Ch 14-Unconscious Motivation

I really enjoy learning about the mysteries of our unconscious mind. It’s not something we think about everyday so it’s very intriguing to me! Chapter 14 discusses various aspects of unconscious motivation. It first discusses psychoanalysis and the ability to study traumatic memories, addictions, anxieties, dreams, and many other topics that can affect our lives and shape our needs and feelings. These can also change our behaviors and thoughts as well. Psychoanalysis reflects sex, aggression, psychopathology, revenge, and other aspects of psychology. Much of this was brought about by the famous Sigmund Freud. His biological aspect included sex and aggression. He indicated that the driving force of these two factors supplied the body with its physical and mental energies. More contemporary psychoanalysts, however, often emphasize the importance of motivational wishes and cognitions rather than drives stemming from biology.

Next, the book indicates that there are four postulates that define contemporary psychodynamic theory. The first indicates that a lot of our mental life is unconscious. This was the most interesting thing to me, because as I said above, we don’t often get to learn and think about our unconscious motives and our unconscious mind. It just blows my mind that there are thoughts, feelings, and even desires that exist beneath our level of consciousness. It’s so shocking that we all behave in certain ways that even we can’t explain. Adaptive unconscious talks about setting goals, making judgments, and initiating action, while thinking about consciously about something else during the same time. Implicit motivation, however, talks about emotions that are rooted in us that are above our conscious level. These unconscious emotions often motivate us without us even realizing it. The second postulate indicates that “mental processes operate in parallel with one another.” This means that people often fear something, but they may also want it at the same time. Thus, people often have conflicting views that motivate them in different ways. They may engage in both approach and avoidance relationships with many aspects in their lives, including their jobs, family relationships, friendships, and many other aspects. The third postulate consists of the development of the ego. Freud played a large aspect of the development of the ego. The book states that healthy life development entails starting out as an immature, socially dependent being and moving t a personality that is mature and socially responsible. This is more complicated than it sounds, however, and can be very complex. To be able to overcome this immaturity, the ego has to be able to find and gather resources and strengths to be able to cope with various worries and anxieties during life. It also must be able to overcome the perceived inability to be able to change the environment for the better. These are both examples of ego defense and ego effectance. The final postulate talked about in chapter 14, was that mental representations of the self and of other people form in childhood. These representations, even though formed in childhood, help to guide adult social motivations.

For me, I guess it’s kind of hard to discover what may be unconsciously motivating me. But I think we can become aware of what drives us unconsciously if we really pay attention to our thoughts and our everyday lives. I can see that in my life I may be unconsciously motivated to help others. I don’t know of any reason in my conscious mind that I have this drive to help others whenever possible. This especially occurs with me when talking about the elderly. There was no one event (that I can remember) that has consciously motivated me to want to help and be compassionate towards older adults. All I know is that I have this uncontrollable motivation and empathy for elderly adults and want to help them in any way that I can. Maybe if I reflected on this item enough in my life and spent some time looking into what has become the motivating factor with the elderly, I could discover my unconscious motivation in this aspect of my life. Thus, I believe that we can uncover our unconscious motivations if we really put some effort into it and spend time thinking about our cognitive processes and our motivating forces.

Terms: psychoanalysis, unconscious motivation, drive, wish, adaptive unconscious, implicit motivation, ego defense, ego effectance

Chapter 14 explains the function, process, and theories behind unconscious motivation. The chapter is broken up into five different categories to help explain unconscious motivation. The first portion of the chapter discusses the psychodynamic perspective of unconscious motivation. The text defines psychoanalytic as those practitioners who remain committed to most traditional Freudian principles. A more contemporary view is known as psychodynamic which is: the study of the dynamic unconscious mental processes. To further understand the foundation of psychoanalytical perspective, the chapter begins by describing the dual-instinct theory by Freud. Freud viewed motivation as regulated by impulse-driven biological forces. His general categories for the needs of the body are: instincts for life and instincts for death. The life instincts he called Eros (maintain life and ensure individual and collective survival). The death instincts he called Thanatos (push one toward rest, inactivity, and energy conservation). The theory states that these body-based instinctual drives toward life and death provide us with the energy we need to motivate our behavior. In contrast to Freud, contemporary theorists/psychoanalysts are now proposing that psychological wishes, not instinctual drives, are what regulate and direct our behaviors.
The contemporary psychodynamic theory has four postulates: (1) the unconscious, (2) psychodynamics, (3) ego development, and (4) object relations theory. The unconscious is also known as the “shadow phenomenon. The three views, or portrayals, of the unconscious are as follows: Freudian unconscious, adaptive unconscious, and implicit motivation. Under Freudian unconscious, the text describes how Freud divided the human mind into three different components. He divided them into the conscious (all thoughts, feelings, sensations, memories, and experiences that people are aware of at any given time), the preconscious (stores all thoughts, feelings, and memories that are absent from immediate unconscious but can be retrieved into consciousness with some prompting), and the unconscious (mental storehouse of inaccessible instinctual impulses, repressed experiences, childhood memories, and strong but unfulfilled wishes and desires). The largest component and the most important component is that of the unconscious. The adaptive unconscious appraises the environment, sets goals, makes judgments, and initiates action all while we are concentrating and thinking about something else. Implicit motivation is “all motives, emotions, attitudes, and judgments that operate outside a person’s conscious awareness and that are fundamentally distinct form self-report motives, emotions, attitudes, and judgments.” According to the text, the term “implicit” describes motivational processes that are indirect, implied, or not well understood. Implicit motivation is linked to emotional experiences.
Psychodynamics is broken into repression and suppression in the text. Repression is what Freud viewed as the central concept to psychodynamics. Repression is the process of forgetting information or an experience by ways that are unconscious, unintentional, and automatic. The text further helps to describe repression as, ‘the security guard checking each thought’s identification card to judge whether [the thought is] fit to enter the public world.’ Suppression is the process of removing a thought by ways that are conscious, intentional, and deliberate (such as a dieter attempting to not think of food). There is a problem with suppression however. While our conscious mind is attempting to suppress the unwelcomed thought, the unconscious mind is attempting to search and detect thought that is supposed to be suppressed. According to the text, only those thoughts that we welcome into our conscious are the thoughts that we are able to forget.
The next main topic in the text for chapter 14 is that of ego psychology. The father of ego psychology is Heinz Hartmann. He believed that the ego developed through learning as well as through experience. Ego development is the “developmental progression toward what is possible in terms of psychological growth, maturity, adjustment, prosocial interdependence, competence, and autonomous functioning. Ego development is important in that it: develops to defend against anxiety, as well as develop to empower one to interact more effectively and more proactively with its surroundings. Along with ego development, ego psychology is broken down into the ego defense and ego effectance. The ego defense mechanisms are denial, fantasy, projection, displacement, identification, regression, reaction formation, rationalization, anticipation, humor, and sublimation. Ego effectance on the other hand, is one’s competence in dealing with environmental challenges, demands, and opportunities. The ego effectance functions as a sort of “ego offense” – “opposite” the ego defense. According to the text, “the greater the ego’s effectance motivation, the greater one’s willingness is to use ego properties proactively by intentionally changing the environment for the better.”
Finally, the text uses the object relations theory to better help to explain unconscious motivation. The object relations theory studies how people satisfy their need for relatedness through their mental representations of and actual attachments to social and sexual objects. The theory focuses on the nature and development of mental representations of the self and others and on affective processes that are associated with these representations. It also focuses on how childhood mental representations of one’s caretakers are captured within the personality and persist into adulthood. The quality of one’s mental representations of relationships has three chief dimensions: (1) unconscious tone (benevolent vs. malevolent), (2) capacity for emotional involvement (selfishness/narcissism vs. mutual concern), and (3) mutuality of autonomy with others.
The criticisms against Freud and his theories mentioned in chapter 14 are that many of the concepts are not scientifically testable and that the psychodynamic theory is “woeful as a predictive device as it is hard to trust a theory that explains only the past.

The most surprising thing I learned was that dreams have numerous benefits. It was extremely interesting to learn that they serve as venting functions, neurophysiological activity functions, memory consolidation functions, stress-buffering or coping functions, and problem-solving functions. I also found it interesting that dreams have very little to do with unconscious wishes. Another thing I thought was interesting was that concerning subliminal messages. I found it surprising that people do not behave in ways that are consistent with the subliminal directive. The text stated that the unconscious might be able to recognize and understand the message in some way, but that actually acting on the directive is a completely different matter in itself.

It was difficult at first for me to think of things that unconsciously motivate me, because by thinking of them, they have become conscious motivators… I believe that I am unconsciously motivated by my need to be accepted by others as well as my tendency to strive for success by comparing myself to others. Realizing now, I guess that in social situations I DO strive to be accepted by others. I also compare myself to others probably more than is naturally healthy. I strive for relatedness and the feeling of being connected and accepted by people. Looking back on my actions, I also alternate my personality for whomever I am with so that they will see how “alike” we truly are. If I am with a group of people who are loud and outgoing, I try to match them in order to feel accepted. Along the lines of comparing myself to others, I guess this unconsciously motivates how I personally view myself. If others are more successful than I (such as in class or the work place) then I tend to view myself as not as important or worthy as the other person. (Low self-esteem I know…) However, I am hoping that brining these unconscious thoughts into my conscious thoughts that I may be motivated to change them into positive thoughts that will help me become successful and happy in life.

I personally think that it is difficult to become aware of our unconscious motivations. It took me an incredibly long time to think of my unconscious motivations. How are we supposed to tap into our motivations if we do not know what or where they are? I was able to find some things that unconsciously motivate me by really concentrating and thinking about why I do specific things. From there, I was able to pinpoint a few of my unconscious motivators. I personally believe that understanding why we behave, think, and feel the way we do is an important first step in uncovering one’s unconscious motivations.

Terms: psychoanalytic, psychodynamic, dual-instinct theory, Eros, Thanatos, the unconscious, conscious, preconscious, adaptive unconscious, implicit motivation, implicit, repression, suppression, ego development, ego defense, ego effectance, object relations theory, functions of dreams, and subliminal messages

The beginning of chapter 14 really caught my attention. I find the unconscious mind to be very intriguing, especially when I watch my friends get hypnotized and they are suddenly doing things unconsciously. This chapter is all about how all of our hidden unconscious thoughts shape our needs, feelings and ways of thinking and behaving. The first scenario pretty much states that motivation can stem from sources outside of conscious awareness and volitional intent. It then goes into the psychodynamic perspective approach of psychoanalysis and psychodynamics. Psychoanalysis is the study of motivational impulses that can be traced back to early childhood, according to Freud, the father of psychoanalytic perspective. Motivation comes across as something that happens to us instead of what one wants or chooses. This includes talking about dreams, hypnosis, inaccessible memories, fantasy, and the other hidden forces that shape our motives and behaviors without being aware of it. Psychodynamic refers to the study of dynamic unconscious mental processes which can be studied inside or outside of the Freudian tradition.

All motivation stems from biological drives. Freud believed there were two main instincts referring to life and death: Eros and Thanatos. Eros are instincts for self-preservation. Instincts for sex, nurturance, and affiliation are needed for survival. Thantos consists of instincts that push individuals to rest, inactivity, and energy conservation. He linked aggression with thantos and sex to eros which he states both motivate behavior. That was soon cancelled out because of the contemporary psychoanalysis and was replaced as psychological wishes and not drives. With contemporary psychodynamic theory, four postulates are presented: unconscious, psychodynamics, ego development and object relations theory.

Freud referred to the unconscious as "a shadow phenomenon" and can only be inferred from indirect manifestations. I also learned about this in another class and I think the iceberg theory was presented with this concept. The top of the iceberg represented the conscious part of the brain which is visible and easy to see such as thoughts and perceptions. The middle of the iceberg which is just right on the surface is the preconscious in which are our memories and knowledge prior to what we already know and below the water which is difficult to see, is part of the unconscious thinking which is the largest part of the iceberg. This model helps me remember the three stages of psychoanalysis. Freud states that with psychodynamics, people often want and fear the same thing at the same time. I can easily relate this to the way I'm feeling when I graduate, which is soon. I really want to move out of state and live somewhere completely different for the experience but I'm also scared because I may not be comfortable by myself away from my family and friends. But the thought of being young and traveling is thrilling to me and it motivates me to go.

The ego was thought to have developed through learning and experiences. Right out of moving through the "id" stage, the ego is immature and constantly overwhelmed by impulses. Self-control emerges once a child understands consequences and rules. The ego can then become self motivating or go backwards, depending how the ego develops throughout the stage. Because our ego is always in a state of vulnerability, our ego can put up defense mechanisms that can help cope with anxiety that may occur. Those who's egos cannot cope with anxiety tend to be less mature and those who have strong egos or even superegos mature quickly and depression and other stressors can be avoided.

The objects relations theory focuses on the nature and the development of mental representations of the self and others and on the affective processes associated with these representations. The child's primary caregiver is the template for the self and for other mental representations. It's not only with with just the caregiver, but with others that surround you and the feedback given and received is what makes those experiences. Those who grew up with unresponsive care end up developing defense mechanisms leaving them vulnerable to the world.

The last part of this chapter talks about criticisms. The biggest criticism over Freud was that most of his concepts are not testable. Even so, I think Freud had great ideas and theories although he does seem a little messed up in the head about some of those theories (mostly retaining to a lot of sex as a child). The second criticism is that the psychodynamic theory is just used a predictive device. It is hard to trust a theory that only explains the past in real-life situations which I agree with. The most surprising thing overall is the unconscious and hypnotism. I think it's really weird how someone can just hypnotize a person and the person's unconscious thoughts and behaviors can be presented. I've never been hypnotized because I'm scared of what I'll do but many of my friends have been and some of their actions are different than their real actions would have been if they were fully conscious...

I think I am unconsciously motivated when something doesn't really matter to me all that much or when it retains to something I'm really comfortable with. When I set goals (long term or short) I am aware and conscious of the decisions I am making because I want to accomplish something. I think back sometimes to when I go into the kitchen and open up the cupboards and fridge looking for food even though I know I have no groceries. I KNOW I have no groceries but I'm unconscious of what I'm even doing because I'm either bored or just want to snack. I think another class can also tie in with the whole unconscious thing. At work, having general intelligence is really important when first getting a job. After a while though, we become unconscious of what we are even doing (tasks) and it seems very simple to the point we don't even realize we're doing it. It's like driving a car. At first, when learning how to drive a car it was a bit complicated learning how to do everything all at once such as how far to push the pedals in, when to break, etc. and now we can get in our car and drive somewhere and not even remember how we even got there (this happens to me a lot). We don't really even think about it because it's no longer important or we are just that comfortable. I do think that we can become aware of our unconsciousness if we just stop and think about ourselves and the future. I also believe that by setting more goals we can become consciously aware the direction we want to go in our life. Overall, this chapter was interesting and I like learning about Freud's theories over again because it's interesting. The unconscious mind is something that will always keep scientists and psychologists interested.

Terms: Unconscious motivation, psychoanalytic, psychodynamic, eros, thanatos, shadow phenomenon, contemporary psychodynamic theory, unconscious, ego development, object relations theory, preconscious, ego defense, Id, ego, superego, wish, drive

Psychoanalysis appeals to us because of its emphasis on the pessimistic aspects of human nature, such as hidden jealousies, fantasies and memories. The chapter begins by discussing Freud’s dual instinct theory, which includes two drives that motivate behavior. The first instinct is called Eros, and is considered the life instinct. Eros includes our needs for food, water, air, sleep, etc. The second instinct is Thanatos, and is considered the death instinct. Thanatos includes our drives for inactivity and energy conservation, which is “achieved only through total rest, which was death” (pg. 394).

This area of psychology has changed over the years, and no longer follows Freud’s original ideas. Rather than being defined by the dual instinct theory, psychoanalysis is now defined by four postulates: the unconscious, psychodynamics, ego development and object relations theory. The unconscious is at work when we find ourselves on “autopilot,” such as when we leave to go to class, start thinking about something, and suddenly find ourselves at our destination without remembering how we got there. Psychodynamics is what Freud refers to as the “clashing of forces” between our will and counterwill. Psychodynamics are at work when we want and fear the same thing, such as during job interviews. Ego development is the process through which we become socially mature and responsible. We do this by forming defense mechanisms for coping with everyday challenges. Object relations theory claims that we form our personality as children, when we begin to form schemas about ourselves, our environment and others. This theory claims that the mental representations that we acquire for interpersonal relationships shape our future relationships. For example, those who feel positive about their relationships with others are more likely to form future meaningful relationships, while those who view their relationships through a negative lens are more likely to have dysfunctional future relationships.

The most interesting part of the chapter for me was the section on the adaptive unconscious. I find myself on autopilot when I’m walking to class, driving for hours on the highway, and even doing tasks such as putting up bulletin boards. One minute I am consciously thinking about what I’m doing, and the next minute, I am either at my destination or have finished my task! Whatever I did in-between the start and finish was done without my conscious awareness! I thought the example given on page 399 about the students being able to accurately rate an instructor’s effectiveness after only seeing a small clip of their teaching was very interesting, as well, especially since the students could not answer why they gave the ratings that they did. The mind is so fascinating!

I have an unconscious motivation for achievement, which is apparent in my academic history. Most semesters at UNI have found me taking 18+ credits, and it was hard for me to accept taking less than that workload this semester. I was in a class that I didn’t enjoy, and was told by my friends and family to drop it. “You don’t need that class” they would tell me, and I knew that they were right. But if they were right, why did I feel guilty about dropping the class? I told my mom that I was so used to being miserable from my class load that I felt like I wasn’t “doing it right” if I didn’t feel like banging my head against the wall in frustration. No one consciously wants to be miserable, so my motivation to work so hard must be unconsciously driven.

I think it is possible to become aware of our unconscious motivations. If I didn’t think so, I wouldn’t have been able to write about my unconscious drive for achievement! The trick to uncovering these unconscious drives is to question why we behave the way we do. If we cannot come up with a good reason, there is a good chance that our behavior is a result of the unconscious. The book states that “because unconscious mental life affects behavior, people can behave in ways that are inexplicable even to themselves” (pg. 415). In other words, if you find yourself questioning why you just behaved in a certain way, you have taken the first step toward uncovering an unconscious motivation.

Terms: dual instinct theory, Eros, Thanatos, the unconscious, psychodynamics, ego development, object relations theory, adaptive unconscious

Chapter 14 is all about unconscious motivation. The first section of the chapter focuses on psychodynamics. This approach is deterministic because it holds that the ultimate cause of motivation and behavior derives from biologically endowed and socially acquired impulses that determine our desires, feelings, and behaviors. Psychoanalysis is studying the unconscious, and the father of psychoanalysis is none other than Sigmund Freud. He had a view of motivation that was based on a biological model where the two instinctual drives of sex and aggression supplied the body with both physical and mental energies. However, contemporary psychoanalysts emphasize the motivational importance of psychological wishes, rather than biological drives, and of cognitive information processing.

There are four postulates that the book talks about that define contemporary psychodynamic theory. The first is that a lot of mental life is unconscious. This argues that thoughts, feelings, and desires all exist in our unconscious. The implication of this postulate is that mental life affects behavior, and people can behave in ways that they can’t explain, even to themselves. There are three contemporary views on the unconscious: the Freudian unconscious, the adaptive unconscious and implicit motivation. The adaptive unconscious automatically appraises the environment, sets goals, makes judgments, and initiates action, doing so while we are consciously thinking about something else. Implicit motivation is rooted in emotional associations that are outside of our conscious awareness. The second postulate of contemporary psychodynamic understanding of motivation and emotional is that mental processes operate parallel with one another, so that people can want and fear the same thing at the same time. This is the postulate about psychodynamics. People can have conflicting feelings that motivate them in different ways. The third postulate is about the ego. Healthy development involves moving from being immature and socially dependent to being more mature and socially responsible. The ego develops of its own by moving through the progression of: symbiotic, impulsive, self-protective, conformist, conscientious, and autonomous. To overcome immaturity and vulnerability, the ego must gain strength including defense mechanisms for coping successfully with anxiety and a sense of competence. The fourth and final postulate is that mental representations of self and others form during childhood and guide adult social motivations. This postulate argues that lifelong personality patterns begin to form in childhood, and once formed, these beliefs form the basis of motivational states that guide the course of an adult’s interpersonal relationships.

The most interesting thing I learned about was about suppression. It was interesting to learn about how it is actually impossible to stop a thought. The human mind is an incredible thing, but this one ability is beyond us. No one can actually stop a thought. Instead of trying to stop a thought, people try to suppress the thought after it has occurred. Suppression is the process of removing a thought by ways that are conscious, intentional, and deliberate. After thoughts enter our consciousness, our thinking will halt itself because the thought precedes something that we wish would not happen. When streams of thought are interrupted, the unwanted thought lingers in our consciousness. We may be able to suppress a thought for a few seconds, or maybe a few minutes, but the thought usually comes up again. We as humans rely on suppression in all areas of life. People rely on thought suppression for behavioral self-control, for example, while on a diet. If we were not able to have suppression, our private thoughts would be freely expressed, which could have negative consequences. This is really interesting for psychodynamics. Conscious thought suppression activates an unconscious counterprocess. When the conscious mind is busy suppressing unwelcome thoughts, the unconscious mind is equally busy searching and detecting for the presence of the thought that is being suppressed.

Suppression plays a role in my own unconsciousness. I can recognize times when I think about something negative, such as something to do with my future, and I consciously try to suppress these thoughts. However, when suppressing negative thoughts, my unconscious monitoring process keeps these suppressed thoughts activated. A specific example in my life is past relationships. Because of being treated poorly in past relationships, I project that my current relationships will have the same result. These thoughts I try to suppress, but as our books says, continued suppression, in time, can build a counterforce that drives unwanted thoughts toward obsession. So sometimes it is difficult to not compare these past relationships to my current relationship.

I’m not sure if it is possible to become aware of our unconscious motivations. Obviously we all know when we are consciously thinking, but the unconscious is just that, something we are unconscious of.

Terms: psychodynamics, psychoanalysis, Freudian unconscious, adaptive unconscious, implicit motivation, ego, suppression

Chapter 14 was all about unconscious motivation. The chapter began by discussing the psychodynamic perspective, which covered how psychoanalytic became psychodynamic, the dual-instinct theory, drives versus wishes, and the contemporary psychodynamic theory. The terms psychoanalysis and psychodynamic were synonymous, but today, psychoanalysis refers to practitioners who remain committed to most traditional Freudian principles, whereas psychodynamic refers to the study of dynamic unconscious mental processes (p.393). In Freud’s dual-instinct theory, he recognized two general categories that were comprised of the instincts for life (Eros) and the instincts for death (Thanatos). These instinctual drives provide the energy for behavior, while the ego provides its direction (p.394). The contemporary psychodynamic theory contains four different postulates: the unconscious, psychodynamics, ego development, and object relations theory. All four of these postulates are major emphases on contemporary psychodynamics.

The next subsection of the chapter is on the unconscious, and it covers the topics of the Freudian unconscious, the adaptive unconscious, implicit motivation, and subliminal motivation. It begins by discussing how researching the unconscious may be a difficult task due to the fact that it is hidden from both private and public consciousness. Therefore, Freud believed that using techniques like hypnosis, free association, and dream analysis could give insight to what makes up the unconscious. It has been agreed upon over time that much of mental life is unconscious, and there are three different views that center on different portrayals of this. These three views are the Freudian unconscious, the adaptive unconscious, and implicit motivation. This subsection winds up by discussing subliminal motivation and how information does get processed at an unconscious level. Yet, it has been found through research that subliminal messages do not direct behavior and are not processed in a way that affect people’s thoughts.

The next subsection is all about psychodynamics and begins by discussing conscious volition versus unconscious counterwill. Psychodynamics is all about conflict in the human mind. It then goes into the topics of repression and suppression. Repression is the process of forgetting information or an experience by ways that are unconscious, unintentional, and automatic (p.402). Suppression, on the other hand, is the process of removing a thought by ways that are conscious, intentional, and deliberate (p.402). Generally speaking, suppression fails because it leads to an obsessive preoccupation about the thought that you tried not to think about. It is difficult to control one’s thoughts. Finally, this subsection delves into the question asking if the id and the ego really exist. It results in saying that early childhood experiences can leave an emotional memory imprint (implicit learning) without a corresponding episodic (conscious) memory, which supports both the id and the ego (p.405).

Next comes the subsection on ego psychology. This involves the process of maturation that makes the ego increasingly independent from the id, which may be developed through learning and experience. Ego development entails developmental progression toward what is possible in terms of psychological growth, maturity, adjustment, prosocial interdependence, competence, and autonomous functioning (p.405). The ego develops over time through different trajectories. These are symbiotic, impulsive, self-protective, conformist, conscientious, and autonomous. As one grows and learns, they advance to the next step and come closer and closer to having an autonomous ego. The ego can be vulnerable, though, which is why there is something called ego defense. Through its defense mechanisms, the ego buffers consciousness against potentially overwhelming levels of anxiety originating from conflict with id impulses, superego demands, and environmental dangers (p.406). There are many different kinds of defense mechanisms, and it is said that certain mechanisms are considered to be more mature than others. The final portion of this subsection discusses ego effectance, which concerns the individual’s competence in dealing with environmental challenges, demands, and opportunities (p.410).

The final subsection of this chapter discusses object relations theory, which studies how people relate to objects to satisfy that emotional and psychological need for relatedness, and it focuses on the nature and development of mental representations of the self and others and on the affective processes associated with these representations (p.411). Like all theories, there are many criticisms of Freud’s psychoanalytic contributions to the study of human motivation. The two big criticisms noted in the textbook are that many of his Freud’s concepts are not scientifically testable and that although psychodynamic theory is a wonderful interpretive device for events that occurred in the past, it is not a good predictive device.

The most interesting thing that I learned from reading this chapter was definitely when it discussed the topic of suppression. Though people can try to suppress a thought, that unwanted thought usually manifests in our minds and we cannot seem to let go of it. Our thinking halts itself and focuses on the unwanted thought, therefore doing the opposite of what we wanted to do in the first place. The suppression fails, and ultimately leads to obsessive preoccupation about the unwanted thought. I thought that this was extremely interesting information to me because I had no idea that this is how suppression works. It makes more sense now that having self-control over one’s thoughts is something that is very difficult. I now understand why thoughts that I try not to think about end up taking center stage in my mind and being the only things I am able to think about. This stuff is crazy!

I believe that everyone is unconsciously motivated, whether they realize it or not. These unconscious motivations may be very hard to come up with because of the fact that they are indeed in our unconscious mind, and things usually need to be in our conscious mind for us to realize them and think about them. Although this is true, I think that I am unconsciously motivated by my need for achievement and by my want to please others. My need for achievement is something that I know is unconsciously motivated because I find myself doing everything in my power to do the best that I can do in any situation, regardless of if it is important or not. I am super competitive and I get really down on myself when I don’t do something as well as I know I can. Achievement is such a huge value for me, and I know that it is something that takes over me sometimes. My want to please others is also a form of unconscious motivation for me. I know this because I am constantly trying to make people happy. It is an inherent thing. I don’t even realize that I am doing it. It just comes from within, and most of the time I don’t even realize why I’m doing it. This could possibly stem from my need for achievement, especially when it comes to wanting to please my parents. I have a tremendous need for my parents to be proud of me in all aspects of life, but especially school and grades. I am sure that part of my unconscious motivation to achieve good grades in school is fueled by the want to please my parents.

I do think that it is possible to become aware of our unconscious motivations because of the fact that I shared a couple of mine in the previous paragraph. It is just a matter of transferring unconscious motivations to your conscious state of mind. It might be hard, but I think that it is definitely possible to do if you really put your mind to it for a while. I feel as though uncovering the truth about why we do certain things and why we behave in certain ways can lead us to what unconsciously motivates us.

All in all, I thought that this chapter proved to be very interesting. It was a quick read, and I am looking forward to moving on and learning more in the weeks to come!

Terms: unconscious motivation, psychodynamic perspective, psychoanalysis, dual-instinct theory, instincts for life, Eros, instincts for death, Thanatos, ego development, object relations theory, unconscious, Freudian unconscious, adaptive unconscious, implicit motivation, subliminal motivation, hypnosis, free association, dream analysis, repression, suppression, id, ego, ego psychology, ego development, ego defense, defense mechanisms, ego effectance, need for achievement

Chapter 14 is all about the unconscious mind, which was very entertaining to read about. Since it is the hidden nature of our mind, this causes difficulty for experts to examine and study. So much of our life is driven by things unbeknownst to our conscious mind, studying this is important. There are many things that our bodies do where we do not need to be consciously aware of them (breathing, blinking). If this did not happen, we would be so overwhelmed it would be nearly impossible to live. Imagine a life where we had to consciously think about when it is necessary to take a breath or when it is okay to blink your eyes. We would never have time to do anything else. These two actions just alone, are thankfully adaptive unconscious behaviors.

There are many different perspectives on what goes on in this state of your mind, so many theories are presented. The psychoanalytical theory focuses on the unconscious mind and uses tools such as dreaming analysis to study the individual. Opposing the psychoanalytical theory is the contemporary theory. This theory has a psychodynamic aspect to it. The research has revealed that outside of conscious awareness, individual obtain and acquire more information than what they can experience through their conscious thoughts. Psychodynamics shows that the human mind is full of contradiction between conscious and the unconscious. This is where suppression comes into play. Our unconscious mind is always trying to think of what you want to suppress. Since it is trying to identify the thought you are trying to suppress, it almost constantly thinking of how to act (try not to think about something, chances are your mind stays on that anyway). We are unable to bring our unconscious mind under our conscious control. We quickly begin to realize we cannot successfully accomplish this task.

Ego development was also a main concept in this chapter. This development involves moving from an immature, socially dependent personality to one that is more mature and socially responsible. The ego constructs motives of its own by moving through a developmental progression. In order to fight through the immaturity, one’s ego must gain strength and resources, which then helps for coping with the inevitable anxieties of life and provide a sense of change for the better.

I was really fascinated by the suppression part of the chapter. It really caught my eye and got my mind thinking when they list the four questions of the psychodynamics. 1) Do not think about something 2) Do not do something 3) Do not want something 4) Do not remember something. All of these are simple questions, yet they mean so much to our human study. As mentioned before, it is tough to not think about something when we are told not to think about it. It is tough to not do something when we are told not to do it (smokers cannot take a break from smoking). It is tough to tell yourself to not want something when in fact, you want it very badly. Lastly, it is dang near impossible to forget something that can be relevant in your life. We remember key moments in our lives, as if they just happen yesterday. This is why it is so incredible to think about how our minds work.

We are unconsciously motivated through our own lives in my opinion. I say this because I believe I keep my own anxiety in a state of balance. In everyone’s lives, there are obstacles and happenings that make us worry, but with being unconsciously motivated, we become aware of these things. I start to understand what affects me. For example: knowing at the beginning of the week, what academic work I have to get done. I have to figure out when I am going to have to accomplish each thing and make sure I have it done by a certain time. My unconscious pushes me so that I do not panic. I feel like I have gotten much better about this as I have matured. Years ago, I was so neurotic about absolutely needing to get something done, but now I have gotten better about understanding that I can take my time on things and still do a thorough job.

Key Terms: unconscious mind, conscious mind, psychoanalytical theory, ego development, suppression, unconscious motivation

Chapter 14 is about the unconscious motivation and discusses the psychodynamic perspective, the unconscious, psychodynamics, and ego psychology. The book talks about how thoughts, feelings, and desires exist in the unconscious level. There are three views on the unconscious are the Freudian unconscious, the adaptive unconscious, and the implicit motivation. The adaptive unconscious makes judgments, sets goals, and initiates action, while we are consciously thinking about something else. I found that one to be pretty interesting. The chapter also talks about ego development and how healthy development involves moving from an immature, socially dependent personality to one that is more mature and socially responsible. I think that makes a lot of sense. This chapter also states that lifelong personality patterns begin to form in childhood. This personality traits guide you through the rest of your life.

I found the section about suppression to be very interesting because it is true that we can only suppress our thoughts for a little while. It’s weird to think that we really do not have any control over our thoughts. Which is weird because we like to think that we have control over our own bodies if nothing else, but the mind is such a complex thing that we really don’t have control over what we think. The only thing that we can control is how we express our thoughts. I have found that the more I try to suppress my thoughts the more I actually think about it. For example, at night after seeing a scary movie I tell myself not to think about the scary monster from the movie, but as soon as the lights go off that is all I can think about.

I’m not completely sure what unconsciously motivates me because I am not sure if we ever completely know if we are being motivated by our unconscious or not, but if I had to guess I would say that I am unconsciously motivated to be organized. I am constantly picking up my room or organizing my folders for my classes. However I don’t really organize other places of my apartment anymore because it just annoys me when my roommates don’t keep it that way. I do try to organize everything else. Now that I think about it, I often am the one who organizes group things for my friends. My friends make fun of me a lot because they say that I can’t leave a mess for very long before I start cleaning it.

Terms: unconscious motivation, psychodynamic perspective, the unconscious, psychodynamics, ego psychology, adaptive unconscious, ego development, suppression

This chapter emphasis was on the unconscious mind. I think the unconscious mind is quit difficult to grasp. The unconscious mind is not something we think about often, it’s actually quit hidden from us, however sometimes certain events can occur triggering those suppressed memories that our unconscious holds. This chapter is broken up into four main parts, psychodynamic perspective, the unconscious, psychodynamics and ego psychology. Chapter 14 discusses numerous parts of unconscious motivation. The chapter begins by discussing psychoanalysis and the ability to study traumatic memories, repressed memories, fantasies, addictions, anxieties, dreams and other issues that can affect us mentally. These issues can have an impact on our feelings, behaviors and thoughts. Psychoanalysis reflects sex, aggression, psychopathology, and revenge. Sigmund Freud, the father of the psychoanalytic perspective, presented his view of motivation on a biologically based model. There were two instinctual drives, sex and aggression, which supplied the body with its physical and mental energies. The chapter also discusses the four postulates that define contemporary psychodynamic theory. I think this whole chapter was interesting learning about the unconscious mind, it was confusing but interesting. If I had to pick one section I think the most surprising section was adaptive unconscious. According to the book people are also able to make accurate judgments of other people’s emotions with only a micro-second of exposure to the person’s facial expressions. The judgments made by the adaptive unconscious often turn out right. When reading these sentences I kind of heard this when I was younger but I think people refer it to like a sixth sense, judging people on the first few seconds of seeing them. I’ve done this my whole life I could never explain it to anyone, there were some people who just on sight and feeling I just did not trust. Everyone would just tell me that I was mean and did not like anyone, most of my judgments were right. I honestly do not know how I am unconsciously motivated; I think there is a way of finding out your unconscious motivations something just has to trigger it to come out.
Terms: Unconscious, psychodynamics, psychoanalysis, adaptive unconscious, sex, aggression, psychopathology, ego psychology, motivation,

Chapter 14 discuses about unconscious motivation. I thought it was very interesting to read this and I enjoyed reading this chapter. The chapter first discusses psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis allows us to study topics such as traumatic memories, addictions, anxieties, dreams, hypnosis, repressed memories, and a whole host of other topics involving the unconscious mind. The subject matter of psychoanalysis seems to reflect what is popular in today's movies (which involves sex, aggression, psychopathology, and revenge). The famous (at least in the psychology world) Sigmund Freud was the father of psychoanalysis. Freud had a biological based view on motivation. In his view, the two instinctual drives of sex and aggression gave the body its physical and mental energies. But today's psychoanalysts put an emphasis on psychological wishes and cognitive information drives, rather than biological drives. Psychological wish agrees with Freudian motivation, but says that sex and aggression do not function like physiological drives.
There are four postulates that define the psychodynamic theory. The first is that much of the mental life is unconscious. This argues that thoughts, feelings, and desires exist at the unconscious level. And because the unconscious mental life affects behavior, people can behave in ways that are that are unexplainable. There are three contemporary views: Freudian unconscious, adaptive unconscious, and implicit motivation. The adaptive unconscious appraises the environment, sets goals, makes judgments, and initiates action, while our conscious mind is elsewhere. Implicit motivation is based in emotional associations that are outside of our conscious mind. When an environmental cue is encountered, emotional associations orients, directs, and selects attention such that people automatically attend to emotionally linked environmental events.
The second postulate of psychodynamics is that mental processes operate in parallel with one another. Such that it is common for people to want and fear the same thing at the same time. It is a rule (not an exception) that people have conflicting feelings that motivate them in opposing ways. This causes people to carry divergent conscious and unconscious racial attitudes, gender biases, and love/hate relationships with their parents.
The third postulate is the development of the ego. This is the postulate of psychodynamics. Healthy development is moving from immature, socially dependent personality to one that is more mature and socially responsible. The ego develops motives of its own. It goes through a developmental progression (symbiotic, impulsive, self-protective, conformist, conscientious, and autonomous) to develop this motivation. As the ego grows from immaturity to maturity, it must gain resources and strengths and a sense of competence that provides the generative capacity for changing the environment for the better.
The fourth postulate is mental representations of the self and other form a childhood to guide adult social motivations. This is the postulate of object relations. It states that lifelong personality patterns begin to form in childhood as people form mental representations of the self, others, and relationships. These beliefs form the basis of motivational states that guide the course of the adult's interpersonal relationships.
I was very interested how much the ego actually 'grows' as an individual grows from a child to an adult. I feel as you grow, so does your ego. When you experience everyday life, you gain the resources and strength from your experiences to finally mature. I thought the whole chapter was interesting to read about. It helped me get a better understanding of my own unconscious and I even tried to analyze my own unconscious, such as thinking about my actions today, both explainable and unexplainable to myself. I feel like it is possible to become aware of your unconscious motivations. But I don't think you are able to until after the fact that you did what you were unconsciously motivated to do. You can look back and analyze what you have done and whether you realized it or not. I think the unconscious is a vast world in your mind that is very interesting to learn about, but still remains a mystery. I believe that we are all unconsciously motivated in some way.

The unconscious mind is something that I do not have very much knowledge on. The unconscious mind is very intriguing to me, however. It’s amazing to learn that even though our brains control our actions and thoughts, many of those thoughts occur without us even knowing about it. The example that the book provides but also interests me is hypnosis. The hypnotist is inserting ideas and thoughts into the unconscious person’s mind, so they act in the way they want them to. Another big example of this is dreaming. While it may not be directly related to motivation and emotion, unconscious motivations cause us to have our dreams. The goals I wish to achieve by researching this chapter is how my unconscious motivation affects the way I react to specific environments.

The first idea presented in the chapter is psychodynamic perspective. Psychoanalysis holds the ultimate cause of motivation and behavior. It says that our desires, thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, all derive from our biological and social impulses. Next, it focuses on the difference between drive and wish. Take things like hunger and thirst. As time goes on, your hunger and thirst intensifies because you wish to achieve homeostasis. Hunger and thirst are drives because they are intensified until homeostasis is reached. If you take something like sexual drives or aggression, those do not intensify as time goes on. Those traits are not associated with drives because they do not need to return to homeostasis. These are referred to as psychological wishes.

The unconscious is an extremely difficult thing to research because many people hide these motivations from their private consciousness as well as the observers. The ways that Freud and other researchers studied the unconscious was by observing certain “accidents.” These things involved hypnosis, free-association, dream analysis, humor, projective tests, errors, and slip of the tongue. These things were not able to fully identify the unconscious, but they were able to shed some light on the subject. Freud divided the unconscious into three different categories which are: conscious, preconscious, and conscious, all of which were parts of the Freudian Unconscious. The conscious memory is the thoughts, feelings, and sensations in the short-term. The preconscious are the thoughts, feelings, and memories that are absent from the conscious mind.

One of Freud’s ideas was the id. He said that the id is present in children at birth. The id is what drives infants to desire their needs, like hunger and thirst. Infants do not have an ego and they cannot care about anything else except achieving homeostasis. When a child begins to develop an ego, this is when they realize and begin to understand the environment around them. They also begin to understand how they personally affect the environment.

The most surprising thing I learned in this chapter was the different kinds of unconscious motivation. It’s amazing to go to the hypnotist shows they have at the beginning of the year and see how this can be directly applied. It’s funny to see how people react when they see the hypnotist as a cop or a monster. This is a great example of how the unconscious motivation affects our lives.

I am most affected by unconscious motivation when I am achieving homeostasis. When I eat a snack or drink some water, I am not always telling my body to go do that task. Sometimes I just find myself with some Cheetos in my hand. I think I can observe my unconscious motivations when I am trying to achieve biological homeostasis. When my body is telling me that I need to go drink water, it’s not something that I necessarily think about. But if I’m taking a drink and I go, “Man I was super thirsty,” then I am observing that unconscious motivation.

Terms: unconscious, motivation, emotion, dreaming, psychodynamic perspective, psychoanalysis, drive, wish, hunger, thirst, homeostasis, psychological wishes, private consciousness, hypnosis, free-association, dream analysis, projective tests, errors, Freudian unconscious, Id, ego

In chapter 14 the discussion of unconscious minds and how they can be motivated is talked about. Psychological is linked to sex and aggression which are conceptualized as psychological wishes, than as physiological drives. Revenge and psychopathology, along with other terms linked to psychology can be found connected to psychoanalysis. This is where are behaviors can be easily changed. Sigmund Freud has a lot to deal with the meaning and defining what psychoanalysis is a reflection of. The goal of psychoanalytic therapy is to understand the confusing activities that are taken place while unconscious to free the go and deal with reality. Contemporary psychodynamic therapists focus more on helping people recognize, improve upon, or run away from their relationships that can be problematic.

There are four postulates that contemporary psychodynamic theory is defined under as. The first is being the unconscious which deals with mental life. The second is psychodynamics which is also mental and it is parallel with one another. Thirdly, is the Ego Development which is the healthy development that moves from immature to more mature and interdependent with others. Fourthly, is the Object Relations Theory this is where the self and other forms of childhood play out in guiding that person to be motivated and interact with relationships in their adulthood. These four things were the most interesting thing I learned about in this chapter, because it helped me make more sense how each one of these postulates can have an effect/affect on your life. I really liked reading about the ego development, because this part is where we are able to grow, develop, and leave behind our immature, narcissistic ways to become mature, empathic, and socially responsible beings. This makes me think of how in Junior High School many of us are socially awkward, kind of rude, not really sure what we’re doing with ourselves, other than trying to find long lasting friendships that aren’t shady. Then a few years later, once High School rolls around, and even advancing into the college age, we see the difference of maturity grow in every individual and how each one handles it differently.

What unconsciously motivates me is tricky, because I’m more of the type of person to think about doing something, over analyzing it, and then deciding whether to act upon the current situation. However, in some situations I act out of empathy for kids and the elderly. I don’t know if it’s because I’ve had the blessing to be involved with children and the elderly in my lifetime, that I have more empathy for them. But when it comes to helping them out, I’ll do it in a heartbeat. So, I believe that there is a way we can figure out how we unconsciously are motivated if we really dig deep and try to figure out what are some of the motivating forces that are connecting us to our cognitive processes to help someone or people out.

Terms: unconscious motivation, psychoanalytic therapy, psychological, contemporary psychodynamic therapists, postulates, psychodynamics, ego development, relations theory

Chapter 14 discusses the transition from Sigmund Freud’s ideas in the psychoanalytic perspective to contemporary psychologists ideas about the psychodynamic perspective. Freud’s theories from the psychoanalytic perspective focused on the idea that sexual pleasure drives human beings. He also made the unconscious a subject matter in psychology. However, over the years, many began to reject Freud’s perspective, which led to the establishment of the psychodynamic perspective, which studies the dynamic unconscious mental processes.

According to Sigmund Freud, humans have two types of impulse-drive biological forces. These two forces were Eros, or life, instincts and Thanatos, or death instincts. These were the center of Freud’s Dual-Instinct Theory. Eros instincts were those that maintain and preserve life and survival, such as nurturance, affiliation, and sex. Thanatos instincts led to inactivity and energy conservation. It also presented some of the negative affect emotions such as aggression. Individuals did not impulsively act upon these two instinctual forces. Through experience, they learned to control and direct behavior. The instincts drive behavior, while the ego, or the learned manner of defense, directs behavior.

The contemporary psychodynamic theory focuses on four postulates: The unconscious, psychodynamics, ego development, and object relations theory. The first focus, the unconscious, explains that our thoughts, feelings, and desires are motivated by the unconscious. This leads people to act impulsively without understanding of why they may have behaved in a certain way. The unconscious is responsible for implicit motivations, motives such as emotion, attitudes, judgments that may even be different from what they consciously believe. Explicit motivations are motives controlled by the conscious, such as learned values. What these two forms of motivation imply is that one can unconsciously have one attitude, while consciously thinking and expressing another. For instance, an individual can be implicitly prejudice, but explicitly fair and unprejudiced.

Psychodynamics is the clashing of the will versus the counterwill. The will is conscious and represented by the ego, while the counterwill is unconscious and represented by the id. Repression is the idea that not all of an individual’s true motives and desires enter the conscious. Regression is “the process of forgetting information or an experience by ways that are unconscious, unintentional, and automatic.” Suppression, on the other hand, is the process of consciously attempting to remove an idea, motive, or thought. According to psychologists, suppression is more or less useless because it often fails to suppress thoughts and actually turns these thoughts into obsessions. It is useful, however, because it allows people to control their behavior.

Although Freud originally discussed ego psychology, Heinz Hartmann became known as the “father of ego psychology.” He argued that the ego developed through experience. Through the development of the ego, individuals psychologically grow, mature, and adjust, and develop prosocial interdependence, competence, and autonomous functioning. The five stages through which the ego unfolds are the symbiotic stage, impulsive stage, self-protective stage, conformist stage, conscientious stage, and autonomous stage. Throughout the five stages, the ego progresses from immaturity and impulsivity (symbiotic) to self-motivating and self-regulating (autonomous). The maturing of the ego helps a person interact and adjust more effectively to his or her environment.

The last postulate, Object Relations Theory, “focuses on the nature and the development of mental representations of the self and others and on the affective processes associated with these representations.” This theory highlights the importance of interpersonal relations, especially those with family, in development of the self. Object relations theory tries to explain how people satisfy their emotional and psychological needs through their interpersonal interactions.

The most surprising and interesting thing I learned was Freud’s Dual-Instinct theory. I have never actually studied that theory, so it was something new and enlightening. It was also very fascinating to learn about the theories of the unconscious and how the unconscious drives so much of human behavior. I am unconsciously motivated by innate physiological needs, such as hunger and thirst. However, these needs do surface to the conscious level as the need to satisfy them becomes more and more pronounced. Based on the understanding of what I read in the textbook, it is not possible to become aware of unconscious motives. They can maybe be studied or observed indirectly through our explicit motives, but I don’t think that we are ever fully aware of our own unconscious motives.

Terms: psychoanalytic perspective, psychodynamic perspective, Eros, Thanatos, Dual Instinct theory, contemporary psychodynamic theory, unconscious, implicit motivation, explicit motivation, psychodynamics, will, counterwill, repression, suppression, ego psychology, object relations theory.

Chapter 14 was a discussion of unconscious motivation and started off with the topic of psychodynamics and psychoanalysis. Psychodynamics is the study of dynamic unconscious mental processes. The unconscious is the main subject of psychoanalysis and places a spotlight on aggressive urges, conflict, anxiety, repression, anxiety, and shortcomings of human nature. Psychoanalysis uses dreams, hypnosis, inaccessible memories, and fantasies that create our motives and behaviors even though we aren’t aware of the motives. The book put a lot of emphasis on the Freudian theories of the unconscious with his dual-instinct theory, along with his others views of motivation and the unconscious. Today’s psychodynamic theory consist of four postulates of the unconscious, stating that most of mental life is unconscious, psychodynamics, the mental processes operate in parallel with one another, ego development, healthy development involves moving from an immature, socially dependent personality to one that is more mature and interdependent with others, and object relations theory, the mental representations of self and others form an in childhood that guide the person’s later social motivations and relationships. Two terms that are related to psychodynamics is that of repression and suppression. Repression is the process of forgetting information or and experience by ways that are unconscious, unintentional, and automatic. Suppression on the other hand is the process of removing a thought by ways that are conscious, intentional and deliberate. When looking at suppression, it commonly fails in the fact that our thinking halts due to the fact that our thoughts precedes something that we do not wish to happen, drawing all our attention to that thought. Suppression is often used to control individuals thoughts in certain areas of their lives.

When looking at the unconscious itself, there are many different thoughts and theories ranging from Freud’s views of the unconscious to the contemporary view of the unconscious although one thing both sides agree on is that people have motives and intentions that lie outside of their everyday awareness. One way of looking at the unconscious is through dreams. Dreams are a venting function of the unconscious in that they create neurophysiologic activity, consolidate short term memories into long term memories, serve as a coping function and problem solving function. The adaptive unconscious appraises the environment sets goals, makes judgments, and initiates action all while we are consciously thinking about something else. Implicit motivation is all the motives, emotions, attitudes, and judgments that operate outside a person’s conscious awareness that relate to emotional experiences such as need for achievement, intimacy and power.

The chapter also discusses what is called ego psychology. The ego is a developmental progression toward what is possible in terms of psychological growth, maturity, adjustment, prosocial interdependence, competence, and autonomous thinking and develops among the stages of symbiotic, impulsive, conformist, conscientious, and autonomous. Ego development is important to motivation in that it develops to defend against anxiety and develops to empower the person to interact more effectively and proactively with its surroundings. Although the ego is constantly vulnerable it has defense mechanisms that buffers the consciousness against potentially overwhelming levels of anxiety that originate from conflict.

The most surprising thing that I learned in this chapter was how intricate the unconscious and conscious mind are. I found this discussion very interesting and at times very confusing due to the fact that this is an in depth conversation of the topic. I am interested for class lecture to gain an even better understanding of the topic.

When thinking of how I am unconsciously motivated not much comes to mind because I really don’t think about my unconscious motives. If I had to choose a way in which I was unconsciously motivated I would say it would be in my need for autonomy for the fact I really don’t think much about this motivation, I just seem to find ways to fulfill this need. I do think there is potential to become aware of unconscious motivations but feel it would take a lot of thinking and analyzing of different behaviors a person expresses and finding our what motivated that individual to take part in such behaviors.

Terms: Unconsciousness, Psychodynamics, Adaptive Unconscious, Implicit Motivation, Repression, Suppression, Ego Psychology

Chapter 14 is about the unconscious. The beginning explains the hype about psychoanalysis and hypnosis. Psychoanalysis is what makes the unconscious the subject matter, and the unconscious is a very interesting concept. Freud's Dual-Instinct theory deals with the death instinct, Thanatos and the life instinct, Eros. These drives towards life and death (sex and aggression respectively) provide the energy to motivate behavior. There are three main beliefs about the unconscious. Freud believed that the unconscious is a "shadow phenomenon" that cannot be known directly, but can be inferred only from its indirect manifestations such as dreams. Our adaptive unconscious appraises the environment, sets goals, makes judgments, and initiate action, all while we are consciously thinking about something else. Implicit motivation refers to the motivational concepts that are indirect, implied, or not well understood. Subliminal motivation is presented at a very weak energy level or for a very brief amount of time.
The term psychodynamics is shown in Freud's depiction of the human mind in conflict -- idea vs counteridea, will vs counterwill, deisre vs repression, excitation vs inhibition, sexual attraction vs guilt. It concerns the conflict between the conflict of the id (unconscious) and the ego (conscious). Repression is a phenomenon on the unconscious. The information we repress for one reason or another is "forgotten" information that remains in our unconscious. Suppression, however, is the attempt to stop a thought or the attempt to repress an unwanted thought.
Freud's thoughts with the id and the ego are that an infant is born with only id, and as they grow up, they develop their ego (and then their superego). This development is a progression towards was is possible in terms of psychological growth. The existence of the ego is one of vulnerability, so we develop defense mechanisms to play the protective, defensive function in the ego. The ego effects our competence in dealing with environmental challenges, demands, and opportunities. Object Relations Theory deals with mental representations of the self and others form in childhood and guide the person's later social motivations and relationships.
Two main criticisms against Freud are a) that his concepts are not scientifically testable, and b) that his concepts are not useful predictive devices.
I find all the information about the unconscious to be very interesting. I think what the most surprising thing to me was the idea of repression. It is weird to me that most of what I have repressed in my life is what makes up my unconscious. I think that it is awesome that my dreams are manifestations of my unconscious. I would think that since Freud believes that there is now way to identify our unconscious, there is also no way to correctly interpret our dreams for ourselves. This is very intriguing to me! I would love to know how I am unconsciously motivated. I think that the way I was raised had a lot to do with where my unconscious motivation is derived from. I would say that I always try to hold true to my Catholic morals and ideals when making decisions, and that my faith is always in my unconscious.

terms: unconscious, hypnosis, psychoanalysis, Freud, Dual-Instinct, Thanatos, Eros, adaptive unconscious, implicit motivation, subliminal motivation, psychodynamics, repression, supression, id, ego, superego, object relations theory, criticisms

We have looked at why we so what we do and a factors/needs/wants that drive us toward a certain goal. Most of the time why we do something is clear when we look at motivation and personality. Chapter 14 now focuses on what we do not see as easily and why we do something without realizing it. It is because of unconscious motivation. We are not aware that something is driving us to do a certain behavior. Chapter 14 has lots of information about the unconscious and how it impacts our lives. When most people think of unconscious Sigmund Freud comes to mind since he is one of the fathers of psychology/psychotherapy.

The first main concept in this chapter is Psychodynamic Perspective. The belief that most of what we do, think, and feel comes from childhood and what we learned when we were younger. This has close ties to psychoanalysis which is a rued idea. This is when he would look at the childhood to figure out why a person is doing what they are doing in adulthood. Psyhcoanylis looks at sexual desire, anxiety, repression, conflict, and ideas of this nature. Psychoanalysis is popular with people because it includes dreams, and fantasy into it making it different from all other psychology.

Many people have been suspicious over the years of this idea since Freud took it so far and had many ideas that were outside the box in his theories. One of them being the Dual-Instinct theory. People are motivated by two things, life and death. Life motivation includes air, water, food, reproduction. These are all thing that we have called physiological needs. Death, on the other hand would include ideas like depression, suicide, and anything that would lead to death. Many psychologists see motivation as much more than life and death. Since lots of activities we do so not fall as nicely into one of these categories as we would like. Stress is an example. People almost need it in their lived to push them forward, but it can also lead to depression.

Unconscious has many parts that Freud focused on. There are main ideas for it; Adaptive, Implicit, and Subliminal. They all are the unconscious and have a few ideas in common. They are all ideas that a person is not aware of; they are memories, repressed memories, wishes, and desires. They are can be easily retrieved. Adaptive is the first idea and the book describes is as being on auto polit. The person goes through the motions quiet well and does what they need to do. The Adaptive unconsciousness goes through the motions and sets goals, gets the job done, and keeps us alive without us even realizing it. Implicit this is the emotions, goals, attitudes, judgments that people make without realizing they have made them. Subliminal Motivation is little thoughts that a person does not even realize they are having. It is still a thought that can have a big impact, but the person does not even realize that thought is affecting what they are doing. Subliminal messages are a great way to advertise and get people to do what you want.

The second main idea of the chapter in Freud’s Psychodynamics. This is the idea that people do things they do not want to do all the time, so there must be more to motivation then just doing what the person wants to do. Freud determined there is a will and a counter will. They are always in a battle. Sometimes something that brings you pleasure brings you pain as well. The book used parents as an example. They give you everything, food, money, life, shelter, but also bring you embarrassment, and disappointment. Two ideas in under psychodynamics are repression and suppression. Repression is forgetting information or hiding it in the unconscious. Suppression is simply trying to not think about something. This never works because if I tell someone to not think about elephants, they will think an elephant.

One of Freud’s biggest ideas was the Ego. This is a person idea of themselves and does not let the id take over, the id always wants pleasure. The Ego helps a person do what is best for not just the self. It matures as life goes on. The Ego helps with depression also. People do not always get what they want. So the Ego helps them look at the situation and not feel depressed they did not get pleasure. The better an Ego is the better the adult life will probably be if they can handle disappointment.

This chapter was hard for me. I am not a fan of Freud most of the time. I agree that the unconscious does play a part on motivation. Subliminal messages are a good illustration of that. I have taken a marketing class and they chow lots of way to get people to buy a product and lots of them or subliminal messages. This is the way I am most affected by unconscious motivation. I feel like I see a commercial for food and suddenly want it, even if I am not hungry.

What surprised me the most/ I learned this chapter was that the Ego helps with anxiety and depression? I have always been taught that the Ego helps a person be a better more understanding adult and they are happier, but I have never thought about why that is. The Ego helps stop depression and anxiety by making it more alright that a person did not get what they wanted.

I am so indecisive when it comes to the unconsciousness. There is so much going on in a person brain that we will never see, nor do I want to know in lots of cases. The question is can we ever become aware of an unconscious minds? I believe we can work on it and think about it, but in the end it is the unconscious mind and we will never know everything going on in our minds. Even going to a physiatrist will not solve it. They might be able to bring out a little more information but not all of it. The unconsciousness will always remain a mystery.

Terms, unconscious, drive, motivation, Psychodynamic Perspective, psychoanalysis, Dual-Instinct theory, Adaptive, Implicit, and Subliminal, physiological needs, Psychodynamics, repression, suppression, Ego

Chapter 14 talks about Freud’s theories and how today we have taken part of his theory on unconscious motivation and developed it into a new category called psychodynamic. Psychodynamics shows that the human mind is full of contradiction between conscious and the unconscious. This theory stated that all drives or instincts are derived biologically and are from two categories: instinct for life and instinct for death. Instinct for life was the drives that looked for survival while the instinct for death was looking for rest and energy conservation. Freud believed that the unconscious was the mental storehouse of inaccessible instincts, repressed experiences and strong unfulfilled desires. When I think of the unconscious mind and what we are learning, I think about subliminal motivations which are messages that are only perceived by the unconscious. This chapter talks about psychodynamics use of repression and suppression. Repression is used to forget information or an experience unintentionally or unconsciously. Suppression is a little different in that thoughts are just removed in ways that are conscious and intentional. Ego psychology is also discussed in this chapter. This is described as the study of the ego which was thought to have evolved during maturation.
There were a lot of really interesting things to me in this chapter, so it was hard to choose. I decided to go with repression, because I find it interesting that people can completely block a specific event, or even hours out of their minds. I think a lot about rape victims or schizophrenic people when I hear repression. Repression is driven by anxiety and arises when an individual cannot bear to know the things about themselves that contradict their self-view or public opinion. This can occur when a tragic event happens and the mind recognizes that it is a painful memory, thus it represses it.
I believe that we are all unconsciously motivated all the time, and we are just simply unaware of it. Which is the whole part, right? We are motivated to go to school and to go to work, well hopefully you are. We are motivated to wake up, to go to bed, to shower, to eat, all of the things that are part of our daily routines that we usually don’t pay attention to. That is all us being unconsciously motivated. A big one for me is to not turn out like my mother. There are some big changes that I have done consciously but there are some unconscious things I have done as well. A few friends are the ones who have pointed them out to me, because I was unaware of them. It’s sometimes hard to get in touch with our unconscious motivations, but they’re always there. I do think it’s possible to become aware. We just need to really pay attention and think hard about the things we do and the choices we make on a day-to-day basis. I do think though that some things, that are repressed, we cannot control.

Terms: Unconscious motivation, psychodynamic, desire, subliminal motivation, repression, suppression, ego psychology, maturation, instinct for life, instinct for death, Freud

Chapter 14 was all about unconscious motivation and brought some different theories on the unconscious. I find the unconscious highly interesting (though, I have to admit that studies and research focusing on consciousness in general are also of interest to me). Anytime you talk about unconscious, you can bet that the name Freud is going to be brought up. Psychoanalytic is practitioners that stay loyal to the classic Freud concepts while psychodynamic (once thought to be the same thing) has evolved in to the study of dynamic unconscious mental processes. The psychodynamic perspective states that the cause of human motivation is based on our biology and social impulses that determine feelings, emotions, desires and behavior; basically, that motivation is not determined by the individual but rather something that happens that affects behavior without the individual’s control. Such impulses and biology include: sexual and aggressive urges, anxiety, conflict, repression, defensive mechanisms, and anxiety. He basic urges of human nature control our behavior. The major difference between psychoanalytic and psychodynamic is the different theories of Freud that some find hard to digest while also agreeing with Freud’s theory idea of unconscious mental processes. Theories that psychodynamics part with Freud are the dual-instinct theory, for example. Freud believed that bodily drives could be split up in to two: life instincts and death instincts. Life instincts are those drives that sustain life, eating, drinking, breathing, sleeping, sex, etc. The death instincts are those drives that push the individual towards rest, inactivity and energy conservation…aggression can be added. In other words life and death or sex and aggression. The contemporary psychodynamic theory involves 4 different facets: (1) the unconscious: much of mental life, (2) psychodynamics: mental processes operate at the same time parallel with each other, (3) ego development: moving from an immature and socially dependent personality to a mature and interdependent one, and (4) object relations theory: mental representations of self and others that are formed in childhood guide social motivations and relationships in later life. Research in the unconscious is difficult as it is a difficult thing to research since it is ‘hidden’ from the individual, themselves. However, there are 2 different ways to look at it: Freudian unconscious and adaptive unconscious. The Freudian unconscious believes that the unconscious is a mental warehouse for different things that can be accessed by assessing dreams, desires and repressed memories that motivate and affect an individual’s behavior and expresses impulses that are not obvious but rather symbolic. The adaptive unconscious, rather than a giant storage warehouse, is more akin to a personal assistant. It attends to environment appraisal, goal setting, making judgments, etc. while the individual is not focused on these tasks. One cannot talk about the unconscious without talking about Freud but also repression and suppression. Suppression and repression are the 2 sides of a coin, one is unconsciously controlled and the other is consciously controlled. Repression is what decides is ok to go out in to the outward world, since we have many motivations (so many that we don’t even know many of our own motivations) we tend to repress (without our knowledge) the ones that the unconscious decides is not ‘ok’ to be shown. Suppression is that same understanding of repression, the stopping of a thought, however, consciously it always fails. You can only suppress a thought for a little bit before it rises back to the surface. In fact, if I attempt to stop thinking about something, many times I end up thinking about it even more. Lastly, are the ego and id. The id is the base thing that motivates, when we are born we are all id. The id wants something and wants it now, the ego tries to curb and alleviate some of the want and need that the id has. In the end, everyone is motivated by unconscious motivation, we just don’t know the extent of it…which is the point of the unconscious. It does all of the things that we do not have to think about. I think the only way to be aware of unconscious motivations is to analyze decisions and motivated behaviors. However, I imagine the line between conscious awareness motivations and unconscious motivations is a bit fuzzy, therefore, if you start trying to analyze decisions and behaviors, I imagine it becomes difficult to determine whether or not it was conscious or unconscious. Therefore, I think you can be aware of unconscious motivations to an extent but one can never be entirely sure or clear whether it was unconscious or conscious.

TERMS: Freud, psychodynamic, psychoanalytic, dual-instinct theory, sexual and aggressive urges, anxiety, conflict, repression, defensive mechanisms, anxiety, life instincts, death instincts, the unconscious, ego development, object relations theory, Freudian unconscious, adaptive unconscious, suppression, ego, id

I loved this chapter, I have always been intrigued about the unconscious mind and what role it plays, I obviously don’t or didn’t know much about the topic so I found reading this chapter to be very educational. First off, in my opinion you can’t talk about the unconscious without first talking about Freud and his psychoanalytical theory; which focuses on the unconscious mind but uses techniques and tools such as dreaming and hypnosis to study the process of the unconscious mind. When looking at the psychoanalytic approach versus psychodynamic they both represent the study unconscious mental processes, however the psychodynamic approach allows a person to study outside of the Freudian principles (psychodynamic approach). One approach of Freud’s, the Dual-Instinct Approach, is not widely used or accepted in today’s society. This theory basically states that we have two categories for instincts, an instinct for life ( Eros) and an instinct for death (Thanatos).
Looking further at contemporary psychodynamic theory, there are four postulates that define it. One being much of our mental life is unconscious, that our thoughts and desires live within an unconscious level. This entire thing just awed me because we can see the things that motivate us or bring up certain feelings, but to think there are things we don’t realize is just very interesting. Then there’s the adaptive unconscious which sets goals, makes judgments and initiates action, all while we are thinking about something else; talk about creepy, Implicit motivation which is rooted in emotions outside of our conscious awareness, which can be activated by our environments. The second postulate looks at mental processes and that they operate parallel with one another, meaning people can experience the same wants and fears at the same time, we have conflicting feelings that can motivate us in opposite ways; I have always called this a love-hate relationship. The third postulate is of the way our ego develops, or looking at how we mature as we age. from being dependent and immature to responsible and mature, which regardless of what the book says I still think some people don’t have this ego development. The last postulate is contemporary psychodynamic understanding, stating that our mental representations of others and our self-form in our childhood which help guide our adult social motivations. This postulate argues that our life long personality can be attributed to our childhood and the environment we were brought up in.
Moving past Freud and the knowledge that is based off of his beliefs and findings, the book then leads into the unconscious, the unconscious to me is very intriguing and mind boggling probably because of the fact that I really can’t figure it out; no matter how hard I try. It’s not something that is observable or able to be accessed through our conscious. Freud looked at our everyday life in three different parts, conscious, preconscious, and unconscious. Conscious is everything were aware of, preconscious is our thoughts and memories that are obtainable through our conscious. The unconscious is everything that inaccessible, from childhood memories to repressed experiences. Looking at the adaptive unconscious kind of looks at the unconscious being on auto-pilot, this reminded me of the movie “click” in which his everyday routines became boring so eventually he skipped over them via a ‘universal remote’.
The chapter then looks at psychodynamics and our own internal war, basically stating that we have ideas and wills, but we also have counters to those ideas and wills, and when these two are in conflict then we are not satisfied, resulting in defense mechanisms. First one being repressions, which is the process of forgetting info and experiences by ways that are unconscious, repression is something that’s not necessarily proven true. Suppression is the process of removing a thought from attention by ways that are conscious. Lastly the book looks at the ego, which is our personality that is developed through learning and our experiences, this is the ‘immature to mature’ idea. The ego also helps to defend against our anxieties and to empower people.
I actually enjoyed everything about this chapter, I was surprised by everything I learned but in all honestly im probably more frustrated now after reading it then I was before, I find it to be a good frustration though. Something that I enjoyed though was that our unconscious motivates us, and the fact we cant observe or explain that motivation is the fascinating part.
When it comes to thinking about my own unconscious motivations I find that to be a difficult question, but I personally have always thought about my unconscious mind ever since I learned about it in high school, I think I’m unconsciously motivated in the fact that im going to school, I mean I know I want a good education and job but there has to be an unconscious motivator along with that otherwise I probably would have dropped out along time ago and just gone shoe shopping with all my loans, honestly. I think that we could become intune with our unconsciousness, but then again if that happened would it still be considered to be apart of our unconscious, or is that now our consciousness.
Terms: unconscious, Freud, psychoanalytical theory, psychodynamic theory, dual instinct approach, thanatos, Eros, contemporary psychodynamic theory, adaptive unconscious, implicit motivations, ego development, conscious, preconscious, unconscious, adaptive unconscious, repression, suppression, ego,