PROBLEM 3
AUTONOMY AND WILLPOWER
LEARNING GOALS
– Part 1
- What different types of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation can be distinguished?
- What is your Relative Autonomy Index?
· (use the BREQ-3, https://canvas.eur.nl/courses/39519/pages/problem-3-autonomy-and-
willpower?module_item_id=812785)
- To what extent do you agree and/or disagree with your RAI? Why?
- What is the role of autonomy and experience of choice on performance?
- Which factors influence someone's motivation?
– Part 2
- What is the evidence in favour and/or against the view that self-regulation is a limited resource?
- What factors influence the depletion of self-regulation?
- How can a depleted resource be restored?
ARTICLE SUMMARIES
PART 1
ARTICLE 1
DE VRIES (2020) – Summary Mini Theories Underlying Self Determination Theory
– 1) Basic needs theory:
- Three basic psychological needs are the source of students’ inherent growth tendencies:
· Autonomy (inner endorsement of behaviour: internal locus of causality, sense of psychological freedom,
perceived choice over actions).
, · Competence (need to be effective in one’s pursuits and interactions with the environment).
· Relatedness (close emotional bonds and secure attachments).
- Basic needs theory explains why students sometimes show active engagement and sometimes disengagement
and provides the basis for predicting which classroom environment will be supportive versus undermining
students’ engagement.
– 2) Organismic integration theory:
- Introduces different types of extrinsic motivation (note that developing a skill is extrinsic as well). It explains
why people engage in an activity and when external regulations become internalized with the self-motivational
system. It proposes that students are naturally inclined to internalize aspects of the social environment
(because they want to increase their competence in the social world or be connected to others).
- Different types of extrinsic motivation are identified that differ in their degree of autonomous motivation.
· Instead of focusing on the distinction between intrinsic versus extrinsic, Deci and Ryan focus on the distinction
between autonomous and controlled. Being autonomous is not being free of external forces; rather, students
experience autonomy in accordance with how much they personally endorse the value and significance of the
way of thinking or behaving.
· Four types from least to most autonomous:
- External
- Introjected
- Identified
- Integrated regulation.
– 3) Goal contents theory:
- Answers the question of what people strive to attain: the goal for studying.
· Intrinsic goal/aspiration:
- personal growth and deeper interpersonal relationships (these goals afford basic need satisfaction).
· Extrinsic goal/aspiration:
- are focused on external indicators of worth, such as enhanced status, increased popularity, material success
(neglect basic need satisfaction).
– 4) Cognitive evaluation theory:
- Explains how and why external events (e.g., classroom conditions) can enhance or undermine intrinsic
motivation. Intrinsic motivation involves doing a behaviour because the activity itself is interesting and
spontaneously satisfying (e.g., “I exercise because it is fun and pleasurable”).
– 5) Causality orientations theory:
- Personality-level individual differences in students’ orientations toward the motivational forces that cause their
behaviour. Specifically, the tendency to rely on autonomous/self-determined (autonomy causality orientation)
versus controlling guides (control causality orientation). Causality orientations are surface individual differences
that are relatively malleable and influenced by socialization experiences.
ARTICLE 2
DECI & RYAN (2008) – Facilitating Optimal Motivation and Psychological Well-Being Across Life’s Domains
– Proposers of the self-determination theory.
– Motivation processes – can be studies in terms of underlying mechanisms in ppl's brains + physiology – but a vast
amount of variance in ppl's motivation is not a function of such mechanisms, but of more proximal sociocultural
conditions in which actors affect themselves.
- Because of this, most theories have focused on effects of social environments (incentives, rewards,
punishments, relationships, etc.).
, - However, by doing so, most theories have treated motivation as a unitary thing – varies primarily in amount
and nothing more.
– Contrary to this previous notion, SDT has maintained that there are different types of motivation, and that the
type of motivation is more predictive that amount in predicting important outcomes.
SDT
Differentiation of Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation
– Intrinsic
- Doing a behaviour because the activity itself is interesting and spontaneously satisfying.
- Performs the activity because the activity is motivating in itself.
– Extrinsic
- Engaging in activity because it leads to some separate consequence.
- E.g. to obtain a reward or avoid a punishment.
– Many theories before have used these distinctions of motivation – but they have also assumed that these types
are additive, resulting in a total motivation.
- Long standing assumption from research showing this:
· E.g. an intrinsically motivating activity becomes less motivating if an extrinsic reward is added.
· However, they had to be contingent on performance. Rewards not contingent on performance = tend not to
undermine intrinsic motivation.
· A lot of conflicting results though, sometimes there’s and effect, sometimes not.
· “In interpreting these findings, we have argued that when people are intrinsically motivated, they feel a sense
of autonomy as their basic need for autonomy is satisfied. Then, when people are rewarded, threatened,
surveilled, or evaluated, they tend to feel pressured and controlled, and that diminishes satisfaction of their
autonomy need, whereas when they are offered choice, they tend to experience greater autonomy
satisfaction”
· Positive performance feedback – sometimes increases intrinsic motivation.
- Perhaps because it directly conveys positive competence information – thus satisfying the need for
competence without being controlling (informational).
· Negative feedback – undermines intrinsic motivation – amotivated.
· Interpersonal climates – (general ambience of a situation) of homes, classrooms, office, etc., can affect ppl's
intrinsic motivation.
- Supportive + informational = enhance intrinsic motivation.
- Effect of tangible rewards or positive feedback can also vary based on interpersonal climates:
· Tangible rewards, usually undermine intrinsic motivation – if interpersonal context is informational and
supportive = can have positive effect.
- If in controlling context = decrease.
· Autonomy and interdependence
- SDT = always concerned with understanding actions that are autonomous and volitional.
· Feel a full sense of choice and endorsement of an activity -> intrinsic motivation = prototype of this
experience.
- Autonomy and interdependence – important to understand difference:
· Autonomy – to act volitionally, with a sese of choice.
· Interdependence – to function alone and not rely on others.
Differentiating Extrinsic Motivation
– Previous research has shown that extrinsic motivations often undermine intrinsic motivation because they’re
experienced as controlling. Ppl can also feel autonomous while being extrinsic motivated. This issue is addressed
by SDT using the concept of organismic integration.
– Organismic integration over mechanistic assumptions:
, - View development as the process through which humans internalise, elaborate, refine, and integrate inner
structures or representations of themselves as their world.
- “Although this integrative process is often viewed as a natural propensity or endowment, SDT emphasises that
internalization and integration will function more or less effectively, depending on the degree to which
organisms experiences ambient supports for basic psychological need satisfaction.”
· Ppl will be inclined to internalise and integrate within themselves the activities that were initially prompted
and /or regulated by extrinsic events. For this to be effective – ppl need to experience satisfaction of their
basic psychological needs.
- SDT proposes that there are three types of internalization that differ in the degree to which the regulations
become integrated with a person’s sense of self:
· Introjection – least effective.
- Involves ppl taking in an external contingency/demand/regulation but not accepting it as their own –
remains somewhat alien, controls them still only as much as it did when it was external.
- Ppl tend to feel controlled.
· Supported by feelings of pride and self-aggrandisement if success.
· Threatened by feelings of guilt, shame, and self-derogation after failure.
· Identification
- Ppl accept the importance of the behaviour for themselves, accepts it as their own – identify with the value
of the activity and willingly accept response for regulating the behaviour.
- After identification, engage in the behaviour with a larger sense of autonomy, thus do not feel controlled.
· Integration
- Ppl have succeeded at integrating an identification with other aspects of their true or integrated self.
- Assimilate this new identification with their sense of who they are.
- The fullest type of internalisation and the means by which extrinsically motivated behaviours can become
truly autonomous or self-determined.
- All the three, along with external regulation, all along a continuum – the degree of autonomy reflected in the
behaviours varies systematically.
· E.g. regulated by introjects – more autonomous compared to behaviours regulated externally, but still quite
controlled.
· Integrated regulation – most autonomous – most similar to intrinsic motivation.
- Both come with the feeling of volition and control.
- Differ – intrinsic motivation = based on interest in the behaviour itself, extrinsic motivation = based on the
person having fully integrated the value of the behaviour (still extrinsic because it remains contingent on
/instrumental to some outcome, not the activity itself).
Autonomous and Controlled Motivation
– “The conception of internalization and types of regulation have shifted the primary differentiation within SDT
from a focus on intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation to a focus on autonomous versus controlled motivation.”
– External + introjected regulations = controlled motivation.
– Identified/integrated regulations + intrinsic motivation = autonomous motivation.
– Amotivation – reflects a lack of intention to act.
· Compared to all other/previous forms of motivation which represent an intention to act.
- Results from a person not valuing a behaviour or outcome, not believing the valued outcome is reliably linked
to the behaviour, or believing that there are behaviours needed for a valued outcome but one does not believe
in their capacity/capability to perform them.
