[Xmca-l] Re: Intrinsic / Extrinsic Motivation
Andy Blunden
andyb@marxists.org
Sun Aug 25 19:32:48 PDT 2019
So you are saying, Artin, as I see it, that in children (who
do not yet have a sense of the wider world and still think
in pseudoconcepts or more primitive forms) the distinction
between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation is problematic. I
agree. Because they are children.
So the distinction is good. It is not a dichotomy. A clear
distinction between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation is a
marker of adulthood. The anarchist who told me she enjoyed
Consensus more than Majority was young and not yet fully mature.
Andy
------------------------------------------------------------
*Andy Blunden*
https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
On 26/08/2019 12:14 pm, Goncu, Artin wrote:
>
> Andy,
>
> We argued that a sharp distinction between intrinsic and
> extrinsic motivation proves to be fallacious in
> understanding the motivation for imaginative play.
> Instead, we maintained that motivation for play should be
> seen on a continuum between what is considered as
> “intrinsic” and “extrinsic” in this distinction. We used
> the following observations in constructing our argument:
> 1) On theoretical grounds, origins of imaginative play are
> non-play experiences of children with others. Therefore,
> conceptualizing motivation for play as only intrinsic
> ignores the social origins of play. Many theorists
> including Piaget, Freud, and Vygotsky illustrated this
> point; children pretend to master the past experience
> (Piaget), heal affective wounds (Freud), and resolve
> tensions emerging in the relationship with the environment
> (Vygotsky). 2) Research on peer interaction further
> supports this point that shared imaginative play emerges
> from negotiations of day-to-day social non-play
> experiences. 3) Many different lines of research show
> that adults actively engage in socializing children to the
> world of imaginative play, suggesting that the motivation
> for imaginative play exists in social interaction shaped
> by cultural expectations and resources. Examples of this
> can be easily seen in mother-infant play. 4) Finally,
> considering motivation for play solely as intrinsic is
> inconsistent with intervention efforts that aim to
> “improve” children’s play and its outcomes.
>
> Best, ag
>
> Artin Goncu, Ph.D
>
> Professor, Emeritus
>
> University of Illinois at Chicago
>
> www.artingoncu.com/
>
> *From:*xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu
> [mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu] *On Behalf Of
> *Andy Blunden
> *Sent:* Sunday, August 25, 2019 5:54 PM
> *To:* xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu
> *Subject:* [Xmca-l] Re: Intrinsic / Extrinsic Motivation
>
> Every rational action is done for a purpose. This is the
> distinction between goal and motive in A N Leontyev and
> between Purpose and Intention in Hegel, between action and
> concept in Vygotsky. This distinction goes back to
> Aristotle. Where this distinction is absent we do no have
> human life.
>
> The distinction between extrinsic and intrinsic is a
> different one. In Hegel it is the distinction between
> Intention and Welfare, in A N Leontyev between the really
> understood motive and the really effective motive. The
> alienated wage worker turns up at work only in order to
> earn a wage. Unless "work" is a government make-work
> program or prison labour, this is an extrinsic motivation.
>
> To say that attending a political meeting because you
> enjoy meetings is an /intrinsic/ motivation is to reduce
> modern social life to pure hedonism. Like the old argument
> that altruism is a logical impossibility, because if you
> do something to help someone that is only because you get
> pleasure from helping someone.
>
> Andy
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Andy Blunden*
> https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
>
> On 26/08/2019 2:32 am, Glassman, Michael wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> The earliest I have read about extrinsic and intrinsic
> motivation (the earliest is was mentioned) was, as
> with so much else in John Dewey – Democracy and
> Education. It may have been mentioned earlier and it
> was probably an idea floating around. I would be it
> came up at some of the salons at Jane Addams place.
> The general distinction (I don’t think dichotomy is
> the correct word here) is that the extrinsic reward is
> something that an agent is offering an individual (in
> Dewey’s case a child) to get them to do something.
> Dewey’s criticism is – for lack of a better word –
> pragmatic. Extrinsic rewards tend to fade or
> disappear. If somebody it paying you to do something
> and the reason you are doing it is because they are
> paying you, then you stop doing it when you stop
> getting paid. There is nothing inherently bad in this
> but it is not what Dewey might call vital experience,
> it doesn’t change the way you approach the world, has
> not impact on lifelong learning. However if you are
> doing something because you want to do it, without an
> outside agent or the outside agent is superfluous then
> there is a greater chance you will keep doing. The
> action is not dependent on anybody else. So Andy I
> think your example or somebody attending a political
> meeting because they enjoy is actually intrinsic
> motivation while somebody attending a meeting because
> they want to get things done is extrinsic, in other
> words they will stop attending if they don’t think
> things will get done (something like this has been
> defined as political efficacy). If I read this wrong I
> apologize.
>
> The reason I think it might be unwise to consider it a
> dichotomy is because of the way the two have been
> define since Bandura. It is more of a process. You
> need to start with extrinsic motivation but through a
> process of feedback (yes, Bandrua like cybernetics)
> and positive reinforcement through success it slowly
> becomes intrinsic. It is one of the fundamental tenets
> of socio-cognitive theory.
>
> I have no idea why socio-culturalists do not like
> this, it seems to fit pretty well, but I am interested
> to here.
>
> As for Deci and Ryan’s self-determination theory I
> don’t really think of intrinsic motivation as innate
> (do they say that). It is more emergent. You have to
> have the right circumstances, which include autonomy,
> relatedness, and competence and this perfect storm
> leads to intrinsic motivation. But it is difficult to
> attain without it. Can you call that innate?
>
> Michael
>
> *From:*xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu
> <mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> <mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> *On Behalf Of
> *Andy Blunden
> *Sent:* Sunday, August 25, 2019 11:53 AM
> *To:* xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu
> <mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> *Subject:* [Xmca-l] Re: Intrinsic / Extrinsic Motivation
>
> Artin, is there any chance that your 'trouble' can be
> expressed in a paragraph here?
>
> Andrew, I also suspect that the making of the
> distinction into a dichotomy, a behaviourist
> interpretation of the distinction and an ahistorical
> understanding of the idea may cause others to reject
> it, throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
>
> We have politicians in this country, and I do believe
> that some of them participate in the practice of
> politics for the purpose of furthering and even
> perfecting that practice, maybe only a few, but some.
> But I am sure that there are some who in there for
> other purposes, mostly enrichment and/or fame. True,
> it is not a dichotomy; some who are there in order to
> advance political practice also enjoy the game and the
> fame in can bring. But to collapse the two would be
> madness. The practice of politics has an object which
> is not self-enrichment. Individual motivation must be
> judged against that concept of politics.
>
> A while ago I was giving a talk on my book "Origins of
> Collective Decision Making," explaining the ethical
> and instrumental differences between Consensus and
> Majority, and a young anarchist said she /enjoyed/
> consensus much more than majority decision making.
> That there could be reason for choosing one mode of
> action rather than another other the pleasure derived
> had not occurred to her. I was, I admit, a bit
> shocked. This case brings out the subtlety of the
> distinction. Acting in political meetings for the
> sheer pleasure of doing it is actually an /extrinsic/
> motive, whereas acting in meetings to produce good
> decisions implies /intrinsic/ motivation. But
> superficially, it seems to be the other way around.
>
> In a certain context, e.g. playing tennis, doing it
> for the pleasure of doing it counts as an intrinsic
> motivation, and when you become a profession and maybe
> then start playing for the prize money and adulation/,
> /rather than in the perfection of the game, then that
> is extrinsic motivation. It depends on whether tennis
> is taken as a game or a sport, professional or otherwise.
>
> But maybe it is just the difficulty in making a nice
> clear dichotomy which sets people against the distinction?
>
> Andy
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Andy Blunden*
> https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
>
> On 26/08/2019 12:34 am, Coppens, Andrew wrote:
>
> I don’t know much about a characteristically CHAT
> objection to the distinction but, to my mind, the
> main problem is in how intrinsic motivation is
> characterized (i.e., acultural, ahistorical) and
> that extrinsic motivation is set up as its
> opposite (i.e., not just a distinction but a
> dichotomy). These two features of the theory
> create many problems regarding what I need a
> theory of motivation to help explain.
>
> My objections might counter some primary CHAT
> texts, but there are a number of reasons I can
> imagine being OK with that.
>
> / Andrew
>
> ---
>
> Andrew D. Coppens
>
> UNH Education Dept., 302 Morrill Hall
>
> 603-862-3736, @andrewcoppens
>
> Schedule a meeting: calendly.com/acoppens
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *From:* xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu
> <mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> <mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu> on behalf
> of Andy Blunden <andyb@marxists.org>
> <mailto:andyb@marxists.org>
> *Sent:* Sunday, August 25, 2019 1:28:40 PM
> *To:* xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu
> <mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> <mailto:xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
> *Subject:* [Xmca-l] Re: Intrinsic / Extrinsic
> Motivation
>
> *Caution - External Email*
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>
> For some reason which I have never understood many
> CHAT people seem to be set against this
> distinction. And yet the distinction is intrinsic
> to A N Leontyev's Activity Theory. In addition,
> Alasdair MacIntyre uses it to, in my opinion to
> great effect, such that I cannot imagine a theory
> of motivation that lacked this distinction.
>
> What is the problem?
>
> Andy
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>
> *Andy Blunden*
> https://www.ethicalpolitics.org/ablunden/index.htm
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.ethicalpolitics.org_ablunden_index.htm&d=DwMF-g&c=c6MrceVCY5m5A_KAUkrdoA&r=T292xnKwVOMtoHKpeIK_s9mDPzJBSXg6AqnqQfLlAoc&m=d4qKpoX8iBmMCrxfuKZ29rBuT4OVmseKPD3o9xA9qwQ&s=PhLbeiPXKpKBLPnSUpAm_95fDmRRopwgDK14cp4c9zc&e=>
>
>
> On 25/08/2019 1:00 pm, David H Kirshner wrote:
>
> I’m reading a behaviorally oriented account of
> intrinsic and extrinsic motivation by
> authoritative authors Ryan and Deci (2000):
>
> “The most basic distinction is between
> /intrinsic motivation/, which refers to doing
> something because it is inherently interesting
> or enjoyable, and /extrinsic motivation/,
> which refers to doing something because it
> leads to a separable outcome [one undertaken
> for instrumental reasons]” (p. 55).
>
> This seems to me an impoverished account for a
> variety of reasons, most pressingly because it
> attempts to naturalize what is pleasurable or
> intrinsically motivating as inherent to the
> organism, without respect to individuals as
> people, engaged in socioculturally constituted
> life histories.
>
> Does the construct of intrinsic / extrinsic
> motivation surface anywhere in sociocultural
> theory?
>
> Alternatively, can anyone point me toward a
> sociocultural critique of the intrinsic /
> extrinsic construct?
>
> David
>
> Ryan R. M., & Deci E. L. (2000). Intrinsic and
> extrinsic motivations: Classic definitions and
> new directions. /Contemporary Educational
> Psychology, 25/, 54–67.
> https://doi.org/10.1006/ceps.1999.1020
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__doi.org_10.1006_ceps.1999.1020&d=DwMF-g&c=c6MrceVCY5m5A_KAUkrdoA&r=T292xnKwVOMtoHKpeIK_s9mDPzJBSXg6AqnqQfLlAoc&m=d4qKpoX8iBmMCrxfuKZ29rBuT4OVmseKPD3o9xA9qwQ&s=PIxeXNE4clr3Jrl5eX2Rj6bw92pwZxqgSO9opx54rtU&e=>
>
>
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