Toward An Eco-Psychology of Being: From Deficiency-Motivation to Being-Motivation

This is an early draft of a paper I will probably be presenting in Chicago in early May 2008, so any comments and questions offered with help in this essays revision. This is a new direction for me, blending motivational psychology with environmental awareness.

Toward an Eco-Psychology of Being:
From Deficiency-Motivation to Being-Motivation
Mark A. Schroll, Ph.D.
This essay begins its attempt to envision an Eco-Psychology of being by pointing out that mainstream environmentalism has almost exclusively failed to call on psychology’s understanding of motivation. Mainstream environmentalism has done a tremendous job of pointing out what’s wrong with humankind’s treatment of the earth and its creatures, yet this critique continues to be perceived in opposition to the American way of life. The messages from mainstream environmentalism are, in other words, all negative—whether or not we choose to agree or disagree with any of these messages. The first step toward envisioning an Eco-Psychology of being will therefore be to create positive motivational messages that people will want to accept as their new philosophy of life or worldview. Abraham Maslow echoed this perspective in discussing his theory of motivation:
The human being is a wanting animal and rarely reaches a state of complete satisfaction except for a short time. . . . It is a characteristic of human beings throughout their whole lives that they are practically always desiring something. . . . Wanting anything in itself implies already existing satisfactions of other wants. We should never have the desire to compose music. . . or to adorn our homes . . . if our stomachs were empty most of the time, or if we were continually dying of thirst, or if we were continually threatened by an always-impending catastrophe, or if everyone hated us. There are two important facts here: first, that the human being is never satisfied except in a relative or one-step-along-the-path fashion, and second, that wants seem to arrange themselves in some sort of hierarchy of prepotency (Maslow: 7, 1987, italics added).
Defining What I Mean By Motivation
The first step toward our creating an Eco-Psychology of being is to define motivation Vs learning. Learning, according to Hal R. Arkes and John P. Garske, “is the process by which a relatively permanent change in behavior occurs as a result of experience” (Arkes & Garske: 3, 1977). Most important in distinguishing motivation from learning is that:
the study of learning emphasizes events in the organism’s past (“experience”) that influence present behavior. The study of motivation emphasizes contemporaneous influences on present behavior (for example, hunger as an influence on eating). Whereas learning is relatively permanent, motivation is not. A person is sometimes hungry, sometimes full (Arkes & Garske: 3, 1977).
Still, because the field of motivation is extremely broad, any attempt toward putting forth a comprehensive definition must be considered provisional at best. Having said this, Littman has suggested that:
Motivation refers to processes or conditions which may be physiological or psychological, innate or acquired, internal or external to the organism which determine or describe how, or in respect of what, behavior is initiated, maintained, guided, selected, or terminated; it also refers to end states which such behavior frequently achieves or is designed to achieve whether they are conditions of the organism or environment; it also refers to the behavior engaged in, or aspects of that behavior, in respect of its organization, occurrence, continuation, reorganization, or termination with regard to past or present or future organic or environmental conditions (Littman, quoted in Arkes & Garske: 3, 1977).
I hope this abbreviated version of Littman’s more thorough definition of motivation will serve as an adequate guide in our inquiry toward an Eco-Psychology of being.
Moving Beyond the Rhetoric of Environmentalism
One reason that mainstream environmentalism has failed to make significant progress in solving the world’s environmental crises (as well as its failure to attract more public support) is because it has focused exclusively on negative motivational messages. I have summed these up as follows.

1. The first can be referred to as the fear approach or the rhetoric of catastrophe.
2. The second as the guilt approach or the rhetoric of shame. And
3. The third as the self-sacrificing/voluntary simplicity approach or the rhetoric of redemption.

The rhetoric of catastrophe represents prophecies of doom, such as global warming, ozone depletion, deforestation, loss of species, etc. The rhetoric of shame says that the industrial nations of the world are consuming the majority of the earth’s fossil fuels (we’re addicted to oil, we need to conserve, etc.). Pointing out we are so in love with technology that our lives have become increasingly complicated and disconnected from nature and each other. This has led environmentalists to call for a “self-sacrificing/ voluntary simplicity;” this rhetoric of redemption tells us drive less, slow down when we drive, car pool; turn down our thermostat, reduce human population growth, recycle, etc. All of these examples are negative motivational messages. We instead need to re-examine motivational psychology, because we need to develop a positive motivational imagery of how to be and a language to empower people to want to become part of this movement.1

Brief Chronicle of Ecopsychology’s Origins

Not enough love to make it, not enough hate to break it,
Just enough to keep me trapped inside this vicious circle
Donnett Smith, 1998

One of the earliest conceptual seeds that led to our current view of ecopsychology can be traced to Robert Greenway, who, as I have discussed at length,
(while working as a writer for Abraham Maslow) coined the term psychoecology in 1963 in an essay he wrote at Brandeis University, Boston. That same year Greenway became the founding dean of Franconia College in the mountains of New Hampshire and continued to explore the relationships between humanistic psychology, the farther reaches of human nature (which later morphed into transpersonal psychology), and psychoecology. Greenway began teaching courses in psychoecology and the ten nascent field of transpersonal psychology at Sonoma State University, in 1968 (Schroll: 29, 2007).
During this same time the cultural historian Theodore Roszak published his book Where the Wasteland Ends (1972), in which he pointed out:
Ecology stands at a critical cross-roads. Is it, too, to become another anthropocentric technique of more efficient manipulation, a matter of enlightened self-interest and expert, long-range resource budgeting? Or will it meet the nature mystics on their own terms and so recognize that we are to embrace nature as if indeed it were a beloved person in whom, as in ourselves, something sacred dwells?. . . . The question remains open: which will ecology be, the last of the old sciences or the first of the new? (quoted in Fox: 27-28, 1990).
These pleas by Roszak seem to predominantly fallen on deaf ears during the maelstrom of sex, drugs and rock and roll in the 1970s and 80, whose effects rippled into university curriculums, demonstrated by the total absence of environmental curriculum within the social science and humanities.
Meanwhile 20-years would pass before Greenway’s research would rise to national attention through the efforts of Elan Shapiro, one of Greenway’s graduate students (Schroll: 29, 2007). In 1989 Shapiro started an anti-war group (just prior to the first Gulf War). Besides Shapiro, early members of this group included Mary Gomes, Alan Kanner, Fran Segal, and others. Through their discussions this group had the awakening that human conflict denigrates, dissolves and destroys everything with which it comes into contact; an understanding that allowed them to perceive a connection between peace studies and environmental philosophy. Greenway was invited to participate in these discussions, but within a year retired from teaching at Sonoma State University and moved to Olympia, Washington.
The reputation of this group eventually attracted the attention of Roszak in 1990, who asked to attend its meetings. This inspired Roszak to write an essay on ecopsychology, which was Roszak’s way of playing with words and Greenway’s idea of psychoecology. . . . Roszak provides a broad definition of ecopsychology with which to frame our discussion: 1) The emerging synthesis of ecology and psychology. 2) The skillful application of ecological insights to the practice of psychotherapy. 3) The discovery of our emotional bond with the planet. 4) Defining “sanity” as if the whole world mattered.
Despite Roszak’s broad definition of ecopsychology, the name ecopsychology fails to convey the full spectrum of his multidisciplinary concerns. Nor does the name ecopsychology call to mind the contributions of indigenous science. . . . A few years later, Roszak expanded on these four points, whose expression was more consistent with his multidisciplinary concerns and those of indigenous science (Schroll: 29-30, 2007).
Unaware of the psychoecology discussion group taking place in Berkeley, my own inquiry chose to focus on the question, how, and in what directions, can we move beyond simply treating the symptoms of the world’s growing number of social and environmental crises? The motivation to ask this question was the result of reading Roger Walsh’s book Staying Alive: The Psychology of Human Survival (Schroll: 29-30, 2007).
This need to recognize the importance of treating or healing the symptoms and getting to the root causes of these symptoms is therefore an essential step toward our understanding of ecopsychology. This focus on healing the symptoms, as Ralph Nader has pointed out, results in the tremendously high burnout rate among environmental activists. Why? Because the motivation that ignites most environmental activists are simply reactionary and symptom focused. Trying to heal each one of these separate symptoms is a never-ending task because the system keep breaking down amidst our efforts to heal it; meanwhile, absent from such a focus is a coherent philosophy of life that enables people to sustain and nurture themselves.
This symptom-oriented approach to healing our planet can be compared to a field surgeon trying to mend all of the wounded in an ongoing war without end. Thankfully we are able to save some of the wounded, but many others die. With each new day greeting us there is the need to care for more wounded, and that eventually results in burnout. Similarly, we as surgeons trying to heal the wounds of our culture will never seen an end to our labours merely by trying to heal all of its symptoms of decay. Instead, the only way to truly heal the wounds of our culture will be to find a way to stop all of the fighting and end our war with nature (Schroll: 30-31, 2007).
Equally important to diagnosing these symptoms or habits of cognition that are associated with the social and environmental crises is our need to create a new philosophy of life. In support of this need, Bill Devall points out that:
Alfred Adler coined the term lifestyle in 1929 after he broke with his teacher, Freud. . . . He defined lifestyle as the sum of eccentricities, values, meaningful acts, passions, and knowledge. Lifestyle includes a person’s vision of how to make peace in the wasteland that we call modern society (quoted in Schroll: 32, 2007).
Envisioning an Eco-Psychology of Being
Hopefully this chronicle of ecopsychology’s origins will help us to understand why I have chosen Maslow’s theory of motivation when so many others exist to choose from. Nevertheless, some of you may still be asking what is it that makes Maslow’s theory of motivation the ideal paradigm upon which to construct an Eco-Psychology of being? The easiest answer can be found in Warwick Fox’s Toward A Transpersonal Ecology (1990). Fox successfully argued in this comprehensive examination of environmental philosophy that its most well-known perspective is the deep ecology movement and that within this perspective:
. . . transpersonal ecology constitutes a distinctive approach to ecophilosophy in that it emphasizes a fundamentally different kind of self to the kinds of self that are emphasized by instrumental and intrinsic value theory approaches (Fox: 247, 1990).
In support of Fox’s transpersonal ecology thesis, James Fadiman and Robert Frager put forth a similar argument in Personality and Personal Growth:
Maslow believed that an accurate and viable theory of personality must include not only the depths but also the heights that each individual is capable of attaining. He is one of the founders of humanistic psychology and transpersonal psychology, two major new fields that evolved as alternatives to behaviorism and psychoanalysis (Fadiman and Frager: 464, 1994).
Frager elaborates on this argument by telling us:
[Maslow] discovered that human functioning is different for people who operate in a sate of positive health than a state of deficiency. Maslow called this new approach “Being-psychology.” He found that self-actualizing people were motivated by “Being-values.” These are values that are naturally developed by healthy human beings and are not imposed by religion or culture. He maintained that “we have come to the point in biological history where we are now responsible for our own evolution. We have become self-evolvers. Evolution means selecting and therefore choosing and deciding, and this means valuing” (1971, p. 11). The values that self-actualizers appreciate include truth, creativity, beauty, goodness, wholeness, aliveness, uniqueness, justice, simplicity, and self-sufficiency.
Maslow’s study of human nature led him to many conclusions, including these central ideas:

1. Human beings have an innate tendency to move toward higher levels of health, creativity, and self-fulfillment.
2. Neurosis may be regarded as a blockage of the tendency toward self-actualization.
3. The evolution of a synergistic society is a natural and essential process. This is a society in which all individuals may reach a high level of self-development, without restricting each others’ freedom.
Business efficiency and personal growth are not incompatible. In fact, the process of self-actualization leads each individual to the higher levels of efficiency (Frager: xxxv, 1987).
From a more philosophical perspective, Maslow’s insight into personality was to see life as a journey through various stages of growth that he referred to as a hierarchy of needs. This journey begins with the struggles of our physical existence. Motivated by our need for safety, love, belonging, and self-esteem, we continue down the road of life. These stages of personality development are referred to by Maslow as deficiency needs, or D-needs (Maslow, 1968), that we can associate with obstacles or hazards to be avoided on the road of life.2
Behavioral psychologists focused their research on these D-needs, selling this knowledge to advertisers. Using the methods of applied behavioral psychology has allowed advertisers to manipulate these D-needs, thereby creating many false deficiency needs. This call for an Eco-Psychology of being can therefore be viewed as a road map to assist us in avoiding life’s hazards. Following this roadmap will not only assist us in avoiding the obstacles on our path; it will facilitate our journey to the top of the mountain. It is worth pointing out that Maslow’s focus on optimum health was not only on aspects of our immediate physical environment, adaptable behaviors and character traits, but on aspects of growth that are beyond or that transcend the usual appearances of reality. Maslow referred to these states of growth as transpersonal.3
The way Maslow tried to provide us with a visual image of transpersonal growth is by referring to the top of the mountain as self-actualization, thereby symbolizing reaching all of the goals that we have set for our life. Specifically self-actualization represents 1) An experience of increased self-acceptance; 2) A newfound spontaneity; 3) An increasing awareness of ethics; 4) The emergence of an appreciation for self-effacing humor; 5) An appreciation for extraordinary interpersonal relationships. 6) Feeling independent from the limitations of our physical environment and the desire to maintain a certain inner detachment from the culture in which we are immersed. And 7) Self-actualizers begin to experience a profound connection with all life and a desire to understand the mysteries of the universe.
Reaching the end of this long and winding road and experiencing the wonders of self-actualization, a strange thing occurs. We discover that the very essence of who we are as a person: our success, our happiness, our hopes, our dreams, our visions, our love, can no longer be separated from this profound connection with all life and our desire to understand the mysteries of the universe. This is the stage of personality development that Maslow referred to as transcendence.4 But since we have reached the top of the mountain, the obvious question is “Where on this long and winding road is transcendence located?” Unlike the previous stages of personal growth, it is not possible to represent transcendence as a physical place, nor is it a destination to be found. Instead, reaching transcendence is what our journey through life is about; indeed it is the journey itself; thus Discovering the Transcendent and Transpersonality in Our Lives means that we must make the journey back down the mountain and become a guide for others.

Toward A Deeper Understanding of Transcendence
The transpersonal seeker

Is lost in the clouds
Our earth-body cries out to be healed.
Mark A. Schroll, 1993

This haiku points to the fact that transpersonal psychology has investigated the “farther reaches of human nature” since its formal organization in 1969. Throughout this investigation a significant amount of its practitioners have reached, as Roger Walsh put it, “the doorway between the imminent and the transcendent” (Walsh, 1993). Those seekers—and the children of tomorrow—that have yet to reach this doorway, passing through its gate, should be encouraged to continue their chosen spiritual path toward the transpersonal. But, for those of us that have reached this doorway, with our heads in the clouds—believing we might be able to go beyond this door and find even more interesting rooms to explore—does not suggest a pattern of behavior leading toward further enlightenment. It is often, instead, a sign of addiction (Schroll, 2005).
It is therefore time to sound the call for a return to remember what spiritual practice truly means. Spiritual practice, transpersonal psychology, is not simply about mapping the farther reaches of human nature. It is not simply about cosmic play and euphoric states of ecstasy—“’vertical’ transcendence or expansion of consciousness to ‘higher realms’” (Metzner: 150, 1991)—as fascinating and as challenging as this investigation is for the future of transpersonal psychology. This is because cosmic play and euphoric states of ecstasy are only half of the whole that makes spiritual practice complete. The other half of spiritual practice, actually the most important half, is when the person steps through the doorway between the imminent and the transcendent, sees the whole, and returns to share the wisdom of this vision through daily practice, dedication and service to one’s community. We shall examine this discussion more thoroughly in chapter 2 and throughout the rest of this book.
This criticism of transpersonal psychology is a double-edged sword, recognizing on the one hand Maslow’s contribution concerning humankind’s urge toward self-actualization and transcendence producing a “widening circle of identification” (Maslow: 272, 1971); and, on the other hand, supporting Warwick Fox’s observation that,
. . . the limit here is identification with the human species. . . . One must wonder, did Maslow never identify with a cat, a dog, a wild animal, or a place? (Fox: 201-292, 1990).
Ralph Metzner shares this criticism, pointing out that transpersonal psychology, “ignores ‘horizontal’ transcendence or expansion of consciousness or identity [thereby failing] to include other humans, animals, plants, places, ecosystems, etcetera” (Metzner: 150, 1991).
Resume`
This call for an Eco-Psychology of being dovetails and builds on Maslow’s Toward A Psychology of Being (1968), that helped lay the foundation for transpersonal psychology; which is also supplemental to Warwick Fox’s book Toward A Transpersonal Ecology (1990). Yet a considerable amount of work lies ahead to fully unite Maslow’s theory of motivation to the work of ecopsychology, and/or an Eco-Psychology of being.

Notes
1. A more completed discussion of “the rhetoric of environmentalism” is in (Schroll, in review).
2. Some of us may be asking how things like safety, love, belonging, or self-esteem are hazards or aspects of deficiency; more needs to be said about this in future essays. Nevertheless a thorough examination of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and its continuing revisions exceeds this essay’s limits. Those of us interested in exploring Maslow’s theory in more detail should refer to these sources (Cleary & Shapiro, 1995; Rowan, 1998; Maslow, 1965, 1987).
3. A more precise definition of the word transpersonal can be found in Chapter 4.
4. Maslow related our personal ability to reach transcendence with anthropologist Ruth Benedict’s concept of synergy that expressed an overall cultural evolution of values; a view Maslow called eupsychian—the good society (Maslow, 1965), that I have called the arete` of living. We shall examine the arete` of living and its relationship to what I have referred to as an Eco-Psychology of Being in future essays.

Bibliography

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