How to motivate myself and my readers with motivation and self advocacy not the same as the before

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How do you get motivated?

Research Proposal on Intrinsic Motivation and Self-Advocacy

Introduction/ Hypotheses:

People desire different things in life, so it is very important for psychologists to understand what motivates people to succeed at work and accomplish their goals. Just because some people adapt to their environment and work in different ways, it does not mean they lack the motivation and the drive to accomplish their goals. Since 1940, people started to recognize the importance of motivation with the discovery of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.  As a result, psychologists are trying to find the best way to motivate people using intrinsic motivation and people self-advocacy. 

This study intends to expand upon the results of many past studies. This proposed study examines the relationship between two variables: Intrinsic motivation and self-advocacy in the workplace. Three hypotheses were proposed in this study. The first hypothesis is that intrinsic motivation in the workplace has a positive relationship on self-advocacy. The second hypothesis is that intrinsic motivation leads to instinctual optimism. The third hypothesis is that self-advocacy has a positive relationship on team cohesion in the workplace. Negative perceptions of a person’s self-image relate to the two hypotheses. A study by Deci showed that there is a positive relationship between self-advocacy and motivation. According to the research, the influence of intrinsic motivation on self-advocacy suggests that if you have a heightened sense of intrinsic motivation, then you are more likely to convey positively your ideas and perspectives. Based on the research findings, one of the positive effects of having a strong sense of self-advocacy is having high self-esteem and confidence to communicate and articulate your beliefs to other people. Because people work in different ways, it is pertinent for psychologists to study motivation in order to understand what makes different people want to achieve their goals. 

Motivation is defined as a psychological process that determines three aspects of every individual’s needs and personality: direction, intensity, and persistence of people’s actions (Jei Ma, 2017; PowerPoint on motivation theories). These aspects lead people to achieve their dreams. Direction of action is defined as where, or rather, what specific tasks an individual should put their effort into (Bandura 1996). Activation or direction involves the decision to initiate a behavior, such as enrolling in a psychology class. Another aspect, intensity, means how much effort you should put into each task. Intensity is the concentration and vigor that goes into pursuing a goal (Bandura 1996). For example, one student might complete tasks, do papers, be a good student without much effort; however, another student will study regularly, participate in discussions, and take advantage of research opportunities outside of class. The first student lacks intensity while the second student pursues his educational goals with greater commitment. Persistence is the continued effort toward a goal even though obstacles may exist. An example of persistence would be taking more psychology courses in order to earn a degree, although it requires a significant investment of time, energy, and resources. So what are the things that actually motivate us to act? Psychologists have proposed various theories to explain what motivates people. However, self-determination theory relates best to the positive relationship between intrinsic motivation and self-advocacy. 

Deci and Ryan developed the self-determination theory (SDT) in 1985. An important aspect of SDT is the concept of internalization, which is defined as the extent to which people understand the causes of why they behave the way they do, as well as the respective consequences to their behaviors. There are two types of internalization. High internalization, relating to intrinsic motivation, is when an individual performs behaviors they love. For example, if an individual reads a novel and enjoys it, they cannot put it down. By contrast, low internalization is when people perform behaviors not because they want to, but because they have to complete them. Examples include writing a paper or cleaning your room (Jei Ma, 2017; PowerPoint on motivation theories). The process of internalization is very important to intrinsic motivation; however, it is crucial for psychologists to study motivation in order to satisfy the three basic needs according to the Self-Determination Theory: competency, autonomy, and relatedness. 

The need for competency gives us the ability to accomplish tasks, dreams, and goals in life. Competency is a person’s desire to be successful. In order to be successful, a person must be able to have the confidence to tackle specific tasks. The need for autonomy says that every individual has the ability to make their own choices in life based on their own personal beliefs and decisions. The concept of autonomy allows a person to learn how to think for himself or herself and not follow other people’s decisions. This is very important because autonomy increases someone’s ability to advocate for themselves and to become more confident. This, in turn, brings up an individual’s self-esteem. Lastly, the need for relatedness is included because of the fact that people are social beings. As human beings, we crave connection with other people. 

An aspect of SDT is the distinction between autonomous motivation and controlled motivation.  According to a study by Gagne and Deci (2005), in order for people to possess true autonomy, they must have two characteristics: the free will to decide and commit to completing specific tasks or actions, and an individual’s ability to experience making independent decisions based on their ability to reflect on their own actions. Autonomy involves acting with a sense of volition and having the experience of choice. In the words of Dworkin (1988), “autonomy means endorsing one’s actions at the highest level of reflection” (Gagné & Deci, 2005) which gives a person complete freedom to make their own decisions. Intrinsic motivation is an example of autonomous motivation. When people engage in an activity because they find it interesting, they are doing the activity because they have a desire to do so. 

By contrast, controlled motivation occurs when a person performs an action because they are being pressured by another individual or society to do so. Due to that pressure, a person may lack intrinsic motivation, which makes it harder for that individual to advocate for what they believe in.  This study found that when people get rewarded for behaviors, controlled motivation is induced (Gagné & Deci, 2005). Autonomous and controlled motivations differ in two factors: the process that motivates the action and the type of experiences an individual would get from the action.  Autonomous motivation and controlled motivation are both intentional, and together they stand in contrast to a motivation, which involves a lack of intention and motivation. Intrinsically motivated behavior, propelled by people’s interest in the activity itself, is prototypically autonomous. However, an important aspect of the SDT is the proposition that extrinsic motivation can vary in the degree to which it is autonomous versus controlled. Activities that are not interesting (i.e., that are not intrinsically motivating) require extrinsic motivation, so their initial enactment depends upon the perception of a contingency between the behavior and a desired consequence such as implicit approval or tangible rewards. Autonomous and controlled motivations are created to prevent a-motivation, or a lack of motivation within the workplace. (Gagné & Deci, 2005). Controlled motivations can decrease a person’s self-advocacy and internal motivation because they are completing tasks and perform actions based on pressure not desire or free will for the action itself however Autonomous motivation increase self-advocacy and intrinsic motivation because actions are completed out of love for the actions.

 According to SDT, if people are so motivated to perform actions, then the behaviors are externally, regulated, which means that these types of behavior are produced by external elements in the environment and maintained by factors that an individual cannot control. This is a classic type of extrinsic motivation and is an example of controlled motivation. When performing   externally regulated, behaviors people act with the intention of obtaining a desired consequence or avoiding an undesired one. Therefore, people are motivated to perform an action only when the action is instrumental to those ends (e.g., I work when the boss is watching). External regulation is the type of extrinsic motivation that is considered when extrinsic motivation was contrasted with intrinsic motivation (Gagne and Deci, 2005). According to the authors of this study use of salient extrinsic rewards to motivate, work behavior can be  detrimental to intrinsic motivation and can thus have negative consequences for psychological adjustment, performance on interesting and personally important activities, and citizenship behavior.  In other words, extrinsic or controlled motivation characterizes any activities that have specific outcomes or actions that rewards or avoid punishments. There are four types of regulations.  External regulation, is behavior that controlled by external incentives such as praise, rewards, and punishment avoidance.  The second type is Interjected regulation , Interjected regulation, is when a person has internalized the external consequences of their actions, therefore, the  individual acts to facilitate self-esteem (e.g. exhibit ability) or reduce guilt and avoid demonstration of failure. The third type is Identified regulation, this behavior is explicitly recognized and valued by the individual Integrated regulation, is  the most autonomous kind of extrinsic motivation , these behaviors are fully integrated into personal values and beliefs such as praying or going to college. As the individuals progress along this continuum, their motivation becomes less controlled and more self-determined (Ryan and Deci 2000). At the far end of the self-determination continuum is a-motivation representing a lack of any drive for behavior. More importantly, autonomous motivation is associated with sustained engagement in the behavior (Wilson, Rodgers, Blanchard, 2005). Intrinsic Motivation is crucial aspect of the motivational spectrum that can interact with autonomous, controlled motivation and an individual’s self-determined behavior to increase people’ self-advocacy skills

Many studies on intrinsic motivation also clarify and describe ways in which tangible rewards can be used they are not detrimental to intrinsic motivation. Furthermore, SDT has detailed the processes through intrinsic motivation can become extrinsic motivation. in addition, Gagne and Deci, 2005 study suggests  that intrinsic motivation (based in interest) and autonomous extrinsic motivation (based in importance) are both related to performance, satisfaction, trust, and well-being in the workplace. When the interaction of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation was first identifies cognitive evaluation theory (CET) provided an explanation for the phenomenon. However, many organizational psychologists and management theorists found the theory of limited use with respect to promoting performance and satisfaction in work organizations. Self-determination theory provides a clear understanding and more useful approach for intrinsic motivation, which leads to effective organizational behavior (Gagne and Deci, 2005). With SDT on the research agenda, it shows psychologists how important all aspects of this theory are in respect to job performance and satisfaction. As a result,   people feel motivated by activities that allow them to satisfy the three needs .They are the need for competency, autonomy, and relatedness. Any activities that person enjoys to perform are and driven by intrinsic motivation. Originally, the theory of self-determination differentiated between what intrinsic and extrinsic motivations were. Later, a continuum with varying degrees of individual autonomy was proposed (Deci & Ryan, 2000). Intrinsic motivation represents the most self-determined or autonomous behavior regulation by inherent interest, enjoyment and satisfaction. There are three types of intrinsic motivation. The first type of intrinsic motivation is increasing your own knowledge for the sake of gaining knowledge or expanding your horizons because of what people desire. For example, if a person performs an activity for the pleasure or satisfaction of learning or understanding something he or she is intrinsically motivated towards knowledge.  The second type of intrinsic motivation focus on people achieving their goals in other words Intrinsic motivation toward accomplishment is defined as engaging in an activity for the pleasure of accomplishing or creating something. The final type of intrinsic motivation toward stimulation occurs when an activity is performed to obtain stimulating experiences. For example, if a person goes to a concert to have fun and be simulated by listening to music then he or she is experiencing intrinsic motivation towards stimulating a specific action 

Intrinsic Motivation and Self-Advocacy:

Industrial psychologists analyze many criterion and predictors of work behaviors. It is important for psychologists to examine the relationship between a powerful criterion of intrinsic motivation and individual self-advocacy. Studying intrinsic motivation as a predictor of self-advocacy allows psychologists to predict whether intrinsic motivation has a positive effect on people’s ability to engage in self-advocacy while they interact with others in the workplace.  In order to understand how intrinsic motivation predicts the tendency of self-advocacy we need to analyze the relationship between the two. Therefore, we need to define intrinsic motivation and self-advocacy. Intrinsic motivation is any behavior that is caused by internal factors, which comes from the qualities of an individual’s personality and their experiences. My research shows that self-advocacy consists of any actions that allow people to speak up for themselves and stand up for what they believe in. However, advocating for you does not mean that people have to depend completely on other people. It also does not mean individuals must do everything on their own.  For self-advocacy to occur there needs to be a balance between being independent and knowing when to ask for help. My data supports the hypothesis of self-advocacy being very significant for individuals to communicate their message. The reason why self-advocacy is very important is that in our society are can be heard unless they articulate their message in a positive way. At the same time, in order for self-advocacy to be affective, an individual has to be intrinsically motivated.

It is important for psychologists to closely examine the relationship between a powerful criterion of intrinsic motivation and individual self-advocacy. Many people do not realize the power of self-advocacy until they find themselves in a situation where the skills are necessary. When people are able to articulate their ideas in a formal setting they are better equipped to advocate for justice. People need to advocate in the work environment.  Individuals must not be afraid to stand up for what they believe in otherwise they will not be able to advocate so they can convey their message in a positive way that does not create problems in the work place preventing will not accomplish their goal or get anything done. People must learn the skills of self-advocacy to be heard and taken seriously. Learning self-advocacy skills also develops self-determination skills, which could foster increased personal satisfaction and happiness. All students must learn through opportunities and experience the importance of intrinsic motivation and self-advocacy as tools to use to their advantage in a work environment or life situation. Intrinsic motivation and self-advocacy can be used as a method of developing your voice so you can interact with others and be a successful individual in society.

Many studies define intrinsically motivated behaviors as any behaviors that individuals are engaged in for the activity’s own sake. People perform these actions for the pleasure and satisfaction derived from the results. When intrinsically motivated, people engage in activities that interest them, and they do so freely, with a full sense of volition and without the necessity of material rewards or constraints (Deco & Ryan, 1985).  For example, a basic researcher is intrinsically motivated because they are engaged in research for knowledge’s sake. Moreover, the child who reads a book for the inherent pleasure of doing so is intrinsically motivated for that activity. Intrinsically motivated behaviors represent the prototype of self-determination. They emanate from the self and are fully endorsed (Deci & Ryan, 1985). In order to understand the power of intrinsic motivation to start social movements, or fight injustice and social inequalities in organizations,   people must learn the skills of self-advocacy to be heard. As a result, intrinsic motivation allows for self-advocacy to exist because people need internal forces such as religion, internalized social norms, interests, and hobbies to initiate the need for self-advocacy. The more motivated individuals are, the more they feel the desire to advocate for themselves in their work behaviors. This makes them more productive and more likely to achieve self-advocacy or their goals in life. An important theory of motivation is self-determination that leads to self-advocacy 

Based on my research, Self-Advocacy is one form of communicating your message to other people in a way that represents what you stand for. This process occurs any time people speak or act on their own behalf to improve their quality of life, effect personal change, or correct inequalities (Concunan-Lahr and Brotherson as cited in Brown, 1999). Many studies define self-advocacy in different ways. For example, according to Strodden (2005), Self-advocacy is referred to as the ability to articulate one’s needs and make informed decisions about the supports necessary to meet those needs (Strodden, as cited in Test et al, 2005).  Therefore, psychologists establish how powerful the relationship between intrinsic motivation and self-advocacy truly is.

Based on a study by Deci and Ryan (2000b) there is a positive relationship between intrinsic motivation and self-advocacy. This means that individuals with high intrinsic motivation are more likely to engage in work behaviors that lead to self-advocacy than people who do not have intrinsic motivation. Individuals need to be intrinsically motivated in order to focus on an issue, since people advocate about something that has personal meaning and value attached to it, something they care about. People educate themselves about issues just to be more informed, and not to get any personal gain. Once a person educates himself or herself on an issue, they might then seek out others that are being affected, and try to develop a strategy for improving the service for others. Self-Advocates use many ideas to capture the attention of officials or other powers through standing up for what they believe in rather than leaving things as they are. There is no right or wrong way to organize others, but the most important thing is how the group comes to the decision together. The power is in the group working together to make a difference in people’s lives. Everyone has the ability to advocate, they just need the intrinsic motivation it takes to rid themselves of the fear of standing up for what they believe in. 

Method:

Participants:

 There are four hundred participants in this study; a sample of 200 high school students and 200 college students was recruited during the spring of 2017. All participants were from a diverse college population. The college participants were in different class standings. For example, there were freshman, sophomore, juniors, and seniors. The participants were international students from all over the world. The majority of participants were African American. The African American participants made up 50% of the population. In addition, 20% of the participants were white, 20 % were Latino and 10% of participants were of other descent. Freshmen and sophomores only accounted for 5% each of the sample. Juniors were represented by 60%.  Lastly, seniors were signified by 25% of the sample, and graduate students were 5% of the sample.

Measures:

The instruments used in this study were a combination of the instruments used in other survey research and items created by S, K. M., Ryan, R. M., & Reis, H. (1996). They developed the Self-Determination Scale (SDS).  Participants indicate the degree to which statement A feels true, relative to the degree that Statement B feels true, on the 5-point scale shown after each pair statements.   Each question has a 1 to 5 response, a one and two response to a question means that participants answer to the question relates to statement A. IF participants have an answer of four or five then their answer corresponds with statement B. If statement A feels completely true and statement B feels completely untrue, the appropriate response would be one. If the two statements are equally true, the appropriate response would be a 3. For example, a sample question would be a. 1. A. I always feel like I choose the things I do.  I sometimes feel that it’s not really me choosing the things I do. The participants have a 1 to 5 response. SDS is an instrument that can shows the motivation of an individual and their level of self-advocacy. It also is able to show where motivation originates; showing whether or not it is intrinsic or extrinsically driven. This instrument helps to measure intrinsic motivation and level of self-advocacy.

The participants were also given a pen and paper survey on self-advocacy and self-determination’s influence on them. R, J. Miller, C. Lombard, and S, A. Corbey (2007), developed the self-advocacy questionnaire.  The questionnaire is from the Transition Assessment: Planning Transition and IEP Development for Youth with Mild Disabilities; the questionnaire has four sections. Each question has a response from 1to 6, 1 means not at all, 6 means all the time. Two-sample question are:

1. I can list and discuss the academic accommodations I need to be successful in high school.

 1 2 3 4 5 6

2. I can list and discuss the support services I need on the job in order to be successful.

 1 2 3 4 5 6

The Self-Advocacy Skills Questionnaire shows how well a person knows himself or herself and shows how they feel they are perceived by society. The questionnaire is also able to show a person’s strengths and insecurities.  The instrument is used to measure self-advocacy. The participants were asked to fill out a Self-Determination Scale and Self-Advocacy Questionnaire.

Analysis Strategy: 

When analyzing the SDS and the Self-Determination and Self-Advocacy Skills Questionnaire, the completed survey’s data was entered and statistically analyzed using the SPS program. The SPS program would be used because of its ability to do numerical analysis because the question are results are also numerical. A second strategy to analyze results is to use person correlation. This will help to show both positive and negative correlations surrounding intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.  Since this study is a survey design, the data is analyzed through correlations and regressions 

Results

There were three hypotheses that were proposed in this study. The first hypothesis is intrinsic motivation in the workplace has a positive relationship on self-advocacy. The second hypothesis is that intrinsic motivation leads to instinctual optimism. The third hypothesis is self-advocacy has a positive relationship on team cohesion. The results greatly supported the first hypothesis and the third hypothesis, but did not support instinctual optimism and intrinsic motivation having a positive relationship. The hypothesis that intrinsic motivation in the workplace has a positive relationship on self-advocacy was supported by my results. It was proven that women who do not advocate for themselves have a negative perception of their image.  My research shows that most women do not advocate because they feel as if they do not deserve the same rights as other people. This is known as the entitlement theory. In addition, because women are not seen the same way as men, when women ask for a raise they are viewed negatively as opposed to men. Therefore, when women ask for more money, employers have the impression of “why is this woman even asking for a raise she does not work hard or deserve it” so employers will not even consider it. Whereas, when men ask for it, they will automatically be considered with no backlash because they are men. On the other hand, because she is a woman, there is a lot of backlash and a double standard. As a result, women are afraid to speak up for themselves.  

 My data supports the fact that intrinsically motivated people participate in more self-advocacy. A Pearson correlation test was conducted to relate the intrinsic motivation to self-advocacy. The result was found to be statistically significant. This suggests that there is a positive correlation between them.

     

Discussion: 

This study intended to expand upon the results of many precedent studies. The proposed study examined the issue of intrinsic motivation’s positive relationship to self-advocacy. Many people do not become conscious the power of self-advocacy until they come across bad circumstances where the skills are necessary. When people are able to communicate their ideas coherently in a formal setting they are better equipped to advocate for justice. People need to advocate so they convey their message in a positive way that does not create problems in the work environment.  Individuals must not be afraid to stand up for what they believe in; otherwise, they will not accomplish their goals or get anything done. People must learn the skills of self-advocacy to be heard and taken seriously. Learning self-advocacy skills also develops self-determination skills, which could foster increased personal satisfaction and happiness. All students must learn through opportunities and experiences the importance of intrinsic motivation and self-advocacy as tools to use to their advantage in a work environment or life situations. People need to rid themselves of the fear of standing up for what they believe in. Self-determination theory does not simply happen automatically. While people might be oriented toward such growth, it requires continual sustenance. According to Deci and Ryan, social support is the key. Through our relationships and interactions with others, we can either foster or thwart well-being and personal growth. Deci also suggests that offering unexpected positive encouragement and feedback on a person's performance on a task can increase intrinsic motivation. Why? Because such feedback helps people to feel more competent, one of the key needs for personal growth.

My research showed that there is a positive correlation between self-advocacy and motivation. this study emphasizes  the power of intrinsic motivation on self-advocacy by highlighting the fact that if people have a high Internalization  they are intrinsically motivtated then indivduals are more likely to enage in self advocacy to positively convey their ideas and perspectives. Based on my research findings, one of the positive effects of having a strong sense of self-advocacy is having high self-esteem and confidence to communicate and articulate your beliefs to other people.  This study is very important because (as mentioned earlier) it is pertinent for psychologists to understand what motivates different people to achieve their goals and dreams. Because people work in different ways, psychologists need to study motivation to understand what motivates different people.

A limitation of this study is the small sample. A study needs a large sample size to produce accurate and reliable results.  Another limitation of this study is the fact that all of the participants were only limited to women students from Hofstra University.  This means that the results cannot be generalized from the entire population; this study needed a larger sample of women from many different universities to generalize the results. The results of this would have been very different; they might have significant results if a sample of 2000 people from five different universities, and five high schools were asked to complete survey on for the questions on self-determination scale and the self-advocacy skills. Participants need to be from a diverse population females. In future studies the same experiment should be conducted with a larger sample. If a sample of people from five different universities a sample of 2000 people from five different universities and five high schools were asked to. Self-determination scale and the self-advocacy skills the results would be generalize. Participants need to be all females. The results of this would have been very different and they might have significant valid and reliable results in that experiment. 

 

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