9. MASLOW'S THEORY OF SELF-ACTUALIZATION. Self-actualization theory was based upon the work of the existential philosophers. It argued that man possesses the capability for a meaningful, viable, potential-filling existence, and that he has the properties and the nature to implement a meaningful existence, but that he has been prevented from engaging and behaving in this meaningful, self-actualizing manner by the conditions and environments in which he lives. He is forced to behave in some suboptimal manner in which he is not able to fulfill himself (or self-actualize) because of the nature of the environmental forces that surround him. Maslow (1954, 1968) was the founder of the self-actualization movement in America. It began when Maslow (1970) revised his original text, Motivation and Personality because he believed "the irritating fact is that this veritable revolution (a new image of man, of society, of nature, of science, of ultimate values, of philosophy, etc.) is still almost completely overlooked by much of the intellectual community, especially that portion of it that controls the channels of communication to the educated public and to youth. For this reason, I have taken to calling it the Unnoticed Revolution (p. 10). Many professional community members, he observed, maintain a negative outlook on the future. They: 1. Exhibit a profound despair and cynicism which emanates from a belief that there is corrosive malice and cruelty present in the world and there is not much that can be done about it. 2. Doubt the "realness of honesty, of kindness, of generosity, of affection, and go beyond a reasonable skepticism or a withholding of judgment into an active hostility when confronted by people whom they sneer at as fools, innocents, do-gooders, or Pollyannas (Maslow, 1970, p. 2). Given such a world view, Maslow (1970) believed the only solution to end the despair was to accept a holistic concept of reality. His hypothesis was that the holistic way of thinking and seeing seemed to come quite naturally to healthier, self- actualizing people, and seemed to be extraordinarily difficult for less evolved, less mature, less healthy people. Maslow used this approach in clinical, social, and experimental ways. He found that it fit well with the personal experience of most people. A structured theory like his made it possible for people to make better sense of their personal lives. He admitted his theories lacked experimental verification and support, but in time he believed, his theories would be validated by research. McGregor (1960) applied this holistic theory of motivation to the industrial situation and found that it was useful in ordering his data and observations. From the industrial rather than the laboratory setting, empirical support developed for Maslow's hierarchy of needs theories. According to Maslow (1970) human life can never be fully understood unless its highest aspirations are considered. Growth, striving toward good health, the quest for identity and autonomy, self-actualizing which results in a yearning for excellence in whatever the individual does, need to be accepted as the most universal human tendencies (p. 3). He believed: ...that if we become fully aware of these human traits, if we can give up the dream of permanent and uninterrupted happiness, if we can accept the fact that we will be only transiently ecstatic and then inevitably discontented and grumbling for more, that then we may be able to teach the general population what self-actualizing people do automatically, i.e., to be able to count their blessings, to be grateful for them, and to avoid the traps of making either/or choices (p. 17). In order for the individual to overcome the lows and highs in life, he will need to undertake the delicate task of trying to uncover his temperament or personality type so that he can grow unhampered in his own individual style. Though Maslow (1970) believed that self-actualizing subjects transcended nationalities, class, and caste, he accepted, a priori, that affluence and social dignity make them more probable. A priori plans for a child, ambitions for it, prepared roles, even hopes that it will become this or that, all these are non-Taoistic according to Maslow (1954). They represent demands upon the child that it become what the parent has already decided it should become. Such a baby is born into an invisible straitjacket. In order to overcome this dilemma, the individual needs to seek his own identity, his own needs, and his own level of self-actualization. Maslow assumed: The actualization of a person's real potentialities is conditioned upon the presence of basic-need satisfying parents and other people, upon all factors now called "ecological," upon the "health" of the culture, or the lack of it, upon the world situation, etc. Growth toward self- actualization and full human-ness is made possible by a complex hierarchy of "good preconditions." These physical, chemical, biological, interpersonal, cultural conditions matter for the individual finally to extent that they do or do not supply him with the basic human necessities and "rights" which permit him to become strong enough, and person enough, to take over his own fate (p. 24). In the search for what motivates the individual, methods, techniques, and logic often get in the way. This does not minimize the need for some orderly procedures in attempting to understand what is clearly in the affective domain of the human being. However, many scholars write big monographs on little subjects. Some call this effort "original research." What matters to them most is that they find facts that were not known before, not that the facts are worth knowing. Their justification for their work is that some other specialist might sooner or later make use of them. The specialists, like mound builders, write for one another, for mysterious ends (Van Doren, 1936). The need to seek new explanations for old behaviors and beliefs is necessary for the advancement of the human body of knowledge. Tradition in science and sociology can be a dangerous blessing. Loyalty is an unqualified peril. Anshen (1934) believed humans "tend to do things that we know how to do, instead of trying to do things that we ought to do (p. 446). Motivation is a part of this "ought" in human life. Humans take few risks because they are unwilling to fail and thereby diminish their own self-esteem. MacLeish (1954) maintained "It is the questions that we do not know" that prompt research regarding motivation and change. Hence, we must continue to ask, what motivates people? Maslow's (1954) theory incorporated sixteen propositions that he believed must be considered when making any sound explanation of what motivates human beings. He maintained that some of them were so true that they sounded like platitudes. Others he found to be less acceptable and more debatable. 1. The Individual as an Integrated Whole. The first proposition stated that "the individual is an integrated, organized whole." In Maslow's framework, this means many specific things. The whole individual is motivated rather than just part of him. There is no such thing as just the need of the stomach, or mouth, or a genital need. There is only the need of the individual. Bert Nemcik wants food, not just Bert Nemcik's stomach. Satisfaction comes to the whole individual and not just to part of him. Food satisfies Bert Nemcik's hunger and not his stomach's hunger. When an individual is hungry, not only is his stomach growling, but other areas of him are affected. His perceptions change (he will perceive food more readily than he will at other times); his memory changes (he is apt to remember a good meal at this time more than at others); his emotions change (he is more tense and nervous than at other times); the content of his thinking changes (he is more apt to thing about getting food than solving math problems). When Bert Nemcik is hungry, he is hungry all over and not just in his stomach (p. 20). 2. Hunger as Paradigm. The common assumption is that all drives follow the example set by physiological drives. Most drives cannot be isolated from one another. The typical human desire is a need of the whole person. It is important for the individual to accept the interrelatedness of the separate but not unique drives present within the self. The hunger drive which seems so simple when compared to the drive for love is actually not so simple in the end (Goldstein, 1939). The motivation researcher faced with the choice of dealing with either (1) experimentally simple problems that are trivial or invalid, or (2) experimental problems that are fearfully difficult but important, the choice needs to be the latter (p. 21). 3. Means and Ends. In examining daily living, desires are usually a means to an end rather than an end in themselves. Earning money is necessary for an individual who wants to purchase a car. Money is the means to the end. Studying symptoms is not so important as placing them in some overall context. A deeper analysis into what goals or needs are behind what drives the individual leads to a greater understanding of what motivates people. Conscious motivational behaviors cannot explain unconscious ones. Psychoanalysis demonstrates that ultimate unconscious aims need not be direct at all. Sound motivation theory must consider the unconscious life as well in order to connect the inner and external means that produce a desired end (p. 21). 4. Desire and Culture. Anthropological evidence indicates that fundamental desires of all human beings do not differ nearly as much as do their conscious everyday desires. Two different cultures may provide completely different means to satisfy a particular desire. Maslow (1954) described how self-esteem in one society might be fulfilled by becoming a good hunter, while in another, the individual would become a great warrior. The dynamics are the same. Ends are more universal than the roads taken to achieve them. 5. Multiple Motivations. Psychopathology research indicates that a conscious desire or motivated behavior is allied with another and serves as a channel through which other purposes may express themselves. For example, sexual behavior and conscious sexual desires may be tremendously different in their underlying, unconscious purposes. The sexual desire may have the same content in individuals, but we know this to be inaccurate. This holds true for both preparatory and consummatory sexual behavior. Maslow (1954) emphasized that it is unusual that an act or conscious wish have but one motivation (p. 23). 6. Motivating States. Static psychology would be satisfied to analyze what a person is feeling, say, depressed, and put a period to this assessment. Dynamic psychology would attempt to imply that many things are involved in this feeling of depression. This feeling causes repercussions in all parts of the organism. There may be tension, strain, and unhappiness as a result. The feeling may prompt many behavioral responses. The feeling of depression is a self motivating state. Maslow (1970) believed motivational theory should assume that it is a constant, never ending, fluctuating, and complex organismic state of being (p. 24). 7. Relationships and Motivations. According to Maslow (1979) human beings are a "wanting animal" and rarely reach a state of complete satisfaction except for a short period time. Once one desire is satisfied another arises to take its place. Throughout life, humans are always desiring something. The appearance of the drive or desire and the actions that it arouses and the satisfaction that comes from attaining the goal, all taken together, give the individual only an isolated instance taken out of the total complex of the human motivational unit. Thus, motivation depends on the state of satisfaction or dissatisfaction present within the human being. Wanting something else, according to Maslow, implies that there is an already existing satisfaction of other wants. The starving artist will not paint much when his stomach is growling. Many motivational theorists pay little attention to the fact that the human being is never satisfied except in a one-step-along-the- path fashion and wants seem to arrange themselves in some sort of hierarchy of need. 8. List of Drives. Lists of drives and needs are unsound motivational theory. They imply an equality of the various drives that are listed. Secondly, they imply each is isolated from the other. Thirdly, these lists are usually based purely on behavior neglecting completely all that is known about the nature of drives. There is no arithmetic progression from one to another. Rather, they arrange themselves in a hierarchy of needs, with the lowest progressing toward the highest which is self actualization. There is no mutual exclusiveness between drives, Maslow (1970) wrote, but an overlapping which blurs any simple recognition of one being different from another. When referring to physiological needs, it is easy to separate instigation from the goal object. But it is not easy to distinguish the drive and goal object from the drive when dealing with the desire of love. The drive and the desire, the goal object, seem to be the same thing but are distinctly different (p. 26). 9. Classification of Motivational Life. Maslow (1970) believed that the only basis on which any classification of motivational life can be constructed is that of the fundamental goals or needs rather than on any listing of drives. Only the fundamental goals remain constant through all the flux that a dynamic approach forces upon psychology theorizing. Motivating behavior is not a sound basis for classification because there are too many variables which affect such activity. An individual going through the whole process of sexual desire, courting behavior, and consummatory love making may actually be seeking self-esteem rather than sexual gratification. Only by a process of logical exclusion are we able to isolate goals or needs as the foundation for classification in motivation theory (Murray, 1938). 10. Motivation and Animal Data. Researchers have relied largely on animal experimentation in developing theories of motivation. White rats are not human beings and therefore, some of the research that theories have been based on are not accurate for humans. As we go up the phyletic scale, instincts begin to disappear and appetites become more important and hungers less. As instincts begin to drop away, there is more emphasis and dependence on culture as an adaptive tool. In order to use any animal data, we must realize that we are much more like primates (monkeys) than white rats (Harlow, 1953; Harlow, 1960; Harlow, 1962; Harlow, 1964; Harlow & Harlow, 1965; Harlow & Harlow, 1966; Howells & Vine, 1940). 11. Environment. Human motivation rarely actualizes itself in behavior except in relation to the situation and to other people. Any theory of motivation must take into consideration environment, the organism, and the role of cultural determination. Maslow (1970) cautioned the theorizer from going to extremes. The individual partly creates the barrier which impedes him from achieving his need, want, or goal. For instance, the child who struggles to attain a certain object of value to him and is restrained by some barrier, determines not only that the object is of value, but also that the barrier is a barrier. Psychologically, there is no such thing as a barrier; there is only a barrier for a particular person who is trying to get something that he wants. Sound motivation theory, according to Maslow, must take into account the situation, but must never become pure situational theory. Unless we are willing to give up a search for an understanding of the nature of the constancy of the organism in favor of understanding the world it lives in, we will not achieve any fully functional theory of motivation (p. 29). 12. Integration. Motivation theory must take into account that the organism behaves ordinarily as an integrated whole and sometimes it does not. The organism seems to be most unified when it is successfully facing either a great joy or creative moment, or when it is facing a major problem or threat or emergency situation. Due to our lack of ignorance or our ability to understand the whole person, we sometimes are incapable of deciding which part of the individual is controlling the whole. It is becoming clear now, that such functioning is not necessarily to be regarded as evidence of weak, bad, or pathological motivations. Rather, it is to be regarded as evidence of one of the most important capacities of the organism: the ability to deal with problems in a partial, specific, or segmental fashion so that the main capacities of the organism are still left free for the more important and more challenging problems it will face (Goldstein, 1939). 13. Non-motivated Behavior. Not all behaviors or reactions are motivated by some seeking for what is lacked or needed. The phenomenon of maturation, of expression, and of growth or self-actualization are all instances of exceptions to this rule of universal motivation. Maier (1939) proposed that most neurotic symptoms or trends amount to basic need-gratification-bent impulses that have somehow been stymied or misdirected or confused with other needs or fixated on the wrong means. They have no goal but to prevent further hurt, threat, or frustration. Maier (1949) believed the difference is like that between the fighter who still hopes to win and the one who has no hope of winning, but tries only to lose as painfully as possible. Klee (1951) wrote that since giving up and hopelessness are definitely of considerable relevance to prognosis in therapy, to expectations of learning, even to longevity, all these facets of human behavior must be considered in any definitive motivation theory. 14. Possibility of Attainment. Dewey (1939) and Thorndike (1940) stressed one important aspect of motivation that was completely neglected by most psychologists, namely, possibility. Humans yearn for that which might conceivably be attained. We are much more realistic about wishing than the psychoanalysts might allow, absorbed as they are with unconscious wishes. Attention to this factor of possibility of attainment is crucial for understanding the differences in motivations between various classes within our own population and between it and other poorer countries and cultures. 15. Influence of Reality. For Freud (1933) an id impulse is a discrete entity having no intrinsic relatedness to anything else in the world, not even to other id impulses: We can come nearer to the id with images, and call it a chaos, a cauldron of seething excitement....These instincts fill it with energy, but it has no organization and no unified will, only an impulsion to obtain satisfaction for the instinctual needs, in accordance with the pleasure principle. The law of logic--above all, the law of contradiction--do not hold for processes in the id. Contradictory impulses exist side by side without neutralizing each other or drawing apart; at most they combine in compromise formations under the empowering economic pressure towards discharging their energy. There is nothing in the id which can be compared to negation, and we are astonished to find it in an exception to the philosopher's assertion that space and time are necessary formations of our mental acts....Naturally, the id knows no values, no good and evil, no morality. The economic or quantitative factor which is so closely bound up with the pleasure-principle, dominates all its processes. Instinctual catharsis seeking discharge is all that the id contains (pp. 103-105) Dewey (1940) contended that all impulses, at least in the adult, are integrated with and affected by reality. He maintained that there are no id impulses, and if there are, they are intrinsically pathological rather than intrinsically healthy. Maslow (1970) noted the contradiction between the two authors and asked, at what point in the life history does the infantile fantasy begin to be modified by a perception of reality? Is it the same for all, neurotic and healthy alike? Can the efficiently functioning human being maintain completely free of such influence any hidden corner of his impulse life? Or if it does turn out that such impulses do exist in all of us, when do they appear, under what conditions, and must they be in opposition to reality? (p. 33). 16. Knowledge of Healthy Motivation. The motivational life of neurotic sufferers should be rejected as a paradigm for healthy motivation. Any theory of motivation that is worthy of attention must begin with the highest capacities of the healthiest, strongest human beings as well as the defensive maneuvers of crippled spirits (Maslow, 1970, p. 33). Maslow's work involved an attempt to answer many of the questions raised above in these 16 points. He wanted to evaluate the nature of human motivation from all perspectives. His enquiries set the stage for the development of the first inclusive theory which contained holistic concepts that enhanced the image of mankind in the context of the human condition of life.