Main content
MCAT
Course: MCAT > Unit 11
Lesson 5: Theories of personality- Theories of Personality Questions
- Situational approach
- Psychoanalytic theory
- Maslow's hierarchy of needs
- Humanistic theory
- Biological theory
- Behavioral theory
- Trait theory
- Observational learning: Bobo doll experiment and social cognitive theory
- Defense mechanisms
- Freud - Death drive, reality principle, and pleasure principle
© 2023 Khan AcademyTerms of usePrivacy PolicyCookie Notice
Maslow's hierarchy of needs
According to Maslow's hierarchy of needs, humans must fulfill five levels of needs in a specific order. Basic needs like food, water, and safety are at the bottom of the hierarchy, while higher-level needs like love, self-esteem, and self-actualization are at the top. Created by Shreena Desai.
Want to join the conversation?
In the modern world, people are expected to achieve self actualization while they're still young, meaning mostly at the base of Maslow's pyramid. You rarely see older more secure people go out and change the world (Sal Khan risked his family's safety while starting Khan Academy).
How does this perceived trend conflict with Maslow's pyramid, if at all?(15 votes)
Interesting point, I would note that Maslow's pyramid is an assessment of the present. An individual cannot progress to the next level at that moment. Sal Khan starting Khan Academy certainly risked his family's safety, but Sal still had those basic needs satisfied at that moment, allowing him to progress up to the more complex tiers. However, the addition of that temporal component as well as one's perception of reality is intriguing and points to potential limitations of Maslow's idea.(12 votes)
- Can you regress to lower level even when those needs have previously been fulfilled? Do you have to climb the hierarchy sequentially?(2 votes)
I think the idea is--you cannot obtain the higher levels unless the lower levels are fulfilled. So, you would have to climb it sequentially. I suppose you could regress--if you're suddenly homeless and can't buy food, you won't have the first level of the hierarchy met and there is no way you can think about self-actualizing without those.(4 votes)
- what a very cool video i will use these steps in sd zğöo üusğ(2 votes)
- Maslow added more to his theory later in his career- he added cognitive and aesthetic needs, as well as others. Maybe we can add more?(3 votes)
Is the Maslow's Hierarchy of needs still used by psychologist ?(1 vote)- Yes, his concept is prominently use in counseling and Positive Psychology (a subfield of Psychology).(1 vote)
- how did he put the proteges together(1 vote)
- this video has some intense asmr(1 vote)
can we have love without safety..??(0 votes)
I think that is most certainly possible. I work for a non profit that serves the poor. I would says that many of the poor people we "love" 1. actually feel loved, feel a sense of belonging, but also 2. don't necessarily have the safety needs down (though most of them do have a certain measure of safety, just not a subjectively defined satisfactory level of safety).
Other interesting examples are that of cults. Often in cults people sacrifice their physiological and safety needs for the sake of belonging. Early Christianity (which was more of a cult than a religion at that time) exhibited such behavior to an extent. Early Christians seemed to not be as concerned about basic needs as they were about being in the Kingdom of God (which probably had to do with the "esteem" and "self-actualization" levels in addition to the "love" level). Evidence is in the fact that they were often tortured, starved, beaten, deprived, and martyred.
Your question just sparked these thoughts of mine. Hope you enjoy them.(2 votes)
- So according to Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, if you don't have a good health, you can't get to the next level of love and acceptance. But what about those with diseases like cancer? I'm pretty sure that they're capable of love and creativity. Can someone please explain?(0 votes)
That's basically the main criticism against Maslow's theory. It assumes that everyone has the same needs and can be satisfied in the same way. One of the limitations of Maslow's theory is that individuals have different needs and they are not necessarily in the hierarchical order suggested by Maslow.(1 vote)
- Is there one more person like Maslow in the World?(0 votes)
Video transcript
So we talked about
before that there's five approaches in
understanding motivation. And one of these
approaches is called Maslow's hierarchy of needs. And it's actually broken
down into a pyramid. So it looks just like this. And it was created by famous
psychologist named Maslow. So Maslow said
that we have needs that need to be fulfilled
in a specific order. And it has to start from
the bottom of the pyramid all the way to the top. So our most basic need is
our physiological need. So this can include anything
from food, water, breathing, sleep. All of these are essential
needs to survive, basically. The second level is
our need for safety, so safety of resources,
safety of employment, safety in our health, property. So all of these are
basic needs as well. But they can only
be fulfilled when our physiological
needs are fulfilled. So we call these two
levels the basic levels. Now, he went on to
name a third level, and this is our level of
love, our need for love, our need to belong, our need
to have friends and family. So this level of needs is
what we call our social needs. The fourth level is our need
for esteem, self-esteem. So we like to feel
confident and have a sense of achievement
in what we do. So this level is called
our level of respect. We like to gain
respect from others when we reach this level. And the last level is
called self-actualization. It's a big word,
but it's basically our need for wanting
morality, a sense of morality, a need for acceptance
and also creativity. So we call this
our full potential. So think of this as
climbing Mount Everest. You have to start at the bottom. But then, along the
way, you're going to have different checkpoints. Each of these
checkpoints are managed by all the Sherpas
on the mountain. You can't go from the
bottom to the next level unless you check
in with the Sherpa, and he makes sure that you're
OK, you've eaten properly, you're getting enough
rest, and only then can you jump to the next level. Again, a Sherpa there
at the higher level is going to check and make
sure you're breathing OK, you're getting enough
oxygen, and so on. So you get to the
next checkpoint and the next checkpoint,
and finally, you're at the top, where
you've realized your maximum potential. So this is called Maslow's
hierarchy of human needs.