Essay on human motivation theories

Yerkes Dodson law works as a mechanism which suggests that there is a practical connection between arousal and performance. The theory was developed by two psychologists in the year 1908 namely, Robert M. Yerkes and John D. Dodson. This theory suggests that performance gets affected by the increased or decreased levels of arousal. It increases with psychological arousal but at the same time it starts decreasing when arousal level reaches too high. Everyone has different levels of arousal which is a very common phenomenon. Let’s take an example to understand this idea. An athlete performs usually better in real game situation rather than practice sessions because there he is more aroused during the real game but his performance gets deceased as soon as he becomes highly aroused. He may miss an easy shot or can get choked (Ath et al., 2010).
Schachter -Singer Theory or two factor theory is a cognitive theory of emotion that developed during the 1960. Both psychologists, Stanley Schachter and Jerome E. Singer used to believe that physical arousal affects the emotional responses. Both the scholars tested their theory on 184 people. These people were injected adrenaline which arouses and increases heartbeat. They were told that they are injected to test their eyesight. Few people were informed about the symptoms that drug might cause but not everybody was made aware of it. In the next step of the test participants were placed in a room with another person who was informed about the symptoms. It was observed that people who were not aware of the symptoms were either happier or angrier than the person who was aware about the results of this test.

References

Roeckelein, J. E. (1998). Dictionary of Theories, Laws, and Concepts in Psychology. Westport: Greenwood Publishing Group.
T. Athanasiou, H. Debas & A. Darzi. (2010). Key Topics in Surgical Research and Methodology. London: Springer.