The study of motivation asks: ·
– What motivates human behavior?
– What drives people to behave in different ways in the face of similar situations?
– What accounts for the same person being driven by different motives?
The study of emotion asks:
– What is the purpose of emotion?
– What factors contribute to the experience of emotion?
– How does emotion serve as an important form of intra and inter personal communication?
– What accounts for emotional intelligence?
Directions:
1) Read Chapter 8 and consider the above questions.
2) Create a hypothesis about a key concept addressed in the chapter (e.g., love, sex, food, work, etc.) and
its place in society today.
a. One such concept/hypothesis formulation might read:
Society is obsessed with romantic notions of love, so we would expect
to find more expressions of romance and representations of traditional
courtship in popular art, music, and cinema, than other forms of love,
like dedication, sex, companionship, or aspiration.
3) Listen to radio and/or music on your phone, as usual, for the duration of one week. While listening,
record the total number of songs and log the key concept addressed in each song (e.g., 27 songs were
played: 14 centered on love; 5 centered on sex; 6 centered on partying; 2 centered on aspiration).
4) Compose a summary of your listening experience that includes:
a. Presentation of your hypothesis and the reasoning behind it
b. Frequency distribution of songs in accordance with key concepts
c. Sampling list of song titles and the key concept each demonstrates
d. Discussion of your hypothesis given the frequency distribution, identifying in bold at least 10
terms from the reading (e.g., sensation seeking, drive-reduction theory, facial expressions, etc.).
i. For each term, paraphrase its definition and explain its relevance to your listening
experience. Specific analysis of the lyrics of one or more songs is encouraged, in order to
support statements made.
This essay should be at least two (2) pages in length and written in APA-style (i.e., double-spaced, Times New
Roman 12-pt font, 1-inch margins, page number. etc.), but no cover page, abstract, citations, or references are
required, as this is a short assignment and all terms are taken from the textbook.
Use—but not overuse—of the first person is permitted.
Name and date should be placed in the upper left-hand corner of the first page of text
