The Yerkes-Dodson Law explains why, by striving for , we can significantly increase the risk of failure? How can a high interest in achieving the desired result play a cruel joke and, according to the Yerkes-Dodson law, cause the case to be abandoned halfway? It turns out that excessive perseverance and interest in the result is not always good. But why is this happening?

What is the meaning of the law?

The Yerkes-Dodson law says that an average level is enough to achieve a result. The relationship between a person's interest and the effectiveness of his activities is not always directly proportional.

Discovery of the Yerkes-Dodson law

At the beginning of the last century, British psychologists Dodson and Yerkes studied the peculiarities of the movement of rats through a maze when exposed to electric current discharges. At first, as its strength increased, the animals began to run faster over it. But the next increase in the strength of impulses led to an unexpected result - the time for passing through the labyrinth did not decrease, but increased.

These data attracted the special attention of scientists. After a detailed study of the situation, it turned out that the cause of what was happening was excessive. It caused panic behavior in rats and their chaotic movement through the maze. Therefore, the exit time from it has increased significantly.

More about the provisions of the law

The famous ancient Roman philosopher Cicero wrote: "Passion is an excessively strong movement of the soul." And this quote is not about love relationships. It refers to the excess of emotions in any business and perfectly captures the essence of the Yerkes-Dodson Law of Motivation. The following two provisions describe it in more detail:

• The dependence of the effectiveness of actions on the level of motivation has the form of an inverted U-shaped curve. According to it, with an increase in motivation, the quality of activity increases only at first. After reaching the optimum motivation, it begins to decline rapidly.
• According to the law of optimum motivation of Yerkes-Dodson, there is an inverse relationship between the level of sufficient motivation and the degree of task complexity. To successfully achieve a difficult goal, its level must be lower than for a less difficult goal.

Examples of the operation of the Yerkes-Dodson law

Examples of its manifestation include the following situations:

• Failures of responsible excellent students in important entrance exams.
• Failures in losing weight among people who seriously take up the matter.
• Refusals to hire people who have been thoroughly preparing for an interview for a long time.

The given examples reflect situations that are paradoxical in the understanding of many of us. Indeed, in them, results-oriented people fail due to excessive motivation. The Yerkes-Dodson Law opens up performance in a new way, focusing on moderate attitudes. How is this possible?

The Yerkes-Dodson Motivation Optimum Law helps to determine the sufficient level of interest that will not interfere with the achievement of the desired result. But why and at what point can striving suddenly become a fatal hindrance?

The fact is that increasing motivation can cause unwanted emotional states. First, it stimulates an increase in tension in the subcortex of the brain. Excessively strong impulses begin to attack the cortex and provoke its diffuse excitation. As a result, feelings of anxiety, fear or anxiety arise, which can destroy and turn into dust any.

According to the Yerkes-Dodson law, the optimal level of anxiety, and not just motivation, also plays an important role. It should allow a person to make informed decisions and not cause panic and.

What criteria determine the optimum motivation?

Using the Yerkes-Dodson Law in Practice

The Yerkes-Dodson Optimum Law allows you to plan the competent achievement of a goal, determining a sufficient, but at the same time a safe level of motivation.

In work processes

Understanding the optimum motivation helps managers to improve the efficiency of their wards. Given it, they will not use wage manipulation to improve the results. After all, the competition that has arisen because of this can cause psychological discord in the state of subordinates and worsen the results of work. Also, people in any position can reasonably approach motivation and performance, based on the Yerkes-Dodson law.

In self-development

Aiming for personal growth, we should not over-persist and overburden ourselves. Remember, any change requires patience. In order not to give up ahead of schedule, you should take care of keeping motivation at a sufficient level.

In sports

Using this phenomenon, you can reasonably control the mood in. This will help prevent premature breakdowns and. After all, sport requires the ability to calculate strength, and not spend it at the very beginning of the race. Experienced coaches are familiar with the concept of optimum motivation. They always help the wards to keep it for the required period.

Conclusion

The Yerkes-Dodson law characterizes the relationship between the desire for the intended result and the real results from an unusual point of view for many. It makes you think about the popular opinion that it is important to increase motivation incessantly.

Hello,

Dear readers and guests of my blog!

It turns out that there is a psychological law that can explain our failures in business and failures in projects we start!

This is the Yerkes-Dodson law. And he is an article.

Very often, people striving to achieve something significant in life and aimed at success ask questions:

how to manage motivation?How does a low level of motivation affect ? and how to reduce this negative impact?

At the same time, the majority believes that the basis of any failure, any failure to achieve the goal and failure to fulfill the tasks (or their poor performance) there is little motivation.

But few people know that the cause of failures abandoned halfway through and unachieved goals can be an extremely strong motivation, an excessive level of perseverance and diligence.

Everyone knows the phenomenon when an excellent student who knows everything fails the exam, and a three-year student who misses classes, who took up the textbook only last night, successfully passes it.

Or another common example.

Many people who want to lose extra pounds, charged with perseverance and unbending will, spend huge efforts, time and money, but never achieve their cherished goal.

And if something works out for them, then it is not possible to stay at the treasured point of the weight minimum for a long time.

Or one more example.

A teenager, once watching a performance by a famous athlete, decided.

He began to train intensively, disappear for days in the gym, participate in competitions, and even win them.

But after several months of extremely hard training, he quits sports and never remembers them again.

Many employers are faced with the so-called paradoxical behavior of employees, when, with an increase in material remuneration for work, the efficiency of employees drops significantly, as their motivation decreases.

At the same time, they cause stress and emotional tension between management and employees, which further worsens the situation.

In addition, most leaders do not know how.

Similar examples of decreased motivation, not achieving the goal, throwing in the middle of things, projects that were previously started with great enthusiasm, you can bring a great many.

As a rule, such failures are explained by a weak will and a low level of motivation.

Of course, in some cases it is. But in others, everything is exactly the opposite, - It's all because of too much motivation.

Yerkes-Dodson law

(The essence and history of discovery)

In 1908, scientists John Dodson and Robert Yerkes trained rats to navigate a maze.

They found that with increased motivation, the accuracy and speed of performing an action increases, but this cannot last indefinitely.

When motivation reaches a certain level and becomes too high, the quality and speed of the actions performed begin to deteriorate.

When they conducted an experiment on humans, the same pattern emerged. A group of subjects were asked to solve jigsaw puzzles. correct solution they were paid money, it was .

The amount grew from task to task. It is clear that the motivation of the subjects also increased. They worked reluctantly, sluggishly and waddle for small amounts, but as the amounts became more attractive, the motivation and desire to solve problems as quickly and as much as possible grew.

And so, when the amount of the monetary incentive became excessive, which was expressed in excessive tension, excitement, fear that “such a big jackpot could slip away from me,” the speed of solving problems and the quality of the solutions themselves began to decline sharply.

Too strong motivation causes in people, which negatively affects the level of motivation.

What conclusion can be drawn from this?

Right! Weak motivation is not enough to effectively perform actions and achieve goals.

But excessive, too strong motivation interferes with this. Hence, to achieve success, you need an optimal level of motivation.

In other words, as a rule, where we want something too much, extremely want to achieve something, we will fail.

What is the optimum or optimal level of motivation?

This is the level of motivation that most contributes to effective performance and promotes success.

Let's consider this using the example of an athlete who wants to win the title of master of sports and a woman who wants to reduce her weight from 80 to 65 kilograms.

Suppose they set these goals for themselves, developed action programs and began to implement them.

By the beginning of the implementation, their motivation was at an optimal level. Here are his signs.

Signs of reaching the optimum

motivation

• interest in the activities performed and in the goal set is maintained and even increased;
• stable ;
• the desire to finish the work qualitatively and achieve the goal dominates;
• performance of actions, the activity proceeds evenly and in an organized manner, without forcing events;
• adequate (objective, conscious and rational) reactions to the behavior of competitors (in the case of an athlete, these are his rivals, in the case of a woman, for example, her friend);
• , creative determination and drive to action.

But at some point, their motives, i.e. striving to improve your social status and the desire to become attractive become excessive and begin to put a lot of pressure on the heroes of our story.

This is facilitated by external pressure, for example, from girlfriends and a coach, and internal coercion - extraordinary efforts of will.

All this leads to a violation of the optimum motivation. Here are the signs of this:

Signs of loss of optimal

level motivation And

• excessive tension builds up when instead of enthusiasm and determination appears;
• there is a desire to finish the job faster at the expense of quality
• subjective and emotionally conditioned haste, the desire to force events, or even to quit everything;
• for failure to complete the task and not achieving the goal (an obsessive thought may appear: “What if something happens and I don’t succeed”);
• errors appear when performing actions;
• the first signs of aggression appear in relation to others and in relation to oneself, ;
• the goal and activities to achieve it begin to cause hostility;
• the role of volitional qualities increases, instead of enthusiasm, it becomes necessary to force oneself to strive for the goal by force;

It is not difficult to imagine what will happen next.

The level of motivation of our fictional characters will begin to plummet, and their progress towards the goal will be greatly slowed down, or they will completely abandon these goals.

Knowing the Yerkes-Dodson law, what would we advise our characters to optimize their motivation management?

Ways to maintain optimal motivation

1. Review your priorities. Is it so vitally important to achieve the intended goal and get what you want? What is behind such a strong desire? Doesn't it reduce? Does it impoverish your life? If you do not learn, perhaps this is not your goal and none of your business?
2. Less use of negative motivational stimuli, such as punishment, psychological pressure and threats, deprivation of any benefits. Do not force yourself, it is of little use, it is better to look for new, more effective ways of motivation.
3. Use more positive stimuli, such as praise, care, recognition of merit, moral ways of motivation, etc. Treat yourself to a day of rest, a trip to the cinema, or something pleasant.
4. Reduce the number and level of negative reactions to failure. Other owls, if something has not been learned, treat yourself condescendingly, with care. “Yes, it’s bad, I’ll try again!”.
5. Learn to switch. Have a couple more interesting activities in reserve, which can temporarily replace the main activity.
6. Learn to relax properly, switch more actively from work to rest. Rest is the most important component of life, without it you will not be able to be effective at work.
7. Remember that not only the goal in itself should bring pleasure, but also the path to it, the activity aimed at achieving it.
8. Allow yourself to make mistakes, after all, you can learn from mistakes.

Thus, if you know what the Yerkes-Dodson law is, you can properly organize the management of motivations, both your own and the motivation of other people.

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We talk a lot about, and performance, and are used to believing that the best result is achieved with the highest level of motivation, but is this true? How motivated should a person be to achieve maximum success? The Yerkes-Dodson law provides answers to these questions.

What is the essence of the law?

The Yerkes-Dodson Law states that the best results are achieved with an average level of motivation. That is, there is a limit (the optimum of motivation), up to which motivation grows and after which it begins to decline. Visually, this can be represented as a parabola:

Image: https://blogintroverta.ru

In fact, the Yerkes-Dodson law includes two laws. The first of them is described above, and the second says that the higher the complexity of the task being performed, the lower the optimal level of motivation, and vice versa: the lower the complexity, the stronger the optimal motivation. Why this is so, you will understand by reading about the reasons for the maximum effectiveness of the average motivation.

Why the Yerkes-Dodson Law Works

As early as 1908, Yerkes and Dodson, during experiments, found out that when teaching animals to go through a maze, the most effective is the average degree of motivation (motivation was set by the intensity of electric shocks). Why is this happening?

Until the optimum point is reached, motivation grows according to the laws known to all: the stronger the need to complete the task, the better we cope with it.

But after reaching the optimum point, we begin to experience emotional stress: we worry, we strain, we experience. And, of course, due to these circumstances, our productivity drops. Therefore, the higher the motivation after the optimum point, the worse we cope with the task.

Practical application of the Yerkes-Dodson law

We have already talked about the experiment with animals, but the research was not only with them. Of course, people were not taught to pass the maze and were not shocked, but in relation to the person, the pattern that Yerkes and Dodson talk about was also revealed.

People were asked to complete the task for a certain financial reward. As the amount increased, the interest of the participants also increased, they coped better with the task. But until a certain point.

When the amount of remuneration became large enough, people began to get nervous and worried, which prevented them from coping with this task. This experiment confirmed the validity of the Yerkes-Dodson law.

It was experimentally determined that for simple tasks, the optimal motivation is 7-8 points on a ten-point scale, for tasks of medium complexity - about five points, for difficult tasks - 2-3 points.

In view of the above, pay attention to what level of motivation you need to achieve.

For example, if you are a boss and entrust some difficult task to your subordinate, then it will not be the best thing to “motivate” him with dismissal or deprivation of a bonus in case of failure. best solution. Such motivation will only get in the way of completing a difficult task.

And don't forget to watch how you motivate yourself. Perhaps somewhere you lack motivation, or perhaps somewhere you have too much of it. Strive to reach the optimum in order to achieve the best results!

Yerkes-Dodson law

Shows the dependence of the quality (productivity) of the performed activity on the intensity (level) of motivation. The first J.-D. h. claims that as the intensity of motivation increases, the quality of activity changes along a bell-shaped curve: first it increases, then, after passing through the point of the highest indicators of success in activity, it gradually decreases. The level of motivation, at which the activity is performed as successfully as possible, is called the optimum motivation. According to the second J.-D. h., the more difficult the activity for the subject, the lower the level of motivation is optimal for it. The laws were discovered by the American psychologists R. M. Yerkes and J. D. Dodson in 1908 while studying the dependence of learning on the force of reinforcement (electric shock) in mice. Subsequently, the laws were confirmed on the material of other types of activity and motivation, both in animals and in humans.

Brief psychological dictionary. - Rostov-on-Don: PHOENIX. L.A. Karpenko, A.V. Petrovsky, M. G. Yaroshevsky. 1998 .

Yerkes-Dodson law

   YERKS-DODSON LAW (from. 292)

In 1908, the famous American psychologist R. Yerkes, together with J.D. Dodson set up a relatively simple experiment that demonstrated the dependence of the productivity of the performed activity on the level of motivation. The revealed pattern was called the Yerkes-Dodson law, repeatedly experimentally confirmed and recognized as one of the few objective, indisputable psychological phenomena.

There are actually two laws. The essence of the first is as follows. As the intensity of motivation increases, the quality of activity changes along a bell-shaped curve: first it increases, then, after passing through the point of the highest success rates, it gradually decreases. The level of motivation at which the activity is performed as successfully as possible is called the optimum motivation.

According to the second law of Yerkes-Dodson, the more difficult the activity is for the subject, the lower the level of motivation is optimal for it.

Yerkes himself always gravitated toward anthropomorphism, did not make fundamental differences between the behavior of animals and people, and easily saw analogies that were far from indisputable. Sometimes it sounded naive, but in relation to the law he discovered, it turned out to be absolutely true.

An experiment repeated on humans showed similar results. Puzzle tasks were used as experimental material, and a monetary reward was used as a motivating stimulus (the amount of reward for the correct solution, initially insignificant, gradually increased to a very significant one). And here is what was found.

For a purely symbolic gain, people worked "in a slipshod manner", and the results were not high. As the reward grew, so did the enthusiasm; the results improved accordingly. However, at a certain moment, when the possibility of winning reached a considerable value, the enthusiasm grew into a rush, and the performance decreased. Thus, it turned out that weak motivation is not sufficient for success, but excessive motivation is also harmful, because it generates unnecessary excitement and fussiness.

It seems that the authors of popular self-help guides to success in life are not familiar with psychology. The slogan put forward by them "Concentrate all of yourself on the desired goal" is not entirely accurate. The goal, of course, you need to have in front of you, you need to strive for it. But at the same time, we must not forget that obsession with a goal can also do a disservice.

Robert Yrks

Popular psychological encyclopedia. - M.: Eksmo. S.S. Stepanov. 2005 .

See what the "Yerkes-Dodson law" is in other dictionaries:

Yerkes-Dodson law- a generalization according to which the difficulty of a task and arousal correlate with each other as follows: in difficult tasks, a low level of arousal improves their performance in comparison with a high level of arousal. In turn, with simple ... ...

YERKS-DODSON, LAW- A generalization that task difficulty and arousal interact in such a way that, on difficult tasks, a low level of arousal improves performance over a high level, but the reverse is true on simple tasks... ... Dictionary in psychology

- (Eng. Yerkes Dodson law) an empirical generalization, originally established by Amer. psychologists Yerkes and Dodson (1908) in experiments on animals (rats), regarding the influence of the strength of motivation (level of arousal) on the effectiveness of activities with ... ...

This law states that for most tasks, performance increases gradually as activation levels increase, to the point where any further increase in activation results in a decrease in performance. Optimum level... Great Psychological Encyclopedia

Yerkes-Dodson law

Yerkes-Dodson law- The law of Yerkes Dodson in psychology is the dependence of the best results on the average intensity of motivation. There is a certain limit beyond which a further increase in motivation leads to worse results. Scientists back in 1908 ... ... Wikipedia

law of optimum motivation (Yerkes-Dodson law)- the law of the dependence of the effectiveness of a person's activity on the strength of his motivation (activation of the nervous system) for this activity. Graphically, this law can be represented as follows: where: W - the level of motivation in conventional units; Q - efficiency ... ... encyclopedic Dictionary in psychology and pedagogy

Establishing the dependence of the quality (productivity) of the performed activity on the intensity (level) of motivation. Discovered by American psychologists R. M. Yerkes and J. D. Dodson in the study of the dependence of learning on the strength of reinforcement in mice ... Great Psychological Encyclopedia

Yerkes-Dodson law- The law of Yerkes Dodson in psychology is the dependence of the best results on the average intensity of motivation. There is a certain limit beyond which a further increase in motivation leads to worse results. Scientists back in 1908 ... ... Wikipedia

Yerkes law- The law of Yerkes Dodson in psychology is the dependence of the best results on the average intensity of motivation. There is a certain limit beyond which a further increase in motivation leads to worse results. Scientists back in 1908 ... ... Wikipedia

York Dodson's law is the motivation of employees in order to get better results from them.

The manager believes that there is a connection between motivation and the result obtained: the more you encourage the employee, the better he will do.

Such conclusions are premature, as York Dodson's law asserts.

Scientific research by British psychologists

1908 was the year of scientific discovery for Robert Yerkes and John Dodson. They spent mouse study, observed their behavior, which passed through the maze, under the influence of discharges electric current. The scientists concluded that when the current was increased, the mice went through the maze much faster than before. But it was enough to further increase the magnitude of the current, the opposite result occurred: the time increased when passing through the same labyrinth.

It turned out that the mice began to get nervous and act chaotically, spending energy on emotions and experiences (fear, stress, tension appeared), not paying attention to moving in the right direction. Decreased results.

Yerkes Dodson's law appeared after long experiments, which was very simple: "For the sake of getting great achievements, you need to determine the motivation of an average level, called optimal."

Scientists decided to apply the law of Yerkes Dodson to animals and humans.

guinea pig it was necessary to find a dark way out of the 2 proposed ones in the labyrinth. If the animal performed the task, then it was encouraged - by meeting with an individual opposite to itself. Otherwise, they were punished with current discharges of various magnitudes. Constantly tasks became more complicated, respectively, the degree of motivation changed.

For people came up with puzzles of varying complexity. They were encouraged with money. They paid little for lungs, people made decisions reluctantly, without haste, self-confident, but the results were not brilliant.

We increased the difficulty of the task and the prize amount, people got an incentive and desire to win.

But when they increased the amount of the prize for a new task, people began to worry, vigilance was lost, thoughts became paralyzed, a person lost the ability to make a sound decision. Few answers were correct. Consequently, the efficiency was ill.

Output:
With increased motivation, psychological reactions occur in the human body: nervous strain, stress, anxiety, productivity worsens.

Therefore, Yerkes Dodson's Law of Motivation reads as follows:

“Little motivation of a person does not give decent effects, he is not interested in doing a given job. Over-motivation diverts from specific tasks and makes it difficult to focus.

Therefore, Yerkes Dodson's Law of Optimum Motivation determines when a person is most productive and striving for excellent effect.

Thus, the dependence was proved effective work regarding the level of motivation itself.

Yerkes Dodson's Law of Optimum Motivation. Application at present.

Yerkes and Dodson came to the conclusion that an increased degree of (rewarding) motivation can sometimes hurt performance. official duties, and even the acquisition of large effects.

If the employee achieves increased success, then such motivation is called optimal motivation. Sometimes Yerkes Dodson's law is called the law of optimum motivation.

The boss who works for a long time can appreciate the degree of motivation
each of his hired workers, in order to achieve certain successes and what kind of activity he is engaged in. He probably knows him.

• Qualities of a personal nature;
• The degree of interest in the final effect;
• Receptivity to rewards.

Each leader must remember that increased motivation only brings harm, and not benefit to your business, productivity (return) of labor decreases, as proven by Yerkes Dodson's law.

It is better to apply Yerkes Dodson's law in two cases:

• Motivation and stimulation of employees.
• Self-motivation (self-development).

In both circumstances, do not overdo it. At better motivation achieved
excellent success.

Scientists Yerkes-Dodson their Law No. 1 depicted in the form of a bell-shaped curve, which showed: vertically - the result of the activity; horizontally - motivation. At the point: the optimum of motivation is the point of a high indicator of a person's success.

Yerkes-Dodson scientists, the optimum motivation law of Yerkes Dodson, was limited to another law No. 2 for cases of medium complexity, which is also preferably performed at an average motivation limit. But given the type of activity (the more difficult it is), then the low point will be considered the optimal point.

Example: The most favorable point of motivation is relatively evaluated by 7 points. But it is enough to increase the motivation by 10 or more points, there will be not an increase in active performance, but a fall. Therefore, exceeding the optimal (average) degree of motivation in achieving the goal is not always convenient.

Yerkes Dodson's Law states that optimum motivation produces the greatest effective performance. Excessively high motivation, on the contrary, reduces the efficiency.