Page 333 - Understanding Psychology

Reader’s Guide
Exploring Psychology
Why Do We Eat?
Many psychologists have noticed that rats often begin to eat and drink after being handled. For example, if you remove a number of rats from their cages, weigh them, and then return them to their cages, you will soon hear the crunching sound of food pellets being eaten. Two psycholo- gists (Antelmen & Szechtman, 1975) rea- soned that the handling, a form of mild stress, activated mechanisms involved in eating. So they devised a way of adminis- tering stress to the rats—pinching the rats’ tails gently with a pair of padded pliers. The technique did indeed induce eating. Normal animals that were pinched twice
a day gained more weight than non- pinched rats.
—adapted from Psychology: The Science of Behavior by Neil R. Carlson, 1984
s Main Idea
Much of life is spent trying to satisfy biological and social needs. Biological needs are physiological requirements that we must fulfill to survive, whereas social needs are those that are learned through experience.
s Vocabulary
• lateral hypothalamus (LH)
• ventromedial hypothalamus (VMH)
• fundamental needs
• psychological needs
• self-actualization needs
s Objectives
• Describe the biological and social
needs of humans.
• Explain Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.
Eating, as demonstrated above, serves both biological and psycho- logical (social) needs. People spend much of their lives trying to satisfy biological and social needs. We choose what, how much, and when to eat because of both biological and social factors. Why is it, though, that some people seem more motivated than others when it comes to achieving something, such as a win in basketball or success at a job? Social needs, such as achievement, also influence our lives.
Chapter 12 / Motivation and Emotion 319
Biological and Social Motives