David McClelland’s Theory of Motivations

This well-known psychologist proposed a theory of three universal human needs.

David McClelland's theory of motivations is one of the best known psychological models of human needs, especially in business and organizations. is one of the best known psychological models of human needs, especially in business and organizations.

In this article we will analyze McClelland's theory of the three needs and the most significant antecedents for its emergence. We will focus mainly on detailing his contributions on the three types of motivation: the three types of motivation: affiliation, achievement and power..

Introduction to the psychology of motivation

In 1943, American psychologist Abraham Maslow American psychologist Abraham Maslow published in the journal Psychological Review an article in which he presented his hierarchical theory of needs. This model, popularly known as "Maslow's pyramid", was a fundamental milestone in the evolution of the psychology of motivation.

Maslow defined five categories of needs; from most to least basic, these are physiological needs (nutrition, sleep, sex, etc.), security (housing, employment, health), love and belonging (friendship, sexual intimacy), recognition (self-confidence, professional success) and self-actualization (creativity, spontaneity, morality).

In the years that followed the popularization of Maslow's model, many similar approaches appeared, such as McClelland's theory of the three needs, which we will describe below. Many of these models humanistic psychology, which claimed the tendency of human beings to personal growth. of human beings.

Motivation has been a subject little studied by behaviorism and the orientations that followed it, since they focus on observable behavior; from this perspective, motivation is usually conceptualized as the incentive value given to a reinforcement, although sometimes ambiguous concepts such as "impulse" are included.

McClelland's theory of the three needs.

In the early 1960s, David McClelland described in his book The Achieving Society (his theory of the three needs in his book The Achieving Society. In it, he defines three types of motivations shared by all people, regardless of their culture, gender or any other variable, although these may influence the preponderance of one or other needs.

According to this author, motivations should be understood as unconscious processes, similar to psychoanalytic approaches. This is why McClelland recommends the use of Henry A. Murray's thematic apperception test, which belongs to the category of projective tests for psychological evaluation.which belongs to the category of projective tests for psychological evaluation, in order to assess needs.

1. Need for affiliation

People with a high affiliation motivation have strong desires to belong to social groups. They also seek to be liked by others, so they tend to accept the opinions and preferences of others. They prefer collaboration to competitionThey are uncomfortable with situations that involve risks and lack of certainty.

According to McClelland, these people tend to be better as employees than as leaders because of their greater difficulty in giving orders or prioritizing organizational objectives. However, it is worth mentioning that two types of leaders have been described two types of leader: the task leader, associated with high productivity, and the socioemotional leader, a specialist in maintaining group motivation.The importance of the need for affiliation had previously been stressed by Henry Murray, creator of the "affiliation" concept.

The importance of the need for affiliation had been previously highlighted by Henry Murray, creator of the thematic apperception test. The same can be said of the needs for achievement and power, which served as the basis for McClelland's proposal.

2. Need for achievement

Those who score high in need for achievement feel intense impulses to achieve goals that entail a high level of goals that involve a high level of challengeThey are not opposed to taking risks in order to achieve them, as long as they do so in a calculated way. They generally prefer to work alone rather than with others and like to receive feedback on the tasks they perform.

McClelland and other authors affirm that the need for achievement is influenced by personal abilities to set goals, by the presence of an internal locus of control (perception of self-responsibility for life events) and by the promotion of independence by parents during childhood.

Need for power

Unlike more affiliative people, those with a predominant power motivation enjoy competing with others - for the sake of winning, of course. Those with a high need for power place a high value on social recognition and seek to control others and influence them. seek to control other people and influence their behavior, often for selfish reasons.often for selfish reasons.

McClelland distinguishes two types of need for power: socialized power and personal power. People who are closer to the first type tend to care more about others, while those with a high personal power motivation want above all to gain power for their own benefit.

People with high power motivation who do not simultaneously have a high level of personal responsibility are more likely to engage in psychopathic behaviors. are more likely to engage in externalizing psychopathological behaviors, such as physical aggressionssuch as physical aggression and substance abuse.