Mental Process
motivation Audio
mo·ti·va·tion [ moh-tuh-vey-shuhn ]
Subclass of:
Emotional Intelligence
Definitions related to motivation:
  • Mental process which causes organisms to seek a goal or satisfy a need; e.g., hunger, thirst, sex drive, etc.
    CRISP Thesaurus
    National Institutes of Health, 2006
  • The psychological feature that arouses an organism to action toward a desired goal; the reason for the action; that which gives purpose and direction to behavior.
    NCI Thesaurus
    U.S. National Cancer Institute, 2021
  • Those factors which cause an organism to behave or act in either a goal-seeking or satisfying manner. They may be influenced by physiological drives or by external stimuli.
    NLM Medical Subject Headings
    U.S. National Library of Medicine, 2021
  • Motivation, forces acting either on or within a person to initiate behaviour. The word is derived from the Latin term motivus ("a moving cause"), which suggests the activating properties of the processes involved in psychological motivation. Psychologists study motivational forces to help explain...
    Encyclopedia Britannica
    Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 2020
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This content should not be used in place of medically-reviewed decision support reference material or professional medical advice. Some terms may have alternate or updated definitions not reflected in this set. The definitions on this page should not be considered complete or up to date.