Theories of Personality

Maslow: Holistic-Dynamic
Theory

Chapter 10
 Outline
• Overview of Holistic-Dynamic
Theory
• Biography of Maslow
• Maslow’s View of Motivation
• Self-Actualization
• Philosophy of Science
• Measuring Self-Actualization
 Outline

• The Jonah Complex

• Psychotherapy
• Related Research
• Critique of Maslow
• Concept of Humanity
Overview of Holistic-Dynamic Theory

• Assumes Whole Person Is Motivated by

One Need or Another

• People Have Potential to Grow toward

Psychological Health/Self-Actualization

• Lower Level Needs Must Be Satisfied

Before Higher Level Needs Can Be Met
 Biography of Maslow
• Born in New York City in 1908
• Oldest of seven children of Russian-
Jewish immigrants
• Harbors lifelong animosity toward
mother
• Received a PhD in 1934 in psychology
from University of Wisconsin where he
worked with Harry Harlow
 Biography (cont’d)

• Returns to New York in 1935 and works

with E. L. Thorndike at Columbia University
• Met and was influenced by Alfred Adler,
Erich Fromm, and Karen Horney
• In 1951, became chairperson of the
psychology department at Brandeis
University
• President of American Psychological
Association 1967-1968
• Died in 1970 of a heart attack
 Maslow’s View of Motivation
• Holistic Approach to Motivation
• Motivation Is Complex
• People Are Continually Motivated by
One Need or Another
• All People Everywhere Are Motivated by
the Same Basic Needs
• Needs Can Be Arranged on a Hierarchy
 Hierarchy of Needs
• Conative or Basic Needs
– Physiological
– Safety
– Love and belongingness
– Esteem
– Self-Actualization
• Aesthetic Needs
– The need for order and beauty
• Cognitive Needs
– The need for curiosity and knowledge
• Neurotic Needs
– An unproductive relating to other people
 General Discussion of Needs
• Reversed Order of Needs
• Unmotivated Behavior
– Conditioned reflexes, maturation, drugs
• Expressive Behaviors
– An end in itself, no purpose than to be
– Person’s mode of expressions
– Looking stupid, being relaxed
• Coping Behaviors
– Effortful, learned and triggered by external environment
– Coping with the environment
• Instinctoid Nature of Needs
– Frustration of instinctoid need causes pathology
 Self-Actualization
• Maslow’s Quest for the Self-Actualized Person
• Criteria for Self-Actualization
• Free from psychopathology
• Have progressed through hierarchy of needs
• Embracing of the B-values
• Full use of talents, capacities, and potentialities
• Values of Self-Actualizers
• Motivated by Eternal Verities or B-Values
• Metamotivation
 Self-Actualization (cont’d)
• Characteristics of Self-Actualizing People
– More efficient perception of reality
– Acceptance of self, others, and nature
– Spontaneity, simplicity, and naturalness
– Problem-centering
– The need for privacy
– Autonomy
– Continued freshness of appreciation
– The peak experience
 Self-Actualization (cont’d)
• Characteristics of Self-Actualizing People (cont.)
– Gemeinschaftsgefuhl
• social interest, community feeling, sense of oneness with all
humanity
– Profound interpersonal relations
– The democratic character structure
– Discrimination between means and ends
– Philosophical sense of humor
– Creativeness
– Resistance to enculturation
• Love, Sex, and Self-Actualization
 Philosophy of Science

• Maslow argued for a humanistic, holistic

approach that is not value free
• Psychological science should stress the
importance of individual procedures
• Scientists should put values, emotion, and
ritual back into their work and be creative in
their pursuit of knowledge
 Measuring Self-Actualization

• Personal Orientation Inventory (POI)

• Comprehensive measure of the values and
behaviors of self-actualizing people
• Short Index of Self-Actualization
• Brief Index of Self-Actualization
Four factors:
1. Core self-actualization
2. Autonomy
3. Openness to experience
4. Comfort with solitude
 The Jonah Complex
• The Jonah complex is an abnormal syndrome
defined as the fear of being or doing one’s
best
• Probably all of us have some timidity about
seeking perfection or greatness
• People allow false humility to stifle creativity,
and therefore they prevent themselves from
becoming self-actualizing
 Psychotherapy
• The aim of therapy is for clients to embrace
the being-values
• Clients must be freed from their dependence
on others so that their natural impulse to grow
can become active
• Psychotherapy must not be value free
 Critique of Maslow

• Maslow’s Theory Is:

– Very High on Organizing Knowledge
– High on Guiding Action
– Moderate on Generating Research,
Internal Consistency, and Parsimony
– Low on Falsifiability
 Concept of Humanity
• Free Choice over Determinism
• Optimism over Pessimism
• Teleology over Causality
• Conscious over Unconscious
• Equal Emphasis on Culture and Biology
• Uniqueness over Similarity