Personality Theorist Paper

Abstract

Abraham Maslow was an American psychologist who is well known, among others, to prepare the ground for Humanistic Psychology. Maslow is also well known for the proposal of his Hierarchy of Human Needs. In this paper will analyze Abraham Maslow’s contributions to the field of psychology of personality and the particular school of thought he falls under. This paper will also focus and analyze how Maslow’s theories can be applied in today’s workplace.

Personality Theorist Paper

Abraham H. Maslow was born in Brooklyn, New York on April 1st of 1908. Abraham was the oldest of seven children. His parents were uneducated Jewish immigrants from Russia who fled to United States in order to push their son Abraham hard in his academic studies. Maslow first studied law at the City College of New York to satisfy his parent’s wishes, but not long after, Maslow along with his spouse moved to Wisconsin where he attended the University of Wisconsin. While attending the university, Maslow met his chief mentor Professor Harry Harlow. Maslow soon became interested in psychology and his academic work improved dramatically. Maslow soon began to pursue a new line of research, investigating monkey’s dominance behavior and sexuality. While attending the University of Wisconsin, Maslow received his Bachelor of Arts, Master of Arts and his PhD in psychology. A year after graduating, Maslow returned to New York and began teaching at Brooklyn College. During this period, Maslow met many leading psychologist such as Erich Fromm, Alfred Adler and Karen Horney. Maslow began his theoretical work at Brandeis University where he served as the chairman of the psychology department. While at Brandeis University, Maslow met Kurt Goldstein the originator of the idea of self-actualization. During this experience Maslow began his journey to humanistic psychology.

Abraham H. Maslow became a leader of the humanistic school of psychology that emerged in the 1950's. Maslow referred to his school of psychology as the “third force”, beyond Freudian theory and behaviorism. A Humanist focuses on potential and believes humans strive for upper levels of capabilities such as creativity, high levels of consciousness and wisdom. These individuals are labeled as a self-actualizing person. Maslow noticed while working with monkeys early in his career that some needs take precedence over others. One example is hunger and thirst. Both humans and animals tend to take care of the thirst before hunger. This is probably due to the fact that mammals can live without food for several weeks, but only a few days without water. From this concept, Maslow created his famous Hierarchy of Human Needs which was one of his major contributions to the field of psychology. In this theory, Maslow believed humans have a number of needs that are innate. He believed although these needs where instinctive some were stronger than others thus creating a hierarchy. Maslow arranged these needs in a pyramid arranging the basic instinctive needs at the bottom of the pyramid becoming stronger higher in the pyramid.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Human Needs is composed of five levels of basic needs which consist of Physiological Needs, Safety Needs, Needs of Love, Needs of Esteem and needs for Self-Actualization. These levels are an attempt to explain a human’s behavior and what motivates them. This idea has been adopted in the business world by many in order to determine what motivates and drives their employees in order to maximize productivity.

In today’s working environment, companies are increasingly focusing on the use of rewards to motivate and promote positive employee performance and productivity. By meeting employee needs, organizations can build a committed and dedicated team of employees. Company who apply the principles of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Human Needs could help lower employee turnovers and increase effort and motivation levels. Motivation is the key to improving performance; therefore companies should study the principles of employee motivation. By studying the principles of employee motivation, an organization can achieve higher productivity. Both monetary and non-monetary incentives are considered to be workplace motivators. Companies use these types of incentives or benefits in order to attract and retain employees. In order for these types of rewards to be effective, the rewards must focus on the employee needs. Since every individual is motivated differently, management should consider the relationship between the individual’s needs and the business’s needs in order to find appropriate rewards to increase motivation at work.

Rewards and benefits should