Power, Achievement, Intimacy: Tap Thy Unconscious Motivation

*** This article is part of a series on burnout. To learn how Implicit Motivation impacts burnout, see Burned out? Frustrated unconscious motives may be at fault

In our highly success-oriented society, much has been said about what motivates people. We have whole theoretical systems developed to address motivation, such as the reward-punishment framework or the internal (e.g., feeling good about yourself) vs external (e.g., monetary gain) motivation paradigm. Everyone from Tony Robbins to Forbes has published articles on the issue.

So why do so many of us feel stuck and lost at times?

My hunch is, because most of these writings address what is known as conscious, or self-reported, motivation. Sure, they try to account for phenomena like internal needs and gain insights from behavioral economics—yes, rewards work better than punishment to motivate behavior. What they omit, however, is unconscious motivation (for an exhaustive list of unconscious processes, cf. Weinberger & Stoycheva [2019]).

What Is Unconscious (Implicit) Motivation?

Research into what we call Implicit Motivation began in the late 1940s and was inspired by the pioneering work of Henry Murray—the developer of the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT). David McClelland and John Atkinson revolutionized our understanding of motivation by theorizing that people were largely unaware of their own driving forces and conducting a series of experiments manipulating images to tap into participants’ unconscious motivations. Theoretical and empirical developments in the field of Implicit Motivation span decades and include the groundbreaking work of David McClelland, Richard Koestner, Joel Weinberger, David Winter, Dan McAdams, and Oliver Schultheiss. Several important main findings have emerged:

• There is a difference between implicit (unconscious) and self-attributed (conscious) motives. Researchers have discovered that people are surprisingly bad at describing their implicit motives and their self-reports seldom match projective assessment tools, or even long-term behavior (cf. Schultheiss & Brunstein, 2010).
• Implicit and explicit motives represent two distinct motivational systems. In other words, we are driven by two different entities, one consciously accessible, and the other operating below the threshold of consciousness. In addition, both systems appear to direct different behaviors—the conscious one driving short-tern behaviors and verbalized goals, and the unconscious one predicting spontaneous and long-term behavior.
• Implicit and self-attributed motives can be misaligned or flat out in conflict. Often times, based on familial, societal, or cultural pressures, we may explicitly be aware of a motive to achieve, say, a top position within our company’s hierarchy. However, we may unconsciously be motivated by a need to feel intimacy and connection, rather than to climb the corporate ladder. So…
• Conflicting implicit and self-attributed motives can lead to distress and feeling stuck. If achieving rank requires us to act in ways that may cause others to dislike us, we may find ourselves internally conflicted, depressed, or self-sabotaging our own promotion.
• There are a limited number of implicit motives/needs that drive us

The Three Implicit Motives/Needs

Early work by McClelland, Winter and McAdams resulted in the discovery and deepened understanding of the three main implicit motives of Achievement, Power, and Intimacy.

The Achievement Motive

The implicit Achievement motive/need was discovered first and was largely the focus of McClelland’s early work. People high in this need seek to achieve for achievement’s sake. Achievement is the only motive of the three unconscious needs that is not relational. In other words, people high on this need seek to problem solve for the sake of finding a solution, not for the sake of, say, the praise they may receive as a result or the impact that the solution will have on others.

As an intrinsic motive, Achievement can be negatively impacted by extrinsic incentives. What is more, while high achievers are generally interested in challenging tasks, they are less likely to pursue a task that is too difficult. This is because such a task has a lower likelihood of being mastered and even if accomplished successfully, is more likely to be accomplished due to luck and not skill. Similarly, tasks that are too easy would not provide a sufficient incentive, for they would bring no sense of fulfilment.

The Power Motive

Satisfying the need for Power, like Intimacy, requires the presence of others. Thus, this motive is inherently relational. People high in this motive derive pleasure from influencing others. However, despite the bad reputation that the word has colloquially earned, the Power motive is not inherently “good” or “bad.” Rather, it simply denotes a need to impact others. How this need is expressed is what matters, so individuals’ ways of satisfying this motive can have positive or negative aspects to them. For instance, a negative expression of the implicit power motive is trying to control or overpower others, while a positive expression is to impact others through inspiring, teaching, or empowering them. David Winter has compared this motive to fire—having potential to accomplish a lot of good (empower) but needing to be constantly monitored due to its destructive potential (overpower).

The Intimacy Motive

The implicit Intimacy motive/need grew out of research into the earlier identified Affiliation need. The Affiliation, Intimacy, and Oneness unconscious motives are sometimes grouped together for they all relate to our need for closeness. There are, however, some subtle differences.

In the initial conceptualization of the Affiliation motive, people who were high in Affiliation needs were thought to derive pleasure from social connections. Fulfillment of this need was shown to result in stress reduction and long-term health benefits. However, studies have uncovered a darker side to this motive; namely, the discovery that the behavioral expression of the Affiliation need is more geared towards avoiding rejection, rather than simply deriving pleasure from connection. In other words, avoiding negative interactions was shown to be a more powerful motivator than achieving positive ones.

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To address some of these discrepancies, Dan McAdams developed the concept of Intimacy Motivation, which crystallizes the reciprocity-approach (vs displeasure-avoidance) aspects of this need. At its core, the Intimacy motive reflects a need for mutuality and for sharing one’s inner reality with another person. It is qualitatively different from the earlier Affiliation motive of avoiding relational hurt. The Intimacy motive is also closely related to the more recently identified need for Oneness (Weinberger & Smith, 2011)—a deeper need for belonging to a larger whole.

Unconscious (implicit) motives have been shown to have different developmental predictors and find their roots, at least partially, in different parenting styles (cf. Weinberger & Stoycheva, 2019). They are largely preverbal, and, as such, cannot be self-reported. Rather, the degree to which each of us possesses each type can be measured through projective measures. Implicit motivation also impacts how our lives unfold, our satisfaction with interpersonal relationships, creativity, and professional development (Weinberger & Stoycheva, 2019).

A growing body of research has also implicated implicit motivation, and the ways in which it is aligned or misaligned with explicit motivation, in mental health. Next week, we will explore how implicit motivation may impact burnout.