Sunday, July 6, 2014

The Secret of Effective Motivation - Intrinsic vs instrumental



We analyzed data drawn from 11,320 cadets in nine entering classes at the United States Military Academy at West Point, all of whom rated how much each of a set of motives influenced their decision to attend the academy. The motives included things like a desire to get a good job later in life (an instrumental motive) and a desire to be trained as a leader in the United States Army (an internal motive). [...]

Remarkably, cadets with strong internal and strong instrumental motives for attending West Point performed worse on every measure than did those with strong internal motives but weak instrumental ones. They were less likely to graduate, less outstanding as military officers and less committed to staying in the military.




  1. Thanks for sharing . This article answers a question put to me here why
    shouldn't we use both intrinsic and extrinsic motivators with kids'
    education. It would have been nice if
    the article shared the reasoning for this -
    they work in opposite directions , with extrinsic or instrumental
    motivation undermining long term interest , quality of work , intrinsic motivation etc

  2. An explanation - intrinsic
    motivation fosters intrinsic goals like competence , whereas extrinsic
    motivation fosters ' performance '
    goals which are more superficial
    and focused on the extrinsic goal

  3. this story explains the se'varah ' behind the findings

    Time To Learn
    A young but earnest Zen student approached his teacher, and asked the Zen Master: "If I work very hard and diligent how long will it take for me to find Zen." The Master thought about this, then replied, "Ten years." The student then said, "But what if I work very, very hard and really apply myself to learn fast -- How long then ?"
    Replied the Master, "Well, twenty years."
    "Thirty years," replied the Master.


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