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Motivation
What is motivation & which type is best?
What is motivation?
Motivation in literal sense means what moves us. What are the psychological causes of our action. The answer to “Why would you do this?” is called the motivation.But here is the kicker, motivation is a human construct. There is no such thing as motivational pathway, neurotransmitter or hormone that leads us to certain action. There are countless reasons why you would carry out a certain action from neuroscience perspective, motivation is not one of them. Motivation is what you consciously believe to be driving factor of your actions.
Intrinsic & Extrinsic Motivation
Instrinsic motivation is one where person does something for its own sake. Purely for enjoyment, bliss or joy. Extrinsic motivation is one where person does something because of some expected reward or to prevent punishment. More internal the perceived locus of causality is the more enthusiasm and task performance is observed.
So even for extrinsic motivation we have to find a way to internalize and integrate it such that even though outcomes are separable, the causality or driving factor should be internal. For a person to be fairly motivated they have to have perceived competency, sufficient autonomy and relatedness.