Why do people blog, create podcasts, develop sets of photos on Flickr, or otherwise create and publish content? Is it a want or a need? I think it’s a need and I want to explore this need (or set of needs) while introducing one of the more famous concepts about motivation and needs.

Psychologist Abraham Maslow is most famous for his work about human needs. His hierarchy of needs is normally represented as a pyramid. The bottom of the pyramid represents the most critical items that we can’t live without. As you go up the pyramid, so Maslow proposed, more complex needs arise.

From bottom to top, the five levels of needs are:

  • Physiological
  • Safety
  • Love/belonging
  • Esteem
  • Self-actualization

We’re all bound by our physiological needs. We need to breathe, to eat, to sleep, to drink, and otherwise fulfill all of the other biological imperatives that bind us in our flesh.

Without the safety of shelter, personal security, and a general sense of stability, many other aspirations simply fall by the wayside.

For many, the bare necessities aren’t enough. We need to love and we need to be loved in all ways, shapes, and forms.

The next level of needs deal with the compelling requirement to feel at ease in our own skins. We need to be able to accept and respect ourselves so that we can more completely embrace those around us. Esteem of the self is the next necessary step.

Finally, with the other levels of the pyramid complete and fulfilled, we stare up at the top level: self actualization. With this firm foundation beneath us, we can reach up and try to be the best that we can be. Things like creativity and problem solving may represent some of the hardest but most rewarding activities that a human being can do.

Many of us in the blogosphere write about social media. This ability to connect with other people via computers and user interfaces is, among other things, a means for us to achieve fulfill some of the needs from Maslow’s hierarchy:

  • Love
  • Esteem
  • Self-actualization

I think that social media can help satisfy some or all of these three needs.

I’m going to exploring self-actualization here at Broadcasting Brain. It’s going to become a recurring theme, an ongoing story arc that we’re going to engage in. I don’t consider myself an expert or authority on this stuff – yet – but I’ll share what I learn as I go.

I’m hoping that you’ll journey with me.

OTHER LINKS:

A more humorous link at Maslow’s hierarchy, tweaked for social media

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