A Surprising Source of Self-Motivation: Prior Competence Frustration Strengthens One's Motivation to Win in Another Competence-Supportive Activity

Abstract

According to self-determination theory (SDT), competence is among the three basic psychological needs essential for one's well-being and optimal functioning, and the frustration of these needs is theoretically predicted to induce a restorative response. While previous studies have explored the restoration process of autonomy and relatedness, empirical evidence for such a process is still lacking for competence. In order to explore this process and to examine the effect of prior competence frustration on one's motivation to win in a subsequent competence-supportive task, we adopted a between-group experimental design and manipulated one's competence frustration through task difficulty in an electrophysiological study. Participants in both groups were instructed to work on the time-estimation task and the stop-watch task in two successive sessions respectively. Participants in the experimental group were asked to complete a highly difficult task in the first session and a task of medium difficulty in the second session, while those in the control group were instructed to work on tasks of medium difficulty in both sessions. In the second session, an enlarged feedback-related negativity (FRN) loss-win difference wave (d-FRN) was observed in the experimental group compared to the control group, indicating that the competence-frustrated participants have an enhanced motivation to win in a subsequent competence-supportive task. Thus, results of the present study provided original neural evidence for the restoration process of frustrated competence, which provided important guidelines for the managerial practice.

Keywords: competence; competence frustration; event-related potentials; feedback-related negativity; intrinsic motivation; need restoration; self-determination theory.

Figure 1

The experimental paradigm. (A) Illustration of time-estimation (TE) and stopwatch (SW) tasks. (B) Demonstration of the experimental procedure.

Figure 2

Feedback-related negativity (FRN) results during the outcome appraisal stage. For illustration, grand-averaged event-related potential (ERP) waveforms of FRN and FRN loss-win difference wave (d-FRN) from the electrode cluster (FC1, FCz, FC2) are shown for group (control group versus experimental group) and outcome (win versus lose) conditions. The scalp topographic distribution of d-FRN is provided for control and experimental groups, and the bar for the topographic map ranges from −5 μV to 5 μV.