MASLOW'S HIERARCHY OF NEEDS- Humanistic Perspective
from Psychology - The Search for Understanding
by Janet A. Simons, Donald B. Irwin and Beverly A. Drinnien
West Publishing Company, New York, 1987
Abraham Maslow developed a theory of personality that has influenced a number of different fields,
including education. This wide influence is due in part to the high level of practicality of Maslow's
theory. This theory accurately describes many realities of personal experiences. Many people find they
can understand what Maslow says. They can recognize some features of their experience or behavior
which is true and identifiable but which they have never put into words.
Maslow is a humanistic psychologist. Humanists do not believe that human beings are pushed and
pulled by mechanical forces, either of stimuli and reinforcements (behaviorism) or of unconscious
instinctual impulses (psychoanalysis). Humanists focus upon potentials. They believe that humans
strive for an upper level of capabilities. Humans seek the frontiers of creativity, the highest reaches of
consciousness and wisdom. This has been labeled "fully functioning person", "healthy personality", or
as Maslow calls this level, "self-actualizing person."
Maslow has set up a hierarchic theory of needs. All of his basic needs are instinctoid, equivalent of
instincts in animals. Humans start with a very weak disposition that is then fashioned fully as the
person grows. If the environment is right, people will grow straight and beautiful, actualizing the
potentials they have inherited. If the environment is not "right" (and mostly it is not) they will not grow
tall and straight and beautiful.
Maslow has set up a hierarchy of five levels of basic needs. Beyond these needs, higher levels of
needs exist. These include needs for understanding, esthetic appreciation and purely spiritual needs.
In the levels of the five basic needs, the person does not feel the second need until the demands of
the first have been satisfied, nor the third until the second has been satisfied, and so on. Maslow's
basic needs are as follows:
Physiological Needs
These are biological needs. They consist of needs for oxygen, food, water, and a relatively
constant body temperature. They are the strongest needs because if a person were deprived of
all needs, the physiological ones would come first in the person's search for satisfaction.
Safety Needs
When all physiological needs are satisfied and are no longer controlling thoughts and
behaviors, the needs for security can become active. Adults have little awareness of their
security needs except in times of emergency or periods of disorganization in the social
structure (such as widespread rioting). Children often display the signs of insecurity and the
need to be safe.
Needs of Love, Affection and Belongingness
When the needs for safety and for physiological well-being are satisfied, the next class of
needs for love, affection and belongingness can emerge. Maslow states that people seek to
overcome feelings of loneliness and alienation. This involves both giving and receiving love,
affection and the sense of belonging.
Needs for Esteem
When the first three classes of needs are satisfied, the needs for esteem can become
dominant. These involve needs for both self-esteem and for the esteem a person gets from
others. Humans have a need for a stable, firmly based, high level of self-respect, and respect
from others. When these needs are satisfied, the person feels self-confident and valuable as a
person in the world. When these needs are frustrated, the person feels inferior, weak, helpless
and worthless.
Needs for Self-Actualization
When all of the foregoing needs are satisfied, then and only then are the needs for self-
actualization activated. Maslow describes self-actualization as a person's need to be and do
that which the person was "born to do." "A musician must make music, an artist must paint, and
a poet must write." These needs make themselves felt in signs of restlessness. The person
feels on edge, tense, lacking something, in short, restless. If a person is hungry, unsafe, not
loved or accepted, or lacking self-esteem, it is very easy to know what the person is restless
about. It is not always clear what a person wants when there is a need for self-actualization.
The hierarchic theory is often represented as a pyramid, with the larger, lower levels representing the
lower needs, and the upper point representing the need for self-actualization. Maslow believes that the
only reason that people would not move well in direction of self-actualization is because of hindrances
placed in their way by society. He states that education is one of these hindrances. He recommends
ways education can switch from its usual person-stunting tactics to person-growing approaches.
Maslow states that educators should respond to the potential an individual has for growing into a self-
actualizing person of his/her own kind. Ten points that educators should address are listed:
Diagram of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, represented as a pyramid with more primitive needs at the bottom.
