Conflict in Motivation

Once a number of specific response mechanisms have been built up to satisfy the various tissue needs, conflict is likely to develop in behavior. The organism, which call follow only one definite line of conduct at a given moment, is played upon by stimuli which either have become connected with different tissue needs or else offer alternative means of equilibrating such needs. An animal may find water in two different places, and a man can exercise preference about the kind of food he will eat. Choice must often be made between motives which trace back to different needs, as when a certain line of sexual conduct is likely to be in conflict with a man's desire to advance professionally in his community. No matter how simple or how elaborate are two (or more) conflicting patterns of response, the organism is seldom at a standstill; contrary to Bunyan's famous tale, an ass would not starve while standing between two equivalent loads of hay. Some type of choice is made; individual learning, social suggestion, and the diversified environment all play their part.

The physiological principles involved in conflict and choice in motivated behavior are not difficult to conceive. In general, we are dealing with the competition of neural tendencies or dominants. These work out a resolution upon the basis of their relative strength and their relation to the total background of neuromuscular activity. Antagonism in response is as characteristic of the reflex as of the cortical level, where most motivational conflicts and moral crises, are staged. The "emotional" reinforcement of competing tendencies by thalamically released response is a powerful added complication, however. Those individuals whose competitions are powerfully reinforced often lack ability to tolerate conflicts. Immediate failure of resolution leads to a neurosis. For example, a homosexual development of the sex urge may collide with a tendency to comply with a social taboo, fear and worry resulting from an oscillation between the two patterns of response. Many cases of shell shock are due to a specious solution of an intensified conflict in motivation. Thus a soldier who has a "fear reaction" to fighting and at the same time a strong desire to meet with social approval forces himself to remain in battle, until an hysterical blindness releases him from his dilemma.

We need not here enter into the other means by which conflicts are resolved, since little is to be gained from them for an understanding of physiological dynamics. Here we are faced with situations in which the balance of power is not sufficiently marked to cause ready and complete resolution of the conflict between two neural tendencies, largely because of the disturbance introduced by thalamic activity. The ability of thalamic action to "fog up" and obscure otherwise clear distinctions between the vigilance and excitability of two dominant centers is generally recognized by abnormal psychologists, to whom we shall leave the problem of charting the devices used by the emotionally unstable to resolve conflicts in motivated behavior.