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Summary literature POCP
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This is an extensive summary of all the mandatory literature for the exam of POCP. I got an 8,5 for the exam :)
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McKnight & Kashdan (2009). Purpose in life as a system that creates and sustains health andwell-being
Hypothesis: Purpose leads to longer life span, fewer health care problems, and greater life satisfaction
Purpose = a central, self-organizing life aim that organizes and stimulates goals, manages behaviors,
and provides a sense of meaning
- Offers direction (rather than governing behavior)
- Living in accord to life purpose -> self-sustaining source of meaning through goal pursuit and
goal attainment
- Central to a person’s identity & behavior
- expected to lead to greater persistence than other important life goals because a central, self-
organizing life aim resonates across time and context
Purpose vs religiosity & meaning
Common in these perspectives: personal agency, prioritizing goal-relevant behaviors, goal
setting
Differences are:
- Purpose is not essential to wellbeing (while personal agency apparently is?)
- Religious faith is not necessary for purpose (purpose can come from religious faith – like
getting to heaven, but it can also come from non-religious sources – wanting to improve
others’ life for example)
- Purpose gives a person a sense of meaning that cannot always be recognizable or easily
articulated
- Purpose may not be available to every person – it requires insight, introspection and planning
(so may not be possible for people with very low intelligence or have had brain injuries,
disease or neglect)
- Purpose is not just a product of faith, meaning or personal agency (purpose and meaning have
a temporal, bidirectional relationship)
Purpose vs goals
Purpose Goals
Broader motivational component, that stimulates More precise in their influence of behavior
goals and behavior
Do not necessarily have terminal outcomes Have terminal outcomes
Stimulates smaller, consistent goals Can be a framework for other subgoals
Is at the highest level of analysis & is central to Are not central
a person’s personality
Some might say that purpose is a higher-order goal that stimulates lower order goals: once a person
satisfies a higher-order goal, a new goal (consistent with the purpose) presents itself, and stimulates
production of other lower-order goals. Both higher- and lower-order goals come from a purpose. Goals
are important to provide a sense of meaning & purpose, but conversely, meaning & purpose are
needed to provide us with goals (bidirectional).
Consistent with behavioral congruence models of personality: we feel the best when we do
things that are in line with our intrinsic values and dominant behavior tendencies.
What I think this means is:
Your purpose = to live an academically fulfilled life (lol)
This presents to you the goal that you need to get your IBP bachelor. Having this goal, you realize
that you need to pass the 2nd year of the bachelor. A lower-order goal might be that you need to pass
this POCP exam. All these smaller goals have clear outcomes, and all work towards a central
purpose.
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, Three dimensions of purpose
Purpose lies along a three-dimensional continuum:
1. Scope: how ubiquitous (= omnipresent?) the purpose is in a person’s life
o Basically, it has a broad scope if it is central to a person’s life, and influences
everything they do
o Influences the extent to which purpose influences action
o A broad scope means the purpose is less organized, but it does have influence in a
greater range of contexts
2. Strength: the tendency for the purpose to influence actions, thoughts and emotions in the
domains that are relevant to its scope
o Strong: powerfully influences purpose-relevant behaviors`
o The stronger & the broader the scope of a purpose, the more it has a positive effect on
a person’s life + the more resilience there is to obstacles
3. Awareness: extent to which a person is aware (duh) and can articulate their purpose
o If a goal is both strong and broad, a person is likely aware of it – if it isn’t, it may be
more hidden to them (So scope & strength relate to awareness – by influencing the
cognitive load). I didn’t really understand this next part, but I’m going to try to
explain as best as I can:
Awareness decreases cognitive load by integrating motivation & behavior into
a person’s cognitive architectural framework. So, being aware of a purpose
makes shifting to behavior that works towards that purpose easier.
When a person is not aware of a purpose, there exists greater cognitive load &
less efficient resource allocation – it takes more time and effort to work
towards the purpose.
Conclusion: awareness influences behavioral flexibility & efficient resource
allocation. It may also increase the strength between purpose and its positive
outcomes (the better health and longevity etc).
Pursuing multiple purposes
Having multiple purposes seems to be beneficial up to a point, but after that point it only
reduces the resources per purpose – dilution of effort (and is therefore no longer beneficial).
Value judgments of purpose
Social acceptance of purposes likely affects the person, by imposing or reducing barriers.
When there are more barriers imposed, there would be more stress associated with working
towards that purpose, and it may even lead to finding other activities or pursuits.
The science of purpose
- Self-determination theory (SDT): satisfying feelings of autonomy, competence and relatedness
are essential to personal development and psychological wellbeing. (the authors didn’t seem to
agree with this in relation to purpose but I didn’t understand?)
- Terror management theory (TMT): people develop and pursue goals, meaning, and growth
opportunities to avoid death-related anxiety. When the threat of death is salient, people
respond by adapting safe, cultural world views. (the authors think this theory goes too far)
- According to the authors: equifinality— purpose can be the end state of numerous motivations
and developmental pathways. Purpose is a broader theoretical perspective than SDT & TMT,
which are more short-term.
Purpose in evolution
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