Your Position on Maslow's Hierarchy?

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love/belonging

Maslow's Hierarchy is of needs ie once one set of needs is met a person focuses on the next level up

Generally, this follows the food, safety, belonging, love etc path

It isn't about not having any morals when you're hungry, it's about what a person's main focus is according to what their situation is

And your examples weren't the same as having nothing to eat ie being very, very hungry

If I said to such a person do you want something to eat or a debate about morality - what do you think they would be likely to say?

(yes we know that if it was you, you'd want the morality debate, but I'm talking about the average person)

It's not an either/or thing, it's what would be most peoples' main focus

Most people need enough to eat and drink before they can focus outwards/upwards on other things, that is the essence of the hierarchy of needs concept

My morals. I've already been in that situation, so I know. It's not a heroic thing; it's just that when it comes down to it, you know you would hate yourself if you compromised just because you happened to be hungry or cold or in danger. You have to have something to live for; otherwise being alive just becomes pointless.

I'm not the only one who objects to Maslow's hierarchy being applicable universally. Quite a few psychologists tend to agree that people need meaning in their lives. Without meaning, you lose the will to live, lose the will to keep yourself fed and sheltered.

I think you don't understand how it's meant to work

You're reading it far too literally

You will have to explain how I am being too literal.

It's needs-based

People need food to keep them alive - that's why it's the first need

People can survive without being loved or having status, that's why it's a higher need
as less vital to being alive

I live in a pretty secure environment, so I'd consider myself a little bit high on the pyramid.

And I'd disagree with that. Think of the person who has all the food and shelter he needs, people who love him--and who has lost his sense of meaning and purpose in his life due to depression. That person may die not because he is missing those "lower" needs, but because he has lost that top-level need for purpose and "self-actualization". Similarly, people have survived in extreme situations because they were holding on to their "higher-level" purpose, morals, achievement. (The book I mentioned talks about that a lot--people who are sick, starving, abused, may still survive because they retain their purpose.)

Many people willingly give up access to the lower levels in favor of the higher ones. For example, think of a mother who buys medicine for her child with her own food money. She is sacrificing the bottom level (food) for a higher level (family, companionship, reproduction). Most mothers would do this. Religious people very commonly fast in order to understand their faith more clearly. There are people who will sacrifice their own safety in favor of achievement (soldiers, policemen, firemen, paramedics, etc.), and most would do so to help someone in danger if there were no other way. There are many, many people who have sacrificed their own well-being for values on the higher levels of the hierarchy. Most people occasionally do. And people who are poor, hungry, unsafe, or unloved are not automatically unable to do useful things. In fact, it's poor people who are often the most generous, because they know what it's like to have very little. People who have suffered abuse and rejection are often the least willing to abuse or reject others. And of course there are the many situations where people have gotten into serious danger because of their own unwillingness to compromise their morals.

The idea that we can't access higher level needs until we've fulfilled lower-level ones just doesn't sit right with me. Those are all important things and I think they sit roughly at the same level, not one on top of the other.

I don't know how to put this any more basically - without food your body won't operate and you die

All the higher stuff is more of a luxury as it's a choice

By all means focus on whatever higher purpose you like if you're starving to death but personally I'll just focus on finding food!

Then when I've had enough to eat I'll focus more widely

I can see you aren't going to last 5 seconds if an apocalypse occurs - all the moral dilemmas
will make you incapable of taking any action!

My "position" is that this is a two dimensional linear way of viewing life and the human experience. Neither life, nor human beings are two dimensional or linear, therefore the hierarchy serves no useful purpose.

Well I find it a very logical and accurate depiction of human needs and the order in which they
tend to get fulfilled in - my life definitely adheres to it

Perhaps I'm just a 2-dimensional person and this is why I fail to relate to most people as they have this third dimension I'm missing?

To give an example

When I am depressed the most I can manage to do is stay alive by eating and keep warm and sheltered by staying in bed

I often wont want to or be able to leave the hosue due to feeling too anxious
When I start to get better I will be able to leave the hosue hence I feel more safe and secure ie ive moved up a level

Then I will begin to look more outwardly as my own needs have been met so I can look at re-connecting with friends and family or attending events out in the community, so I have more of a sense of belonging

I might look for a partner

I might then feel able to look for a job to give me self esteem

then I might feel positive enough to start doing the self-actualisation stuff
and also help others along the same path

Hence there is a very logical upward path that I have taken myself many times
so it definitely works as a route map for me

Au contraire. Helping each other is how people survive apocalypses.

They need food and shelter first and foremost though and this will be their main focus

Yes--food and shelter for everyone. Not just for themselves.

Elizabeth Kubler-Ross wrote about that as well, and pointed out that the children in the concentration camps would draw butterflies on the walls.



I disagree that these levels have to be achieved in a particular order. I can be in a position of not knowing how this month's bills are going to be paid or whether I'll be homeless next month (have been there many times) and still tend to pay more attention to another level in Maslow's hierarchy. I think his theory, as present here, is flawed or at least too simplistic. Of course, if one is actively starving or cold, for the moment, one is going to focus on overcoming that for the present. But that's an aberrant situation, or should be, temporary. It's not a "normal" condition of humanity, and it doesn't mean someone who is hungry is at level one as a person. One can also have low self-esteem and still be spiritually oriented, and so forth.

I haven't read Maslow, so I'm not sure what a more elaborate explanation of his hierarchy might involve, but the way it's presented here, I can't answer either.

I never said a person wouldn't join with others - they'd do anything to enable them to find food
as food is necessary to live

You are looking too deeply into a simple diagram in my opinion

It's not meant to be looked at moralistically, just practically