Insight, Self-reflection, Psychological Mindedness, Evolution

     Meditation practice has long been known to bring about profound mental-health benefits.

     "The non-reactive, detailed, systematic, and impartial observation of one's own cognitions & emotions through the technique of meditation can be a source of personal insight & self-understanding. ... even among patients with little psychological mindedness, approximately 20% 'with a wide range of psychophysiological disorders, who joined stress reduction & relaxation programs involving mindfulness meditation, became interested in psychotherapy for further expansion of self-understanding.' Within this framework, they refer to meditation as a 'psychobiological form of introspection.'"
       Shapiro DH. A preliminary study of long-term meditators: Goals, effects, religious orientation, cognitions. Journal of Transpersonal Psychology 1992; 24(1): 23-39.

     "our perception, cognitions, & emotions related to our ordinary experiences can be distorted or biased to varying degrees. Depending on certain dispositional factors, these biases are sometimes pathological, but exist on a spectrum and may therefore be present without any clear psychopathology. Within this framework, mindfulness is described to reduce such biases through specific forms of mental training that develop meta-awareness of self (self-awareness), an ability to effectively manage or alter one’s responses & impulses (self-regulation), and the development of a positive relationship between self & other that transcends self-focused needs and increases prosocial characteristics (self-transcendence)."
       Vago DR, Silbersweig DA. Self-awareness, self-regulation, and self-transcendence (S-ART): a framework for understanding the neurobiological mechanisms of mindfulness. Front Hum Neurosci. 2012; 6: 296.

ARClark   www.dpreview.com

 

Promoting Healthy Personality Development & Well-being

     "the absence of symptoms of mental disorders does not assure the presence of positive emotions, life satisfaction or other indicators of well-being. ... An adequate model of well-being will require a better understanding of the role of self-transcendence. In contrast to defensiveness and effortful control, an outlook of unity is expressed in activities such as fluidity in athletic performance, improvisation in musical composition, trustful perception of social support, and generosity in charitable donations, which each activate the most recently evolved parts of the brain, particularly prefrontal poles. Activation of the anterior prefrontal cortex produces feelings of satisfaction even when anticipating adversity or when making meaningful personal sacrifices. ...

     Much more work is needed to develop empirical measures that are able to reliably distinguish the different processes that promote healthy personality development and well-being. We need to better understand the crucial role of self-transcendence along with other dimensions of personality in the development of health and happiness. The great deficiency of emerging classifications of mental disorders is that they embody little or no understanding of the science of well-being."

       Cloninger CR. Healthy personality development and well-being. World Psychiatry 2012; 11(2): 103-4.
 
     "The goal of meditation at its deepest level has been liberation from the egoic self; developing a sense of harmony with the universe; and the ability to increase one's compassion, sensitivity, and service to others. These goals may include, but go beyond, personal self-regulation or self-exploration."

       Shapiro DH. Examining the content and context of meditation; A challenge for psychology in the areas of stress management, psychotherapy, and religion/values. Journal of Humanistic Psychology 1994; 34(4): 101-135. 

 

Efficacy Beliefs Regulate Human Functioning

     "Whether you think you can, or think you can't, you're right!"             Henry Ford
 

     "Efficacy beliefs regulate human functioning through four major processes. They include cognitive, motivational, emotional, and choice processes. Much human behavior is regulated by forethought. Efficacy beliefs affect whether individuals think pessimistically or optimistically, self-enhancingly or self-debilitatingly. Efficacy beliefs play a central role in the self-regulation of motivation. Most human motivation is cognitively generated by goal aspirations and the material, social, and self-evaluative outcomes anticipated for difficult courses of action. People of high perceived self-efficacy set motivating goals for themselves, maintain commitment to them, expect their efforts to produce favorable results, view obstacles as surmountable and figure out ways to overcome them.

     People’s beliefs in their coping efficacy also affect their emotional life and how much stress, anxiety and depression they experience in threatening or disheartening situations. Those who believe they can manage threats and adversities view them as less inimical and act in ways that reduce their aversiveness or change them for the better. People have to live with a psychic environment that is largely of their own making. Many human distresses result from failures of control over perturbing thoughts. Beliefs of coping efficacy facilitate the exercise of control over perturbing and dejecting rumination. Efficacy beliefs play a key role in shaping the courses lives take by influencing the types of activities and environments people choose to get into. Advantageous destinies are shaped by selection of environments known to cultivate valued potentialities and lifestyles. 

     Self-efficacy is a key determinant because it affects behavior both directly and by its influence on these other determinants. As already noted, efficacy beliefs determine goals and aspirations; they shape the outcomes people expect their efforts to produce; and determine how environmental facilitators and impediments are viewed. People of low self-efficacy are easily convinced of the futility of effort in the face of impediments. Those of high self-efficacy view impediments as surmountable through perseverant effort and improvement of self-management skills."

       Bandura A. Swimming against the mainstream: the early years from chilly tributary to transformative mainstream. Behav Res Ther 2004; 42(6): 613-30.

 

Critical Role of Beliefs re One's Own Abilities to Change & Overcome Adversity

     Which is preferable, a mastery- or a helpless-oriented self-regulation strategy? Every parent, health-care professional, and all other educators need to become skilled at fostering an unshakable belief in each individual's ability to help themselves rise above the many & varied adversities that are a natural part of life.
     "Belief in one's efficacy to exercise control is a common pathway through which psychosocial influences affect health functioning. This core belief affects each of the basic processes of personal change - whether people even consider changing their health habits, whether they mobilize the motivation and perseverance needed to succeed should they do so, their ability to recover from setbacks and relapses, and how well they maintain the habit changes they have achieved."             Bandura A. Health promotion by social cognitive means. Health Educ Behav 2004; 31(2): 143-64.
 
     People who assume that fundamental attributes (such as intelligence or personality) are static traits that are relatively fixed & not subject to personal development are said to be "entity theorists." Those who hold that these human attributes are, instead, dynamic qualities that can be cultivated & can be developed & changed incrementally through personal efforts are referred to as "incremental theorists."
     Research shows that belief in one or the other of these theories has a major impact "on immediate self-regulatory responses to setbacks, including a) responding to failure, b) coping with dysphoria, c) overcoming negative stereotypes, & d) managing personal conflict in intimate relationships. 
     If attributes are seen as fixed, then success or failure provides diagnostic information about how much of these fixed attributes one possesses (& will ever possess). Therefore, for entity theorists, failure often signifies that abilities are permanently lacking in some way. Following failure, any self-regulation in which these individuals are engaged is thus likely to focus primarily on suppressing the importance of this failure or on coping as best they can with the negative emotional impact. 
     In contrast, if attributes are seen as malleable, then success or failure provides diagnostic information about the level to which these attributes have thus far developed. Therefore, for incremental theorists, failure may signify that their abilities require improvement through further attention and effort. Following failure, any self-regulation in which these individuals are engaged is thus more likely to focus on determining how to bring about this improvement." 

       Molden DC, Dweck CS. Finding "meaning" in psychology: a lay theories approach to self-regulation, social perception, and social development. Am Psychol 2006; 61(3): 192-203. 

Basic Concepts: Motivation in Intentional Behavior

     "Any intentional behavior can be classified in terms of the degree to which it is self-regulated versus regulated by forces outside the self, thus indexing the relative integration of action. A general schema for this is presented in Fig 1. This figure illustrates four types of motivational orientations that can be applied to extrinsically motivated (instrumental) behaviors, and leaves a separate category for intrinsically motivated actions which, although clearly self-regulated, do not have to be internalized. While the labels used for these types of motives may be idiosyncratic, the types of motivation to which they refer are identifiable in other theoretical frameworks under different labels, & also are readily observable in everyday behavior. 

     The most heteronomous form of regulation is external regulation, wherein people perform behavior only because they are either coerced into it, or rewarded for it. Here the regulatory impetus to behavior is external in the classic sense of being literally outside the person. When individuals experience their behavior to be externally regulated, they typically feel controlled or alienated, such that when the external regulatory force is absent, so is the behavioral regulation.

      Introjection represents behavior driven by the dynamics of self- and other approval. Behavior regulated through introjection is characterized by "intemally controlling states" and the guilt and anxiety avoidance that accompany them. Thus, while introjection represents a motivational impetus that is intemal to the person (ie is intrapsychic), it nonetheless remains conflictual & external to the self. Introjection therefore can be understood as a form of partial assimilation or integration. 

     A somewhat more autonomous form of regulation is entailed in identification, which involves the acceptance and personal valuing of an acquired regulation. Identification entails greater autonomy insofar as one's behavior is felt to reflect one's conscious values and identity. Because of this the pressure and conflict associated with introjection or extemal control is somewhat ameliorated. However, despite their relative autonomy, identifications can be more or less isolated or unintegrated with other identifications, introjects, or aspects of personal experience. 

     The ultimate form of "assimilation to self" is that of integration, in which various identifications are organized, or reciprocally assimilated, and brought into congruence with organismic experience as a whole. This crucial transformation completes a process of movement from heteronomy to autonomy or self-regulation. 

     Fig 1 represents intrinsic motivation as a separate category, which, as noted, pertains to behaviors that are done for their inherent satisfactions & thus are not a product of internalization. Intrinsically-motivated behaviors (IMBs) reflect a relatively conflict-free & volitional expression of the self, and have an internal perceived locus of causality. Being a prototype of autonomous regulation, intrinsic motivation is placed on the far right side of the continuum to represent a marker against which internalized regulations can be compared in terms of their degree of autonomy. 

     This schema also includes amotivation (impersonal causality) as a regulatory style, which represents the most impoverished state of integration and autonomy in behavioral regulation. Heider referred to impersonally caused behaviors and outcomes as those that are not intentional & not under personal control. People are amotivated when they do not see action as either (a) reliably connected with outcomes (as in helplessness) or (b) viable given perceived incompetence or lack of environmental supports. When amotivated, a person feels neither competent nor autonomous with regard to acting. Because amotivation represents a nonintemalization of regulation, it, like intrinsic motivation, is presented as a separate category in Figure 1."

        Ryan RM. Psychological needs and the facilitation of integrative processes. J Pers 1995; 63(3): 397-427. 

Fig 1 - Regulatory Styles - Ryan 1995

Intrinsic Motivation & Integration

     "The synthetic view of integration in behavior proposes that people are intrinsically motivated to extend themselves into the world and to integrate what they experience — but they typically show this attribute only when afforded supports for autonomy, competence, and relatedness.

     People also inherently prefer to be the 'origin' of their own behavior, as opposed to being regulated by forces outside of the self. This preference is manifest in the processes of internalization and emotional integration, in which external and internal presses to action are actively transformed into self-regulations. However, these latter processes, like those entailed in intrinsic motivation, are also heavily influenced by the nature of contextual supports relating to autonomy, relatedness, and competence."

        Ryan RM. Psychological needs and the facilitation of integrative processes. J Pers 1995; 63(3): 397-427. 

 

Eric Meola   http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/photography/