Tuesday, June 18, 2019

PSYCHOLOGY OF TEACHING AND LEARNING :: NEEDS, MOTIVATION & MASLOW's HIERARCHY THEORY OF NEEDS.



Needs are the necessities that an individual have throughout his or her life. If the needs are satisfied, individuals feel motivated. Every individual have many needs, it can be materialistic or quantity based or can be qualitative in nature. Today through this blog, I am going to help my audiences understand the various needs of an individual and thrown light on the ‘Maslow’s Hierarchy Theory of Needs’. We are going to discuss how completion of the needs leads to motivation. 

A motivation can be verbal from other individual or can be by fulfilment of the needs he or she have. Motivation gives an individual the power of hundreds of elephants to tackle all the challenges life throws at you.

Motivation has been studied by psychologists since the early 1970’s. Any action of human beings needs motivation. A motivated person does his or her activity properly. When we talk about the children, who are the future of our country or say the ambassadors of world peace, they need motivation for learning as well. Even we need motivation at times to finish a task or to learn something new. This motivation is the central factor in the process of learning. It brings out the interest of an individual to learn. Motivation is the crucial factor in classroom management; it affects learning and the behaviour of students.

The term motivation originated from a Latin word motum, which means motion. Motivation arouses the interest in learning and doing something. By doing something unusual and learning continuously we become more wise and humble in our life. Motivation is the inner state of arousal which energises the individual to act on the goal attainment. Motivation works at the level of subconscious mind and help individual adapt to things faster.

To further understand the concept of motivation let me quote an example of two situations.
Situation 1: A person surrounded with negativities.
Situation 2: A person supported by people with positivity.

Let’s discuss both the situations:
 In situation 1, the person is surrounded with negativities. People who are too judgemental. People who de-motivates the individual, who back bite him and finally causes him to feel insecure. What do you feel, isn’t motivation an important need that affects an individual so much? Consider situation 2, the person is supported by people with positivity. People who are positive and have good attitude towards things will help each other and build each other. Finally motivating and strengthening each other and finally leading to a much better society. We need to understand the fact that we want leaders for our growing economy, we need leaders who will bring world peace and join the nations. Every individual and his or her actions and behaviour affects the society, nation, world and the universe. We all are a part and parcel of it.

Now imagine a situation where we are talking about children in this context, tiny little creatures taking so much of negativity. They cannot even express the pain due to lack of words and maturity at that age. It is important to understand that the first contact of the child i.e. the parents, grandparents, relatives and maids at home and then the second contact of the child i.e. the teachers, principal, peers etc. Everyone matters in the process of growth of an individual and children as whole. Children are like sponges. Whatever you speak before them, they just absorb. 

Maslow (1971) argued that a humanistic educational approach would develop people who are “stronger, healthier, and would take their own lives into their hands to a greater extent. With increased personal responsibility for one’s personal life, and with a rational set of values to guide one’s choosing, people would begin to actively change the society in which they lived”.

In today’s scenario we are complicating the situation with extra case towards the children. It is true that motivation, love and affection are important but with that over flooding the needs, will lead to a difficult situation. Parents should keep a proper gateway to the needs that are being provided to a child. Every human has to struggle finally in his or her life to achieve whatever he or she wants. We are making their life so easy and simple thinking its care and concern. But during harsh time, when they face a problem or a challenge they are becoming handicapped literally and giving up or ending their lives.

 Think about the same child, who fought for 9 months in the womb of his or her mother just gave up...….

Giving up is very easy in life, what is to be taught is to find ways to fight back and to stand strong; these are the life skills which need to be taught to the children. It has a greater impact when taught by parents than the teachers. To teach the children that we need to be like water. Flexible like water, attaining the shape of a container. Teach the child to adapt to whatever situation lies before. Being a parent or teacher the best advice we can give to a child is, move ahead I am with you!! What more does he or she needs than motivation.

 On the same contrary correcting the child is also very important but positively without comparing the child, without being too judgemental recollecting the odds of past. Every child is unique, different and special. Once we understand this fact, that makes the child unique and special from others, handling the child becomes very easy. We can make a child do anything and everything, the only point is to find the unique factor and the proper direction to be given.


Abraham Maslow (1954) had developed a hierarchical order of needs from physiological to self-actualization needs. Maslow’s theory is also known as ‘Self-actualization Theory’.

Maslow classified the needs starting from the basic survival or lower order needs to higher order needs. They are Physiological needs, Safety needs, Love or belongingness needs, Esteem needs, Cognitive needs, Aesthetic needs and Self-actualization needs. Maslow says that these needs can be arranged in a hierarchy. A man is never satisfied by all his needs. If one need is satisfied another need will arise and it is a human tendency.

I even want my audiences to understand the fact that we cannot satisfy any individual 100%. Don’t stress so much upon yourself, rather do things that make you happy at first place or fulfil your needs and make you feel motivated.

Going back to Maslow’s Theory:
Maintenance needs: The first four needs such as physiological needs, safety needs, love or belongingness needs and esteem needs are considered to be maintenance needs or motives. These needs are strong and are recurring. They become very strong, when they are denied. These needs basically are granted or denied by external factors.
Growth needs: The other three needs cognitive, aesthetic need and self-actualization needs are considered to be growth needs and they spring and bloom from within. They are mild and continuing. They grow strong if fulfilled. With respect to children, maintenance needs should be satisfied among students when they are educated. Growth needs should be made realized of by teachers to students for their benefit and future goal accomplishment. 




In the hierarchy if the first need is satisfied the next becomes dominant and reaches self-actualization need, which is the highest level of functioning. Let’s discuss each need briefly.

1. Physiological Needs: These are the most potent of all and are the basic needs required for the existence of an individual. These needs are also called as biological needs. Need for food, water, oxygen, rest, sleep, elimination of wastes from body is fundamental for the survival of the individual. 


2. Safety Needs: Once the physiological needs are granted, these needs become dominant. It includes security and order. E.g. when the child goes to the school for the first time, he/she weeps and cries of losing the safety.

3. Love or Belongingness Needs: These needs emphasize the gregarious nature of human. Everybody has a desire to love and to be loved. It helps in motivating the individual and maintains a pleasant and happy relationship with others.

4. Esteem Needs: It means prestige, social status, reputation, self-esteem, self-respect and self-regard. Every individual wants to look high in the eyes of the others. One feels hurt, if his/her self-respect is injured. Esteem need also include an individual’s achievement. Every individual manifests the need for achievement. The achievement of an individual depends upon his talent and the environment.

When a child enters a school, the most important thing for him/her is to overcome the emotional pain which he/she experiences. Providing him/her with food and safety will satisfy him/her partially. Love, care and belongingness of a very higher order which can replace the emotional pain that the child is experiencing can do wonders..... Curriculum makers need to give that extra space to child to settle first. Once the child becomes teacher’s pet, to mould the child is not difficult. This logic applies to all the schools, colleges, universities and professionals as well. Time can settle things in a better manner than unnecessary hush and rush.

5. Cognitive Needs: It includes knowledge, understanding, curiosity, exploration, need for meaning and predictability.

6. Aesthetic Needs: Aesthetic needs mean appreciation of beauty and order of things or arrangement of things appropriately. Every one derives pleasure in appreciation of beauty, music and nature. E.g. poets.

7. Self-actualization Needs: Self actualization means maximum development of an individual, whatever he or she is capable of. It means to fulfil one individual’s nature in all its aspects. A self-actualizer is free from all the restrains of a society and wants to attain perfection in all the aspects of the life. It is the highest need. For Maslow, a person is always 'becoming' and never remains static in these terms. It’s actually a dynamic process.  In self-actualization, a person comes to find a meaning to life that is important to them. In this stage they try to challenge the reason for their existence. As each individual is unique, the motivation for self-actualization leads people in different directions (Kenrick et al., 2010). For some people self-actualization can be achieved through creating works of art or literature, for others through sport, in the classroom situation, or within a corporate setting.


8. Transcendence Needs: When an individual helps others to reach self-actualization. Person is so much motivated by values which transcends beyond the personal self. E.g. service to others.


Every individual is capable and has the desire to move up the hierarchy towards a level of self-actualization. Unfortunately, progress is often disrupted by a failure to meet lower level needs. Life experiences, challenges and loss, may cause a person to fluctuate between the levels of the hierarchy. Therefore, not everyone will move through the hierarchy in a one-directional manner but may move back and forth between the different types of needs.

Before a student's cognitive needs can be met, they must first fulfil their basic physiological needs. E.g. a hungry student will find it difficult to focus on learning. Students need to feel emotionally and physically safe and accepted within the classroom to progress and reach their full potential. For effective learning all these needs are to be satisfied. It is the responsibility of the teachers to check with the students whether all these needs are satisfied for the smooth running of the class.



Students must be shown that they are valued and respected in the classroom, and the teacher should create a supportive environment. Students with a low self-esteem will not progress academically at an optimum rate until their self-esteem is strengthened. Earlier there were fewer numbers of schools; now a day’s every street has one. Selecting proper school that really caters the needs of the child is mandatory, it is not important whether it is a well equipped branded school or a normal school. In this hi-tech generation, parents are so busy with their jobs and lives that they are just sending the child to school without proper understanding of what are his or her needs. 

Parents have huge expectations from the tiny creatures, who are just settling. I have heard stories from my personal involvement with parents saying, “As a child, I and my husband did wonders, don’t know why my child is so?” Growth, development and maturity happen at different levels for each individual. Today a slow learner or a back bencher or a weak student can be tomorrow’s brilliant scientist, world leader or can be a great human. We should stop judging and start accepting the uniqueness. The same thing applies for individuals around the world. 

Love humans without conditions or judgement. The more you judge people; your mind will start accepting the negativities and slowly the subconscious mind will make a wrong picture in your mind which can’t be corrected.
It is very easy to speak lies about someone and imagine very hard for that someone to prove himself back. So make life easy for others. Bloom with positivity!!
May God bless you all!
Thank You,
Srividya Gurugubilly.

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