Motivation Continued

The Arousal Motive:

e.g. when nervous or excited have higher levels of physiological activation (more adrenaline)

when sleepy have very low levels of physiological activation

What is the Optimal Arousal?

• Yerkes-Dodson Law:

 

 

• performance on a task is best for an intermediate level of arousal, and performance gets worse for extremely low and high levels of arousal

e.g.

 

•  

 

 

 

e.g. the optimal arousal level for doing a simple addition problem would be higher than for doing a complex geometry problem.

 

 

• optimal arousal is also higher for well-learned tasks than for novel tasks.

 

 

 

• the optimal arousal level for a given task will vary from person to person depending on their background.

 

 

e.g. an outstanding math student will have a higher optimal level of arousal for doing arithmetic than would a poor math student. (so an outstanding student may have to "psych up" before an exam and the poor student might have to relax)

 

 

 

 

• Optimal Arousal and Sports Performance:

• if have too much arousal

 

 

e.g. Basketball: if think about movements on how to shoot a free throw, then the normal automatic process will be disrupted.

 

 

• if have too little arousal

 

 

 

• Sonstroem & Bernardo (1982) Research on female collegiate basketball players

 

 

 

Sensory Deprivation -

 

 

e.g. studies of reports from Arctic explorers, prisoners in solitary confinement, and shipwrecked sailors.

 

 

• though people differ in the amount of arousal they prefer, all people require at least a minimal amount for our brains to function properly.

• if deprived of sensory stimulation

 

 

 

• due to brain's attempt to restore its optimal level of arousal.

 

• Bexton, Heron & Scott (1954) -- Participants were confined to a bed in a soundproof room (only hum of a fan). They wore translucent goggles to reduce visual sensations and cotton gloves and cardboard tubes over their arms (reduce touch sensations). They were permitted to leave the bed only to eat or to use the toilet. Their task was to stay in the room for as long as they could tolerate.

   

  Results:

 

 

 

• Was a tactic used in "brainwashing" by Chinese communists during the Korean War. Deprived prisoners of social and physical stimulation and it was so unpleasant, they cooperated with their captors just to receive more stimulation.

 

Flotation Restricted Environmental Stimulation: (a.k.a. sensory deprivation tank)

• participants float in a dark, soundproof tank filled with warm salt water. (for limited periods)

 

 

• used to reduce arousal without causing distress or cognitive impairment

 

 

Sensation Seeking -

 

e.g. Would you prefer to ride a roller coaster or lie on a beach?

e.g. Would you prefer to attend a lively party or have a quiet conversation?

 

 

 

 

• People with high sensation seeking prefer activities that increase their arousal levels while low sensation seekers prefer activities that decrease arousal.

   

  • high sensation seekers are more likely to participate in risky activities

   

   

  • McNamara & Ballard (1999) - found college students who scored higher in sensation seekend preferred more arousing music than those who scored lower in sensation seeking.

   

   

  • high sensation seekers are more likely to engage in dangerous habits

   

   

 

Note: these are all correlational designs and so we cannot infer causality. It is not necessarily the case that sensation seeking causes risky behaviors.