Theories and Theorists

 Goal-setting theory

Locke and Latham's (1990) goal-setting theory has had a substantial impact in the field of work motivation. They suggested that people's goal representation are the efficient causes of behavior and that people's performance will maximized when (1) they set specific, difficult goals that have high valence and (2) they understand what behavior will lead to the goals and feel competent to do those behaviors(Gagne & Deci,2005).






Social Learning Theory






According to Bandura , people learn through observing others' behavior, attitudes, and outcomes of those behaviors. "Most human behaviors is learned observationally through modeling: Social learning theory has sometime been called a bridge between behaviorist and cognitive learning theories because it encompasses attention, memory, and motivation.




Cognitive Evaluation theory





CET concerns intrinsic motivation, motivation that is based on satisfactions of behaving "for its owns sake."  Prototypes of intrinsic motivation are children exploration and play, but intrinsic motivation is a lifelong creative wellspring.CET specifically addresses the effect of social contexts on intrinsic motivation, or how factors such as rewards, interpersonal controls, and ego-involvements impact intrinsic motivation and interest(Ryan,R. M. & Deci,E.L.2002).