Maslow's pyramid (theory of hierarchy of needs, Maslow's hierarchy of needs) explains why some people have a strongly expressed need for continuous self-improvement, while others do not consider their personal development at all. Read what exactly is Maslow's pyramid, i.e. the theory of the hierarchy of needs!

Maslow's pyramid of needs - what is it?

Maslow's Pyramid( theory of needs hierarchy ) distinguishes five groups of human needs:

  • physiological needs,
  • need for security,
  • need for love and need for respect,
  • the need for self-realization.

In modern times, it is becoming more and more popular to take care of your development and self-realization. Eventually, the popularity of coaching is growing, and the shelves in bookstores often bend under the weight of numerous books on personal development.

For some people, such a trend is at least strange and incomprehensible: who would be interested in some kind of self-development in a situation where in the daily race you have to remember to pick up your children from school, run a house or earn money to meet basic life needs?

The position presented above can be considered quite understandable, what's more - it can be explained using one of the psychological theories. We are talking about the Maslow pyramid, also known as the hierarchy of needs theory. Its author was the psychologist Abraham Maslow.

The pyramid of needs was described by him in 1943 - it was published for the first time in the Psychological Review journal. More than 10 years later, in 1954, a book by this psychologist - "Motivation and Personality" - was published in which Maslow definitely developed his theory, and it was thanks to this work that the man became a famous figure in the world of psychology.

Maslow's Pyramid - 5 types of human needs

Maslow distinguished five floors in his hierarchy of needs. At the base of Maslow's pyramid were the most basic needs, going in turn towards its apex, in the hierarchy of needs, successive, different, different needs are distinguished.

Basically, the most important thing in the hierarchy of needs theory is that, according to Maslow, there must be individual needsfulfilled sequentially - only when a person has fulfilled the needs from the first level of Maslow's pyramid, does he begin to feel the needs from its subsequent steps.

This would explain why some people - for example, who are unemployed or struggling with a sense of social acceptance - do not even consider taking any steps to achieve the best possible degree of self-realization.

The word "need" has already appeared here several times, but so far it has not been specified exactly what needs, according to Maslow, people experience.

The American psychologist in his theory took into account basic needs, such as sleep or eating, as well as much more complicated issues, such as the desire to learn about the world or the constant improvement of one's professional qualifications.

Maslow's Pyramid - physiological needs

As you can probably guess, the basis of Maslow's pyramid are the needs directly related to the functioning of the human body, i.e. physiological needs. These include the need to eat, sleep and procreate, and in a broader sense also the need to have clothing (which provides people with protection against the cold, for example) and the need to have your own home.

In Maslow's pyramid, physiological needs are considered to be the most basic - if a person has something to eat, has a place to live, and if other needs from this category are met, then there is an urge to meet other needs.

Maslow's Pyramid - the need for security

Theoretically, it would seem that the need for security is quite easy to meet, but in practice - due to the scope of this need - it is not so easy. According to Maslow's theory of hierarchy of needs, a person needs to feel several "kinds" of security.

This is because it is about economic security (i.e. having a job, the income from which allows a person to function freely), personal security, but also about having good he alth.

The need for security also includes the need to be ready to quickly combat the consequences of various events, such as e.g. falling ill with a serious illness or experiencing an accident (this need can be met e.g. by setting aside money for the so-called rainy day) ).

When a person has already met his needs directly related to himself - that is, physiological needs and safety needs - other needs may arise, which begin to be related to relationships with other people.

Maslow's Pyramid -needs for love and belonging

On the third floor of Maslow's pyramid are the needs of love and belonging (sometimes referred to as affiliation needs). In this case, it is primarily about the fact that a person generally wants to love and be loved.

In this part of the hierarchy of needs, there is a need to create relationships with other people, not only emotional, but also friendly. This is because here also include the need to maintain friendly or family relationships.

The third floor of Maslow's pyramid also includes the need to belong - in this case it is understood as the need to gain acceptance in various social groups. This can be a professional or religious group, but also a sports team of which a given person is a member.

Maslow's Pyramid - the need for respect and recognition

On the next, fourth floor of the hierarchy of needs, Maslow placed respect and recognition. It is quite obvious that people need respect from other people. For this purpose, we undertake various activities, such as, for example, efforts to fulfill our duties properly at work.

It is important, however, that we need to experience respect according to Maslow's pyramid not only from other people, but also from ourselves - in order for the need for respect to be fully met, a person should simply respect himself.

Maslow's Pyramid - the need for self-realization

The last, fifth floor of Maslow's pyramid is a need for self-realization. According to the theory of the hierarchy of needs, this would appear when a person would meet the needs of the lower levels of Maslow's pyramid.

The need for self-realization includes, among others, the drive to acquire new knowledge or the desire to experience various aesthetic impressions (e.g. visits to theaters or art galleries).

This group of human needs also includes all other behaviors that would result in continuous personal development and improvement of oneself and the surrounding world.

Worth knowing

Disputes over Maslow's theory

There are many controversies associated with Maslow's theory of needs - as it is with many psychological and sociological theories. They even concern the issue of presenting Maslow's assumptions - it turns out that the scientist himself only described his models, and the graphic form of presenting a set of human needs (the one in the form of a pyramid) was developed and proposed by completely different people.

There are also different opinions on how many levels should really be specified in the hierarchy of needs.The most popular version of Maslow's pyramid - the one described in the text - distinguishes 5 floors of the pyramid.

What some sociologists (and readers of our portal) point to, however, is not the only functioning version of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. You can come across its 7- or even 8-step version.

Modifications to the pyramid were supposed to be made in the 1960s and 70s of the previous century, but there are also some controversies associated with them. In fact, it is not even clear who made these modifications - whether it was Maslow himself, or maybe some other authors.

Doubts arise, for example, from the fact that you can come across information that could come from Abraham Maslow and which dates back to the 1980s, while this man … died in 1970.

Additional floors of Maslow's pyramid

Getting down to business, the additional levels of Maslow's pyramid would be:

  • cognitive needs: sixth floor, understood as the need to gain knowledge and understand the world more deeply, look for new solutions or satisfy one's curiosity,
  • aesthetic needs: the seventh floor, needs related to the search for beauty and perfection in the world around us,
  • need for transcendence: the eighth, top floor of the pyramid, understood as the need to experience immaterial experiences, such as contact with God or experiencing deep sensations related to nature or sexual activity.

To summarize it all this way - there are at least a few versions of Maslow's pyramid and it is impossible to indicate the one that would be certainly true. The easiest way would be to get this information from the creator of the hierarchy - as already mentioned, Abraham Maslow has been dead for almost 50 years.

Criticism of Maslow's theory

In principle, the validity of the theories presented by Maslow is quite easy to determine by looking at how we function ourselves - after all, when we are sleepy or hungry, we typically think about sleep or a meal, and not thoughts about respect or some more refined in our minds entertainment.

It is not hardly surprising, however, that there have been (or in fact still do) voices of criticism against the hierarchy of human needs presented by the American psychologist.

The criticism of Maslow's pyramid focused primarily on the fact that in fact the classification of needs for all societies functioning on our planet should not be standardized.

Maslow based his observations on researcha narrow group of patients and, in fact, the values ​​and needs that were the most important for the studied group of people, if the analyzes were performed in a different group, could turn out to be completely different.

Category:

Psychology