Free Essay

Motivational Processes

In: Philosophy and Psychology

Submitted By Vatopballa
Words 1471
Pages 6
Physical activity or exercise is a core part of quality life because of its psychological and physiological benefits. Exercise assists in management of weight, reduction of blood pressure, lead to reduced risk of developing cardiovascular diseases and diabetes, improved mood, and causes a general increased sense of well being. The mechanisms that control or govern the direction, choice, intensity and adherence to exercise are thus important. The mechanisms include external desires (extrinsic) that drive a person to exercise and internal feelings (intrinsic) that drive a person to exercise. In this regard, this assay evaluates the influence of intrinsic and extrinsic factors on the motivation to engage in exercise.
As already explained, intrinsic motivation to exercise pertains to engaging in physical activity because of the inherent satisfactions and pleasures the activity provides. Intrinsic factors influences motivation to engage in exercise through arousal. Inherent factors like feeling happy and feeling secure arouse the motivation to engage in an exercise. For example, some people engage in weight lifting because it makes them feel secure. Inherent feeling of wanting to be secure thus can arouse motivation to go weight lifting. Some people are motivated to perform specific exercises because the exercises make them feel happy. For instance, some people get motivated to play games like cards because that makes them happy. This arousal of motivation for exercise may occur often whenever an individual feels the need to feel secure. In such instance, the motivation for exercise will be aroused and the individual engages in the activity. Through causing arousal of motivation for exercise therefore, intrinsic factors influence the direction of physical activity. People would engage in selected activities to which motivation has been aroused.
Intrinsic factors also influence motivation for exercise through memorizing stimulating sensations experienced out of engaging in a particular exercise. This means that a person is motivated by the feeling the exercise brings. For instance, some people may engage in weight lifting because they love the bumping experience resulting from weight lifting. Enjoyment is another intrinsic factor that influences motivation for exercise. Many people get motivated to engage in sports like athletes, football, and basketball among others, because they enjoy the sports’ activities. A person who enjoys running therefore get motivated to engage in exercise in form of running. Many people who do running as exercise may be motivated by the thrill of the runner’s high they experience and may never care about becoming thin or any other such related outcomes.
When people engage in an activity because they enjoy the activity or like the feeling the activity brings, the intensity and persistence in the activity increases. A person is likely to run for a long time because he or she likes it, or a person may lift weight for prolonged time because he or she enjoys the bumping feeling the weight brings. This is on the contrary to a person who could be doing the same for another reason say to cut weight. In this manner, intrinsic factors influences motivation for exercise by increasing intensity and persistence for exercise (Jermsuravong, 2006). According to results of one survey, intrinsic motives (competence and enjoyment), motivates adherence and attendance to a selected physical activity (Ryan, Frederick, Lepes, Rubio, & Sheldon, 1997).
Intrinsic factors influence motivation by satisfying particular basic psychological needs. In particular, feeling of autonomy and competence is an important factor in intrinsic motivation. Since intrinsic motivation is an evolved and natural propensity, certain environmental factors can diminish or undermine how the intrinsic factors can influence motivation for exercise. Cognitive evaluation theory (CET) explains that events that negatively affect an individual’s experience of autonomy and or competence diminish the influence intrinsic factors would have on motivating exercise. On the other hand, an event that support or promote feelings of autonomy and or competence enhances intrinsic influence on exercise motivation. For instance, while football may be interesting to an individual, presence of a controlling coach who puts too much pressure and orders on players can diminish an individual’s interest and joy of participating in the activity. In parallel, environmental conditions that pose extreme challenges may make an individual to feel incompetent and thus demoralize him or her in engaging in the activity (Ryan, Williams, & Patrick, 2009).
Influence of Extrinsic Factors on Exercise
Motivation for engagement in exercise activities is also influenced by external gains. In fact, even most exercise drive by enjoyment equally requires durations of extrinsically motivated practice in order to develop particular skills. Extrinsic factors like look and health, influences motivation for exercise through arousing the need for exercise. Many people, particularly the youth, would be driven to engage in exercise by the need to acquire or maintain an attractive look. The need to acquire a particular look would influence exercise by determining the direction or type of exercise an individual engages in. For instance, a person intending to gain slim waistline would be motivated to engage in cardiovascular exercise, while another intending to become famous in a football team and even get scholarship from the team would be motivated to engage in athletic exercise in order to become more fit for the football team.

External factors like wanting to gain health need influences motivation for exercise through persistence. Individuals who engage in exercise because they want to maintain appropriate body mass index, or reduce the risk of developing diseases such as cardiovascular or diabetes, or maintain active metabolic systems are likely to get motivated regularly and thus become persistent with exercise. In this way, extrinsic factors influence exercise motives through integration. This means that the external factor (e.g. health gain) makes an individual to fully assimilate a particular exercise activity, making the exercise to become in congruence with the person’s other values and needs.
Additionally, the extrinsic factors influence exercise motives through introjected regulation. Extrinsic factor like fame may motivate an individual to engage in exercise though the person may not accept the exercise as his or her own. Through introjections, a factor like pride can make a person to persistently engage in exercise (Jermsuravong, 2006).

Heredity and Environment
Motivation for exercise can also be attributed to heredity and environment. Certain inheritable genes have been identified to influence exercise through their influence on fatigue. For equally fit individuals, some may find a specific exercise more tiring and less appealing than others due to difference in genetic composition. Another exercise related gene is widely expressed in the brain and muscles and act to determine how different people with different genetic composition find a particular exercise physically easy and psychologically rewarding. Further, other genes have been associated with how the body regulates energy, which has an impact on the desire to engage in exercise. Different phenotypes in different individuals have been linked to the variations on response to exercise training. According to one survey, individuals exposed to same exercise training displayed remarkable differences in maximum oxygen uptake, endurance, skeletal muscle oxidative metabolism, adipose tissue metabolism and fasting glucose and lipoprotein levels. While others exhibited no change in maximum oxygen uptake, others gained almost more than a liter of oxygen uptake. Remarkably, the differences could not be linked to either age or sex. The research deduced that certain heritable genes were associated with the differences in response to exercise training (Bounchard, 1993). By determining how particular exercises are physically easy for instance, heredity influences motivation for exercise through developing competence for the selected activity.
Environment also extrinsically influences exercise through directing choice, determining how long and hard a person engages in exercise (Voltaire, Berthouze-Aranda, & Hue, 2003). For instance, a student in a college where all peers have grown muscles may feel insecure and as a result, get motivated to do gym exercise. Environment for performing exercise such as indoors or outdoors in groups may determine how hard or long a person does the activity.

Conclusion
Both intrinsic and extrinsic factors play important roles in influencing motivation for exercise. Heredity and environment also plays significant roles in influencing exercise. Engagement in exercise is stimulated through arousing motivation, creating perseverance and endurance, and making external outcome of exercise part of internal values.

Bibliography
Bounchard, C. (1993). Heredity and Health related Fitness. Physical Fitness and Sports , 1-7.

Jermsuravong, W. (2006). motivational fcators on exercise behavior in youth. Silpakorn University International Journal , V. 6 p. 35-65.

Ryan, R. M., Frederick, C. M., Lepes, D., Rubio, N., & Sheldon, K. M. (1997). Intrinsic Motivation and Exercise Adherence. International Journal of Sp[ort PSHYCOLOGY , 335-354.

Ryan, R. M., Williams, G. C., & Patrick, H. (2009). self determination theory and physical activity: the dynmics of motivation in development and wellness. Hellenic Journal of Psychology , Vol. 6.

Voltaire, B., Berthouze-Aranda, S., & Hue, O. (2003). Influence of a hot/wet environment on exercise performance in natives to tropical climate. The Journal of Sports Medicine and Physical Fitness , 306-311.

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