Motivation and emotion/Book/2020/Reward system, motivation, and emotion

Reward system, motivation, and emotion:
What role does the reward system play in motivation and emotion?

Multimedia presentation (3 min)

Overview

Scenario April is trying to stick to her new "healthy" eating diet, however, after a week of eating low sugar foods, her motivation to continue decreases. She feels angry that she is unable to stick to her healthy ways. What should April apply to the plan that will motivate her to continue?

Focus questions: How is emotion involved? How is motivation involved? What is the reward system? How is the reward system influenced by motivation and emotion? How can we utilise the reward system in life?

Emotion

Emotion can be defined as something that is short-lived, purposive, expressive and a type of bodily response that allows for adaptation when opportunity or challenges are presented. Significant life events produce a distinct pattern of neural activity that generates and coordinate the emotional reaction that is feeling purposive, expressive and bodily response. Izard (2010) asked 34 leading emotion researcher to define emotion and he concluded with two main points.

• Emotions involved neural circuits, response system, and a state or process that motivates and organises cognition and action.
• Emotions provide information to those experiencing it through appraisal, interpretation, expression, social communication and signals effects.

How many emotion are there?

There are two main perspectives that are spoken about when asked about the number of emotion presented. These are; the Biological perspectives and the Cognitive perspective. Biological perspective emphasis the basic emotions whereas cognitive perspective focuses more on experiences and appraisal.

Biological Perspective

Researchers in this area focus their argument on the basis of emotions. There are many theories and researches on the number of emotions presented, for example;

• Jeffery Gray (1994) suggests that there are 3 main emotions, joy, anger/fear and anxiety. Their suggestion is based on the three anatomical brain circuit; behavioural approach system (Joy), fight-flight-reproduction system (anger/fear) and the behavioural inhibition system (Anxiety).
• Nancy Stein and Trabassor suggested that there are 4 basic emotions; joy, sadness, anger and fear. They based their research on the four bases of life-essential pursuits; attain (joy), loss (sad), obstruction (anger), uncertainty (fear).

There are multiple other researchers suggesting different numbers of emotions however all agree that

1. There are a small number of basic emotion that exists
2. Emotions are universal
3. Emotions are a product of biology and evolution.

Cognitive Perspective

Researchers who take more of a cognitive approach are focused on the experiences and appraisal. They believe that emotions are influenced by one's experiences and the way in which a person appraises those experiences (Lazarus (1991).

Motivation

Motivation refers to the idea that one is active and energise by the desire to achieve a certain goal or task (Ryan and Deci 2000)

There are two main types of motivation;

Extrinsic Motivation

Extrinsic motivation refers to the influence that the environment has on the action one takes. There are 3 main categories under extrinsic motivation;

1. Incentives; environmental situations that attract or repels a person towards or away from the task.
2. Consequences; Reinforcerment and punishments, one's action depend on what they gain from it.

            For example 

April may want to eat a piece of cake but she knows that if she eats it she will feel guilty after, in addition, she knows that if she doesn't eat she will lose weight and gain a reward from it.

1. Reward; offering something in exchange for that action being taken.

April may say to her self to if she does not eat any sugar she will go shopping for that new dress she wants. Therefore she must stick to her diet.

Instrinsic Motivation

Intrinsic motivation is the inherent desire to seek out challenges, self-improvement and explore one's full capacity. Individuals who are intrinsically motivated are strongly tasked oriented, function well and have greater well-being, These individuals are likely to stick to a task for longer and are more motivated.

Theories on Motivation

Cognitive Evolution Theory

The Cognitive Evolution Theory (Deci 1975), suggests that extrinsic events influence extrinsic and intrinsic motivations. Extrinsic events can be significant external events that impact motivation in a certain way. When extrinsic events are presented in a controlling way, extrinsic motivation increases while intrinsic even decreases. This is due to the effects on autonomy. However, when extrinsic events are presented in an informative way, intrinsic increases as a result of competency.

Self-Determination Theory

Self-Determination Theory proposed that individuals act or perform a certain task due to wanting to obtain reward and avoid punishments. This means that individuals are able to perform the behaviour without enjoyment or interests due to the significant of the reward (Deci et al 1994).

• Introjected regulation; the act of doing a task due to wanting to avoid feelings of guilt and rather a satisfaction.

• Integrated regulation; the act of doing a task due to the value of the task and personal self-control.

Intrinsic Motivation Theories are focused more on the influences of specific psychologically-based motives that are a higher order of needs. Malone and Lepper (1986) developed a classification scheme that assumes that assumptions on intrinsic motivations should consider the relationship between the different motives and their effects on performances. For example: Bandura (1986) suggests that natural consequences and internal and external outcomes produce two form od intrinsic motivation; neutral motivation and arbitrary motivation.

Emotions can be referred to as a strong feeling that is displayed when certain events occur that may influence an individual. Such emotions can include love and anger.

The reward system

The Reward System is a group of structures that functions when rewarded or reinforced with certain stimuli. By exposing the brain to reward stimuli, the brain realized dopamine which is associated with pleasure. Dopamine is mainly found in the Ventral tegmental area of the brain that is connected to the ventral striatum. The ventral striatum is associated with reward and motivation, therefore when presented with certain rewarding stimuli, the brain is associating it to motivation and reward.

April may reward herself with a form of self-care when she eats "clean", therefore when she does her brain realizes dopamine that is then associated with the motivation thus her motivation levels will likely increase if she continues to realize the dopamine neurotransmitters.

A research conducted by James Old and co. (1950) on rats found that rats would repeatedly press on a lever in trust that there will be a reward. This indicates that even rats understand that by doing a certain action there will be a certain reward. Though dopamine is associated with pleasure and potentially addictive behaviours it is not always true. Dopamine is also related to the feeling of those experiences.

How the reward system influences emotion and motivation

Emotion is a form of motivation. Its energy is direct, and sustains one's motivation. For example, anger and fear may motivate one to act a certain way due to the fear of guilt. Emotion is also a "readout" system that assists in indicating how one is doing in social situations. For example. if someone is happy, it is likely that they are "happy" in society. According to Desteno (2004), Emotion is a motivational state that triggers appropriate behaviour to occur. This means that when in a certain situation emotion is the primary source that will motivate behaviour to occur. This correlates to Izard (1991), who suggests that emotions are the primary motivation system, essentially this means that when an emotion is felt motivational factors will often occur as a result.

Conclusion

Emotions are short-lived feelings, purpose, expression and bodily response that allows one to adapt to new opportunities and challenges. Emotion can be seen as the primary cause of motivation, emotions have the ability to energise, direct and sustain certain motivations and therefore, also have the ability to create certain behaviours.

In April's case, if she wants to be motivated to continue her "healthy" diet, she will need to sort out her reward system, therefore allowing for balance emotion and motivations. If she rewards herself every time she eats clean, her dopamine system will increase and thus associate eating clean to getting that reward. This in turn will allow her to continue her diet and perhaps not be swayed by her emotions.

See also

Delayed reinforcement and motivation (Book chapter, 2016)

Dopamine and motivation (Book chapter, 2014)

Reward dependence and motivation (Book chapter, 2016)

Personality and motivation (Book chapter, 2010)

References

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