32 If you had a choice what would you be doing?
33 Since you were last beeped has anything happened or have you done anything which could have affected the way you feel?
Source: Adapted from Csikszentmihalyi and Csikszentmihalyi (1988):257–8.
Table 2.4 Strategies for enhancing well-being using strengths, intrinsic motivation and flow
Domain Strategy
• Complete the VIA-IS and identify your signature strengths.
Using signature
strengths • Decide to complete activities and tasks that allow you to use your signature strengths every day.
• For each signature strength list a series of activities you could do that would allow you to use your strength. Some will be skilled activities and some will not.
• For skilled activities follow the guidelines for task selection, moving along the continuum, reversals and flow outlined below.
• Select skilled activities that you would like to be intrinsically motivated to engage in. These activities should be moderately challenging but you should feel that you could do them well, and that they could give you satisfaction.
Task selection for intrinsic motivation
• For very challenging complex tasks, work first towards moderately challenging subgoals.
Once a series of subgoals have been mastered, the whole task or activity may be addressed.
• Accept that for many skilled activities there is movement from extrinsic motivation towards intrinsic motivation.
Moving along the continuum
• To move along the continuum towards intrinsic motivation practise skills regularly in an extrinsically motivated way using the most informative rewards available, not rewards that you perceive to be controlling.
• Once the skills become well-developed, decide to do the skilled activity for its own sake rather than for rewards or to avoid aversive situations (but
acknowledge that sometimes you will be rewarded for your achievements even though your activities were intrinsically motivated).
Reversals • When you are carrying out a highly skilled absorbing activity acknowledge that you may periodically flip from a paratelic state, in which you are doing the activity in a playful way for the sake of doing it, into a telic state where you are doing the activity to achieve a goal in a serious-minded way.
• Reversal may occur when you are frustrated with the situation, when you are satiated and have had enough of the activity, or when there is a change in the social or physical context in which you are
doing the activity.
Creating flow experiences
• To create flow experiences select controllable but challenging tasks or activities that require
considerable skill, complete concentration and which are intrinsically motivating.
• Select tasks that there is a good chance of completing within the time available to you.
• Select tasks where there are clear goals and immediate feedback.
• Focus on the task, not yourself, your feelings, or the potential external rewards of the task or activity.
• Expect to be no longer conscious of yourself and to experience time-distortion.
• Gradually increase the difficulty or complexity of the activities or tasks, so that the challenge you face matches your growing level of skill.
• Provide them with clear goals and positive informative, non-critical feedback.
• Respect what interests them now rather than exclusively focusing on what might be good for them in the distant future.
Helping children develop flow
• Give them opportunities to make choices about what they do and to be mindful of the consequences of these choices.
• Encourage them to unself-consciously try their best at activities they choose.
• Offer them opportunities to face bigger challenges as they get older.
Source: Based on Apter (2001); Csikszentmihalyi (1990); Ryan and Deci (2000): 68–78; Seligman (2002).
self-esteem and subjective well-being. Between the extremes of intrinsic motivation and amotivation on Ryan and Deci’s self-determination continuum distinctions are made between four different extrinsic motivation regulatory styles: extrinsic, introjected, identified and integrated. Greater autonomy is associated with integrated regulation than
with the other three styles. As children develop, they internalise and integrate more and more regulations and experience increasing autonomy in carrying out various actions. We develop intrinsic motivation to do activities that are moderately challenging, that we feel we can do well and that give us satisfaction. Intrinsic motivation occurs when needs for competence, relatedness and autonomy are met. Intrinsic motivation is strengthened by offering opportunities for self-direction and positive feedback.
Seligman classifies positive emotions into three categories: those associated with the past, the present and the future. There are two distinct classes of positive emotions concerned with the present: momentary pleasures and more enduring gratifications. The pleasures include both bodily pleasures and higher pleasures which come from positive sensual experiences. Gratifications which entail states of absorption or flow come from engagement in activities that involve exercising signature strengths. Signature strengths are personal traits associated with particular virtues defined in the Values in Action Classification of Strengths. The Values in Action Classification of Strengths is a system in which distinctions are made between virtues, strengths and enabling themes. Virtues are the core characteristics valued by moral philosophers and strengths are less abstract personality traits which may be used to achieve virtues. Enabling themes are the specific habits that lead people to manifest given character strengths in given situations and hence contribute to virtues. The 24 strengths associated with the 6 virtues of Values in Action classification system can be assessed with the Values in Action Inventory of Strengths.
In addition to activities that entail the use of signature strengths, other activities, notably those which are exceptionally exciting or those which are done for their own sake rather than to achieve a goal, may lead to the experience of flow or absorptions. Reversal theory offers a useful framework for conceptualising motivation to engage in these sorts or activities. Reversal theory focuses predominantly on transient metamotivational states such as the telic and paratelic states. The former motivates goal-oriented behaviour and the latter motivates task-focused activity. Reversals or shifts from one metamotivational state to another may occur at any level of arousal due to frustration, satiation or changes in the situation. Reversals are associated with a sudden change in emotion, for example from relaxation to boredom or from anxiety to excitement. Flow experiences may be associated with either telic or paratelic metamotivational states. Reversal theory also proposes that people have dominant metamotivational states. Telic and paratelic dominance are associated with distinct psychological and psychophysiological profiles.
Flow experiences occur when we become engaged in controllable but challenging tasks or activities that require considerable skill and which are intrinsically motivating.
These activities typically entail clear goals and immediate feedback. They demand a high level of concentration and consequently during them we no longer think of our everyday lives or our selves. Time perception is also altered during flow experiences. Flow experiences may occur during reading, sports, involvement in creative arts and music, rituals or involvement in certain types of work. Activities that lead to flow experiences are said to be autotelic because they are intrinsically and immediately rewarding.
Cultures in which the goals, norms, roles, rules and rituals closely match the skills of the population afford citizens more opportunities for flow experiences. Children from families characterised by optimal levels of clarity, centring, choice, commitment and challenge have more flow experiences. For sexual relationships to retain their vitality over the long term, it is vital that the psychological as well as the erotic dimension of the
relationship become more complex by sharing valued interests, hopes and dreams;
embarking on joint adventures; raising children; and by jointly facing all life’s challenges.
QUESTIONS
Personal development questions
1. Complete the VIA-IS on the website and find out your personal strengths.
2. What activities are you intrinsically motivated to do that involve using your personal strengths and flow experiences?
3. Are you satisfied with the amount of time you spend doing these activities at present?
4. How could you change your daily or weekly schedule so that you engaged in more intrinsically motivated activities that involve using strengths and flow experiences?
5. What would be the costs and benefits of making these changes?
6. Make some of these changes and assess the impact this has on your well-being by assessing yourself before and afterwards on one of the well-being scales contained in Chapter 1.
Research questions
1. Design and conduct a study to test the hypotheses that when people engage in activities that involve using their signature strengths and meet the criteria for flow-inducing tasks, they are more likely to be intrinsically motivated and to experience flow than when they engage in equally demanding activities that do not involve the use of their signature strengths.
2. Conduct a PsychInfo search covering literature published in the past couple of years using the terms ‘flow’, ‘intrinsic motivation’, and ‘signature strengths’ individually and in combination. Identify a study that interests you and that is feasible to replicate and extend. Conduct the replication.
FURTHER READING
Academic
Apter, M. (2001). Motivational Style in Everyday Life: A Guide to Reversal Theory. Washington, DC: APA.
Csikszentmihalyi, M. and Csikszentmihalyi, I. (1988). Optimal Experience: Psychological Studies of Flow in Consciousness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Self-help
Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1990). Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. New York: Harper Row.
Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1997). Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement with Everyday Life.
New York: Basic Books.
MEASURES FOR USE IN RESEARCH
Motivational styles
Apter International (1999). Apter Motivational Style Profile, Manual and Workbook. Uppingham, UK: Author. http://www.apterinternational.com/main.htm email:
<Marieshelton@apterinternational.com> Apter International Limited, Glaston Road,
Uppingham, Rutland LE15 9EU England. Phone: (+44) 01572 821111 Fax: (+44) 01572 81311 Kerr, J. (1997). Motivation and Emotion in Sport: Reversal Theory. Hove, England: Psychology
Press (Telic State Measure is in appendix F.)
Kerr, J. (1999). Experiencing Sport: Reversal Theory. Chichester, England: Wiley (the Telic-Paratelic State Questionnaire is in appendix B.)
O’Connell, K., Potocky, M., Cook, M., and Gerkovich, M (1991). Metamotivational State Interview and Coding Schedule Instruction Manual. Kansas City, MO: Midwest Research Institute.
Strengths
Dalsgaard, K. (2002) Values in Action Inventory of Strengths for Youth (VIA-Y).
Cincinnati, OH: Values in Action Institute. For information, contact dahlsgaa@CATTELL.psych.upenn.edu Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, 3815 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104 215–898–7173.
Peterson, C. and Seligman, M. (2001b). Values in Action Inventory of Strengths (VIA-IS) Manual. Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, 3815 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104 215–898–7173, chrispet@umich.edu, http://www.positivepsychology.org/viastrengthsinventory.htm
Flow
Csikszentmihalyi, M. and Csikszentmihalyi, I. (1988). Optimal Experience:
Psychological Studies of Flow in Consciousness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Contains the flow experience questionnaire.)
GLOSSARY
Autotelic activities. Activities that lead to flow experiences and which are intrinsically motivating.
Character strengths. Personal traits which serve as routes for achieving virtues, for example curiosity is a strength associated with the virtue of wisdom.
Enabling themes. Factors that lead us to show particular character strengths in specific situations. For example, mentors may enable us to develop the strength of curiosity and so foster the virtue of wisdom.
Extrinsic motivation. Engaging in activities for external reward or to avoid punishment.
Flow experiences. Czikszentmihalyi’s term for experiences which occur when we become engaged in controllable yet challenging activities that require considerable skill, complete concentration and which are intrinsically motivating. During flow experiences we become unself-conscious and time perception is altered.
Intrinsic motivation. Engaging in activities for their own sake rather than for external reward or to avoid punishment.
Reversal theory. Apter’s view that at any given moment our motivation may be characterised by our status with respect to pairs of metamotivational states, the most important of which are the telic and paratelic states. Reversals from one
metamotivational state to another may occur due to changes in external stimuli;
frustration; or satiation and will lead to a sudden change in emotion, for example from relaxation to boredom or from anxiety to excitement.
Self-determination continuum. A dimension ranging from intrinsic motivation to amotivation, along which a variety of gradations of extrinsic motivation may be distinguished.
Signature strengths. A person’s VIA-IS character strengths on which particularly high scores are obtained.
Telic and paratelic states. Apter’s view that in the telic state we are externally
motivated and focus on doing an activity to achieve a goal but in the paratelic state we are intrinsically motivated to carry out activities primarily for their own sake. The telic state is associated with seriousness and achievement, while the paratelic state is associated with playfulness and fun. In the telic state, where a low level of
psychological arousal and a positive hedonic tone is experienced, then the dominant emotion is relaxation. As arousal increases and hedonic tone becomes more unpleasant, relaxation gives way to anxiety. In contrast, in the paratelic state, where there is a low level of arousal and an unpleasant hedonic tone, the dominant emotion is boredom and this gives way to excitement as arousal increases and the hedonic tone becomes more pleasant.
Values in Action Inventory of Strengths (VIA-IS). A self-report questionnaire which evaluates 24 strengths associated with the 6 virtues of the VIA classification system developed by Petersen and Seligman.
Virtues. Core characteristics valued by moral philosophers, such as wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance and transcendence.