standard of excellence. The need for achievement gets people to accomplish tasks. It is what drives us to get good grades, preform in athletics, and strive to do well at our job. Researchers have found three origins for achievement: socialization influences, cognitive influences, and developmental influences. Socialization influences come from the people around you. Our families, peers, and friends set standards which we compare our achievements to. The way you think affects your need for achievement, and the more cognitive influences you have the higher your need for achievement. The third origin is developmental influences; this is about how someone’s way of thinking changes over time. When children are young they are not very good at estimating their abilities. They might fail at completing a task but will still believe that they are able to do it. Around middle school, they begin to rely on performance evaluations from their peers, parents, or teachers and are able to better gauge their range of abilities. There are two models that help us understand the need for achievement. The Atkinson's Model follows the idea that achievement behavior depends not only on the individual's dispositional need for achievement, but also on their probability of success when performing a certain task. In the Dynamics-of-Action Model, achievement behavior occurs within a stream of ongoing behavior. This stream of behavior is determined by three forces. The first, instigation, occurs by confronting environmental stimuli associated with past reward. The second, inhibition, occurs by confronting environmental stimuli associated with past punishment. Finally, consummation refers to how the performance of an activity will eventually bring about its own end. Examples of this include reading, drinking, and sleeping; by engaging in these activities you are eventually satisfied and stop.
The next social needs, affiliation and intimacy, are closely related. Affiliation is establishing, maintaining, or restoring positive and affective relationships with others. Intimacy is willingness to experience a warm and close exchange with another person. These two social needs are very important and can be extremely detrimental to our psychological well-being if they are not being met.
Finally, the need for power is a desire to make our social and physical world become our personal image of how it should be. Impact, control, and influence are what allows people to establish, maintain, and expand/restore power. Leadership, aggressiveness, influential occupations, and prestige possessions satisfy people’s need for power. Those who readily acquire goals demonstrate a high need for power. This discussion on power was one of the surprising things that I learned in this chapter, specifically the things that satisfy our need for power.
If I was required to rate myself on the various social needs I believe that I would score medium on achievement, high on intimacy and affiliation, and medium on the need for power. My need for achievement manifests itself in my life in my need to do well in sports. Even if an athletic activity is not supposed to be competitive, I often find myself competing with those around me. We finish our warm us in practice with two 25 meter sprints. Since it is a warm-up activity it is not meant to be competitive, but I always compete with the rest of the team and strive to finish first. This is a prime example of a specific behavior my need for achievement motivates. As for intimacy and affiliation, I feel as though I require much time with my friends to be happy. Finally, my need for power manifests itself in my life in the way that I seek to acquire influence on those around me and often enjoy filling a leadership position.
Chapter 7 is about social needs. Social needs are learned and change throughout the lifetime. There is another type of needs humans have called quasi-needs. These are wants and desires that are influenced by our environment. Quasi-needs are not required to live as social and physiological needs are, but they affect how we think, act, and feel. Examples of quasi-needs are cars, shoes, and good grades. While each thing is important to keep us satisfied, we don’t need to it live.
As stated before, social needs change throughout our lifetime. What we needed socially during childhood is often drastically different from what we require in adulthood. The four main social needs are: achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Achievement is the need to do well when compared to a standard of excellence. The need for achievement gets people to accomplish tasks. It is what drives us to get good grades, preform in athletics, and strive to do well at our job. Researchers have found three origins for achievement: socialization influences, cognitive influences, and developmental influences. Socialization influences come from the people around you. Our families, peers, and friends set standards which we compare our achievements to. The way you think affects your need for achievement, and the more cognitive influences you have the higher your need for achievement. The third origin is developmental influences; this is about how someone’s way of thinking changes over time. When children are young they are not very good at estimating their abilities. They might fail at completing a task but will still believe that they are able to do it. Around middle school, they begin to rely on performance evaluations from their peers, parents, or teachers and are able to better gauge their range of abilities. There are two models that help us understand the need for achievement. The Atkinson's Model follows the idea that achievement behavior depends not only on the individual's dispositional need for achievement, but also on their probability of success when performing a certain task. In the Dynamics-of-Action Model, achievement behavior occurs within a stream of ongoing behavior. This stream of behavior is determined by three forces. The first, instigation, occurs by confronting environmental stimuli associated with past reward. The second, inhibition, occurs by confronting environmental stimuli associated with past punishment. Finally, consummation refers to how the performance of an activity will eventually bring about its own end. Examples of this include reading, drinking, and sleeping; by engaging in these activities you are eventually satisfied and stop.
The next social needs, affiliation and intimacy, are closely related. Affiliation is establishing, maintaining, or restoring positive and affective relationships with others. Intimacy is willingness to experience a warm and close exchange with another person. These two social needs are very important and can be extremely detrimental to our psychological well-being if they are not being met.
Finally, the need for power is a desire to make our social and physical world become our personal image of how it should be. Impact, control, and influence are what allows people to establish, maintain, and expand/restore power. Leadership, aggressiveness, influential occupations, and prestige possessions satisfy people’s need for power. Those who readily acquire goals demonstrate a high need for power. This discussion on power was one of the surprising things that I learned in this chapter, specifically the things that satisfy our need for power.
If I was required to rate myself on the various social needs I believe that I would score medium on achievement, high on intimacy and affiliation, and medium on the need for power. My need for achievement manifests itself in my life in my need to do well in sports. Even if an athletic activity is not supposed to be competitive, I often find myself competing with those around me. We finish our warm us in practice with two 25 meter sprints. Since it is a warm-up activity it is not meant to be competitive, but I always compete with the rest of the team and strive to finish first. This is a prime example of a specific behavior my need for achievement motivates. As for intimacy and affiliation, I feel as though I require much time with my friends to be happy. Finally, my need for power manifests itself in my life in the way that I seek to acquire influence on those around me and often enjoy filling a leadership position.
social need, quasi-need,Atkinson Model, dynamics-of-action, affiliation, intimacy, power, impact, achievement, influence
Chapter seven focused on acquired psychological needs, which included quasi-needs and social needs. Quasi-needs are situational induced wants and desires that are derived from an environmental demand. Quasi-needs affect how a person thinks, feels, and acts. Quasi-needs begin from situational demands and pressures, and when a person satisfies their demand or pressure the quasi-need weakens. What makes a quasi-need different from other needs (i.e. physiological, psychological, and social needs) is that a quasi-need is not necessary or essential to the growth, life, or well-being of a person. Rather, it is temporary and if the need is not met, your life is not ultimately disrupted. A social need arises from the individual’s personal experiences and unique developmental, cognitive, and socialization histories. Social needs act as emotional and behavioral potentials activated by situational incentives. There are four types of social needs: achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence, which means any challenge to a person’s sense of competence that ends with an objective outcome of success versus failure, win versus lose, or right versus wrong. Affiliation is establishing, maintaining, or restoring a positive, affective relationship with another person. The need for affiliation is rooted in a fear of interpersonal rejection, which can make a person come across as “needy” or “clingy.” Intimacy is the social motive for engaging in warm, close, positive interpersonal relationships that produce positive emotions and hold little threat of rejection. A person with a high need for intimacy thinks a lot about their friends and relationships, engages in frequent conversations, and tends to remember life episodes as those that involve interpersonal interactions. Power is a desire to make the physical and social world conform to one’s personal image or plan for it. People with a high need for power want to impact, control, or influence another person or even the world.
The most surprising thing I learned from the chapter was that affiliation is correlated with a fear of rejection. I learned that people can experience anxiety because of fear of loneliness so they try to engage in behaviors that satisfy their need for affiliation to stay away from these negative emotions.
Achievement: I would have to rate myself as fairly high on achievement need. I set fairly high standards for myself and work hard to achieve those standards. However, sometimes, I find myself falling short of these standards in certain areas. For instance, academically, I have always placed high standards to achieve but in certain classes, I do not meet those standards for whatever reason and I feel incompetent and overwhelmed by the course work. Not meeting these standards produces a lot of anxiety for me but I still push myself through because I need to achieve my degrees and the class is one of the steps I need to complete in order to achieve my degrees.
Affiliation: I would rate myself as a medium-low on affiliation. As I get older, I’ve come to realize that I don’t need other people’s approval to feel good about myself. All through high school, I had a very high need for affiliation yet I always felt like an outcast in school. I am thankful that today, I am not that same person. I spent too many hours out of my life trying to impress others just to get them to like me. Now, I do what makes me happy.
Intimacy: I think I am a high rating on intimacy need. While I don’t need lots of people to like me, I do have a few people whom I am very close with. I like to form relationships with people whom I can be open and honest with and have very deep and intellectually stimulating conversations with. I like to be able to connect with people on a close and personal level. For instance, my best friend and I have been friends for over 25 years. We have been through a lot together and individually and even though she lives a few hours away, we keep in contact with each other because we both see the other person as a strong emotional support system that helps us through our difficult times.
Power: I am low in the need for power. Though I have had several leadership positions over the years, I’ve always felt a little awkward in those positions. I am not really the type of person who steps up and takes control in a situation unless I absolutely have to. I rather be involved and have guidelines set out before me, rather than oversee and set the guidelines.
The social need of achievement has been a major motivator for me these past few years. This is because I have spent most of my adult life working towards getting back into school and earning my degrees in Psychology and Criminology.
Terms: psychological need, social need, physiological need, quasi-need, achievement, affiliation, intimacy, power
This chapter discusses the acquired social needs of quasi-needs and social needs. Quasi-needs are fleeting desires that arise with a tense or urgent situation. Examples of this are a sudden reminder of our ‘need’ for money or approval. Quasi-needs are characterized by their ability to be dealt with and subsequently forgotten about in a swift fashion. Feeling poor due to a bare cupboard can be averted by a quick trip to the grocery store, and a lack of approval can be fixed by a short phone call to your parents. Social needs, on the other hand, are far more lasting. These arise from our own unique development histories and act as emotional and behavioral potentials activated by situational incentives. Social needs are further broken down into four different categories: achievement, affiliation, intimacy, and power. Achievement is the desire to do well relative to a standard of excellence. However, measuring against this standard can be either good or bad depending on the individual. Some may be energized by the chance to prove their competence and exhibit approach behaviors, while others are filled with anxiety at the prospect of failure and exhibit avoidance tendencies. Affliation is defined in the book as establishing, maintaining, or restoring a positive, affective relationship with another person or persons. This social need is rooted in a fear of interpersonal rejection, and those with a higher need will monitor whether others disapprove of them and spend much of their time seeking reassurance from others. The need for intimacy goes beyond mere affliation in that it entails a concern for the quality of a person’s social involvement. High-intimacy persons exhibit an increased willingness to experience a warm, close, and communicative exchange with other people. And finally, the need for power is conceptualized as a desire to make the physical and social world conform to a person’s one image or plan for it. These sorts of individual tend to interact with others in an aggressive fashion and typically exhibit a great need for dominance, reputation, status, or position.
As far as social needs go, I would say I am fairly low on most of them, save one. I think I am highest on my need for intimacy. Over the years, I have found that I do not need several friendships, nor would I prefer to feel obligated to try maintaining all of them. I would much rather have a few people who I feel I can confide in and they in me. I think this relates a great deal to my lack of a need for power. People high in this need typically enjoy being the life of the party and surrounding themselves with friends. I cannot help feeling that there tends to be a close connection between a need for power and a need for affiliation. It is quite difficult for a person to gain status or dominance over others if they do not enjoy interacting with them. By the same token, I do not feel that I have a high need for achievement either. I want to achieve at a rate and a level that satisfy myself and those whom I hold dearest. Because I do not have a high need for power, I am not overly concerned with measuring myself against people with whom I do not have a intimate social relationship. However, I guess I would say I have a high need for achievement within my intimate relationships – I would like to impress these people most of all. The opinions of people outside this circle really do not matter that much to me.
Terms: quasi-need, social need, achievement, affliation, intimacy, power, approach motivation, avoidance motivation