Maslow pyramid 7 levels drawing examples. Oil pyramid. How to "attach" the pyramid of human needs in everyday life

Every person who has attended psychological courses and business trainings has heard about Maslow's pyramid. One question remains: "How to apply it in everyday life and work?" We will talk about this in this article.

Maslow's pyramid is a small model of human needs, ranked by level of importance. It was developed by psychologist Abraham Maslow, who lived and practiced in America. In addition, he published several books in which the author's ideas were fully revealed.

According to Maslow, one cannot assume that a person seeks to satisfy exclusively physiological needs, as psychologists talked about earlier. There is a certain hierarchy in the nature of human needs. After the natural needs, determined by physiology, there are needs of a higher type that directly affect the actions and thoughts of each person.

Maslow pyramid structure (7 levels)

The American psychologist identified several levels of needs:

1. Physiology.
2. Security.
3. Love, belonging.
4. The need for respect, recognition by society.
5. Cognition.
6. Aesthetic needs.
7. Self-actualization.

All of them can be combined by species group. Some are responsible for human physiology, others for the pursuit of security, others are responsible for socialization in society, the fourth talk about prestige, and the fifth elevate the spiritual side of life.

The scientist claims that needs can be divided into lower and higher. The satisfaction of the former is imperative. This is necessary for banal human survival. Animals have the lowest needs as well.

Satisfying higher needs is not easy. For this, suitable conditions should be created. But their implementation improves physical and psychological health. Only 2% of people reach the top of the pyramid, while the rest hang along the way. Only after satisfying the previous need, you can proceed to the next.

To combine needs in a pyramid came to mind of another scientist - Philip Kotler, and this was done after the death of Abraham Maslow. It occurred to him to transform human needs into marketing.

Let's take a closer look at each need:

• Physiology.

This level makes human and animal related. These include food saturation, sleep, rest, thirst, sexual instinct. Regarding the latter, Maslow amends, arguing that sex is not the only reason a person decides to find a mate.

• Security.

The desire for security is manifested by a person at an early age. The child begins to cry when the mother leaves him for a long time. To cover the need for food, a person is looking for a job that will bring him income. But here, too, the desire for safety takes its toll - the presence of social guarantees, the stability of the company play an important role in employment.

• Affiliation, love.

This desire makes people unite in interest groups, make friends, create family units.

The family can be based on any instinct - physiological, the desire for safety, the desire to learn the meaning of life through caring for a loved one. The choice is based on the general satisfaction of the person, the formation of his personality, the successful completion of previous needs.

The more the child was loved in childhood, the more chances he has to grow up as a mentally healthy person, to create his own strong family.

• Confession.

The self-esteem of a person, his need and usefulness to society depends on the closure of this need.

The formation of personality does not depend on false respect, but on the real merit of a person. Sports successes, career, creativity are taken as a basis. Lack of proper recognition is often the main reason for applying for dismissal. It is for this reason that it is important to determine the vector of your development and move along it.

It is very interesting to see how marketers play with this human need for their own purposes. They replace the respect earned by work with external attributes. The substitution of concepts leads to the fact that a person begins to be appreciated not for achievements, but for branded clothing or the use of luxury cosmetics.

• Knowledge, understanding.

Its other name is cognitive. This need strikingly distinguishes humans from animals. It is based on the desire to learn new things, and not only on the fear that he will not be able to navigate in an unforeseen situation.

From early childhood, the child learns the world through touch, tasting toys. An adult fulfills a need through travel, religion, philosophy, reading books, otherwise he may fall into a prolonged depression. This also applies to those who are engaged in monotonous, boring work for a long time.

• Aesthetics.

The desire to decorate this world with new colors can be attributed to an aesthetic need. It becomes physically unbearable for a person to be in a gray, boring world. The vision of beauty is inherent in every person from birth, but some manage to develop this ability more strongly. Someone decorates their home, independently creating a designer interior, others splash everything into creativity.

It is on this need that the world of fashion and beauty is built. Show business could not exist without her.

• Self-actualization.

This is the development of one's own personality, the highest level of needs. For the harmonious development of personality, it is vitally important for a person to reveal the potential inherent in him through creativity, work or hobby, to realize his goals and abilities.

Controversial points regarding the structure of the pyramid

At first glance, everything seems quite logical, but this is not entirely true. Its creator himself said that needs can change places, depending on a particular person. After all, many of us have met people who completely devoted themselves to building a successful career, forgetting about family and love.

Complete closure of the previous stage does not always guarantee the transition to the next and vice versa. For example, great creators very often lived in poverty and hunger, but did not give up their favorite occupation. Maslow himself explains such examples by the fact that such people had their previous needs as closed as possible in childhood, so they were able to sacrifice them in adulthood.

In addition, it is possible to fall down if some of the needs located there were not fully satisfied earlier. There is a heated debate about putting the sexual instinct first. The examples of holy people prove exactly the opposite.

The study of the pyramid is quite an interesting process, but you should not take it as a basis, because each person is unique.

The use of Maslow's pyramid in life

However, do not underestimate the conclusions of the American scientist.

Exploring the pyramid will allow a person to:

• Understand your personality, understand what needs have already been fully satisfied, and where there is a significant deficiency.
• Set life goals and priorities. Understanding them will help you achieve your goals faster and more efficiently.
• Choose an interesting direction for future activity in which you can build a career, having achieved success.
• Be more sensitive to the wishes of loved ones, understand their needs, guide.

How to apply the pyramid in career building?

As mentioned earlier, the Maslow pyramid is actively used by marketers, creating new values ​​that the target audience will later desire. In addition, it will be useful for executives and business coaches. The correct motivation of subordinates is able to bring the process of organizing work to a new level, without a significant investment of financial resources.

If we consider the ideal situation, each employee should have a stable salary, remembering the need to strive for safety, additional bonuses and the ability to create or participate in various social associations (corporate events, sports competitions). Any kind of encouragement will talk about recognition, and individual assignments will contribute to the development of creativity.

Human Needs Theory - Maslow's Pyramid of Human Needs

There are 5 basic human needs (according to A. Maslow's theory):

• Physiological needs (food, water, warmth, shelter, sex, sleep, health, cleanliness).
• The need for security and protection (including stability).
• The need for belonging to a social group, involvement and support. This is about partner, family, friends, intimacy and affection.
• The need for respect and recognition (self-esteem, self-esteem, confidence, prestige, fame, recognition of merit).
• The need for self-expression (realization of one's abilities and talents).

The pyramid of needs reflects one of the most popular and well-known theories of motivation - the theory of the hierarchy of needs.

Maslow's needs are distributed as they grow, explaining such a construction by the fact that a person cannot experience high-level needs while he needs more primitive things. At the bottom is physiology (satisfying hunger, thirst, sexual needs, etc.). A step higher is the need for security, above it is the need for affection and love, as well as for belonging to a social group. The next step is the need for respect and approval, over which Maslow placed cognitive needs (the thirst for knowledge, the desire to perceive as much information as possible). This is followed by the need for aesthetics (the desire to harmonize life, fill it with beauty and art). And finally, the last step of the pyramid, the highest, is the striving to reveal the inner potential (it is self-actualization). It is important to note that each of the needs does not have to be fully satisfied - partial saturation is enough to move on to the next step.

As the lower needs are satisfied, the needs of a higher level become more and more urgent, but this does not mean at all that the place of the previous need is taken by a new one only when the former is fully satisfied.

At the base of this pyramid are the so-called basic needs. These are physiological needs, and a need for safety.

Physiological: the need for food, water, sexual gratification, etc. If for some reason it is impossible to satisfy them, a person can no longer think about anything, cannot move on to satisfying other needs, higher in the hierarchy. Probably, everyone was faced with a feeling of severe hunger, which prevents them from doing or even thinking about anything else. V. Frankl described this very eloquently in the book Saying Yes to Life. Psychologist in a concentration camp. " How people living in constant fear, anxiety for themselves and their loved ones, could not talk about anything other than food. They talked about food at any moment of their rest, and the work was very hard, they described the dishes that they once cooked, talked about the restaurants they visited. One of the most important needs, guaranteeing life, the need for food, was not satisfied with them, and therefore it constantly declared itself.

When the physiological needs are satisfied, the person stops thinking about them, forgets for a while, until the body gives another sign. Then you can turn your attention to meeting other needs. Of course, we have learned to abstain, to endure for a while. But only for a while, until the discomfort becomes very strong.

The next step of needs is the need for security... It is very difficult to realize any of your plans, dreams, work, develop without feeling safe. If this need is not satisfied, a person organizes all his activities (sometimes even neglecting physiological needs for a while) in order to make his life safer. Global cataclysms, war, illness, loss of property, housing, as well as the threat of dismissal from work can serve as a threat to security. You can track how during the period of social instability in the country, the level of general anxiety rises.

To maintain a sense of security, we are looking for any guarantees: insurance, work with a guaranteed social package, a car with modern technologies that provide passenger protection, study legislation, hoping to receive protection from the state, etc.

The third and fourth stages are related to the area of ​​psychological needs. If we are not worried about unmet basic needs, or, more simply, if we are not hungry, do not suffer from thirst, disease, are not in a war zone and we have a roof over our heads, we strive to satisfy psychological needs. These include: a sense of significance, belonging to a particular social system(family, community, team, social ties, communication, affection, etc.), the need for respect, for love. We create systems for this, communities, without which we cannot survive. We seek love, respect, friendship, strive to be members of a group, a team.

When these needs are not met, we are acutely concerned about the absence of friends, family, partner, children. Most of all we do not want to be accepted, heard, understood. We are looking for how to fulfill such a need, neglecting, at times, basic needs, so great is the torment of experiencing loneliness.

Sects and criminal groups often speculate on this need. The desire to be in a group among adolescents is especially great. And therefore, a teenager, often without hesitation, obeys the rules and laws of the group, which he strives only in order not to be rejected by it.

The next step is the need for recognition, samovexpressions, respect for others, recognition of their own value, stable high self-esteem. It is important for us to occupy some significant social position. We want to be recognized for our merits, our competence was appreciated, our skill noticed. This includes the desire to have a good reputation, status, fame and glory, superiority, etc.

And we ourselves should sometimes think about how much these needs are satisfied in our life, for example, in percentage terms. And, if these figures are less than the average statistical figures given by A. Maslow (85% physiological, 70% - safe, 50% - in love, 40% - in respect, and 10% - in self-actualization), then you should probably think about what we can change in our life.

It is more convenient for us, as salespeople, to use a different classification, with the help of which we find out what needs potential customers are experiencing.

There are several basic needs that each person seeks to satisfy during his life. If one of the desires is satisfied, the person strives to satisfy the next need.

The need for survival. The survival instinct is the most powerful instinct in a human being. Every person wants to save his life, to protect his family, friends, compatriots from danger. Only having received a guarantee of survival, a person begins to think about satisfying other desires.

The need for security. Once a person receives guarantees of survival, he begins to think about the safety of every aspect of his life.

Financial security- every person is afraid of poverty and material losses and strives to overcome them. It is expressed in the desire to save money and increase wealth.

Emotional security necessary for a person to feel comfortable.

Physical security- every person needs food, warmth, shelter and clothing up to a certain level.

The need for security does not mean that a person needs an armored door. He may well want to purchase high-quality wallpapers that will serve him for a long time.

The need for comfort. As soon as a person reaches the minimum level of security and safety, he begins to strive for comfort. He invests a huge amount of time and money to create a cozy home environment, strives to create a comfortable working environment. A person strives for comfort in any situation and chooses goods that are convenient and easy to use.

The need for an image. The client is guided by the attractiveness and prestige of the product.

The need for free time. People want to rest as much time as possible and look for every opportunity to stop work and rest. Evenings, weekends and vacations are the main focus of attention for the majority of people. Leisure activities play a central role in human behavior and decision making.

Need for love. People have an urgent need to build and maintain loving relationships. Everything that a person does is aimed either at achieving love, or at compensating for the lack of love. An adult personality is formed in the conditions of love received or not received in childhood. The desire to create a secure environment for love is the root cause of human behavior.

The need for respect. A person seeks to earn respect for himself from other people. The main part of human activity is aimed at this. Loss of respect can be a significant cause of dissatisfaction, and getting a high-ranking position can be more incentive than money.

The need for self-realization. The highest desire of a person is the realization of the creative potential of an individual, his talents and abilities. Human motivation is aimed at achieving everything that they are able to achieve. Throughout his life, he strives to use most of his talents and abilities. The need for self-realization can be stronger than all other motivations.

There are quite a few different pyramids in the world. You've probably heard about or about the pyramids that the Incas and Aztecs built. Each of them has its own peculiarity and purpose. However, there are other types of pyramids that belong to the category of intelligent designs.

Today we will talk about Maslow's pyramid, named after an American psychologist. This pyramid is widely used today not only in, but also in management theory, and in many other areas and knowledge.

Maslow's pyramid of needs

Maslow's pyramid is the commonly used name for the hierarchical model of human needs, which is a simplified presentation of the ideas of the American psychologist Abraham Maslow.

The pyramid of needs reflects one of the most popular and well-known theories - the theory of the hierarchy of needs. This theory is also known as the theory of needs or the theory of hierarchy.

It looks like a pyramid in the form of a diagram, which shows the various needs of a person. It is important to note that in the works of the scientist himself there are no images and drawings, since, in his opinion, this hierarchical order can change. It directly depends on each individual taken separately.

For the first time they learned about the Maslow pyramid in the 70s of the last century. At this point in time, information about it can be found in many books on psychology and marketing.

Maslow's pyramid of needs is widely used in economics, and has significant weight in the theory of consumer motivation and behavior.

It is noteworthy that Abraham Maslow himself did not create the pyramid, but only formed the needs of those individuals who reached certain heights in life.

Maslow pyramid levels

According to Maslow, every person needs 5 basic needs. Let's list them in order, and give a brief explanation of each need:

1. Physiological needs

Since every living organism needs certain physical needs, they are also inherent in every person. Thus, if this or that individual does not satisfy them, he will not be able to develop and improve normally.

For example, if a person wants to use the toilet, then at this moment he is unlikely to want to enjoy reading, admire nature or think about anything else.

Therefore, until he satisfies his physiological need, he will not be able to work normally, make any decisions and do any other business.

Physiological needs include hunger, thirst, and many other things.

1. Security

Each person seeks to protect himself and have a certain stability, comfort and constancy of living conditions. This can be easily understood with the example of an infant.

Immediately after his birth, he subconsciously strives to receive protection. And only a caring mother can give it.

A similar analogy can be seen in situations with adults. A person, wanting to protect himself, can take out insurance for his life, install reliable locks, doors, alarms, etc. in his own house.

1. Social needs

We are talking about social needs: communication, affection, caring for others and attention to oneself, joint activities.

When people are trying to get to know someone, make friends or find a life partner for themselves, this is a vivid demonstration of social needs.

One way or another, but any person desperately needs not only to show love himself, but also to receive it from others.

In the environment of society, the individual manages to feel his significance in practice. It is this need that motivates a person to become attached to someone and seek reciprocity.

1. Prestigious needs

These include self-esteem, respect from others, recognition, and high appreciation of their activities, career growth. That is, everything that is associated with the desire to gain respect and authority.

These needs of Maslow provoke a person to demonstrate to society his individual characteristics, for example, the ability to sing, dance, play musical instruments, etc.

Only after receiving recognition among close and dear people, a person becomes self-confident, and gets the opportunity to realize his own potential.

1. Spiritual needs

The last level of Maslow's pyramid of needs is spirituality. This includes cognition, self-actualization, self-expression, self-identification, etc.

At this last stage, the person seeks to realize his spiritual needs and wants to self-develop. A person begins to get carried away with creativity, goes to various cultural events, and tries to better develop his inherent talents.

An individual who has managed to satisfy the 4 previous stages and be at 5 begins to reflect on the meaning of life, is interested in the world around him and tries to leave some kind of trace behind him.

Such a person may develop new beliefs and views on life in general.

According to the theory of Abraham Maslow, the basic needs of a person look like this. Whether they are accurate and true, you can determine for yourself by introspection.

However, in fairness, it should be noted that there are several dubious factors in this pyramid.

Authorship

In 1975, in the book of a little-known W. Stopp, a graph was presented called "The Hierarchy of Needs". Maslow died in 1970, but no such graph has been found in his writings.

Therefore, there are reasonable doubts about the true authorship of the pyramid of needs, which the rack associated with the name of Maslow.

Satisfied need ceases to motivate

In this case, the question arises regarding the relevance of needs for a particular individual. For example, if pride and indifference towards society is inherent in someone, then naturally he will not strive towards it in any way.

Also, the one who feels that he is protected will not become more protective of himself. It follows from this that a satisfied need loses its meaning, passing to another stage.

Therefore, in order to understand the real needs, it is enough just to know the unsatisfied ones.

Theory and practice

Many modern psychologists are critical of Maslow's pyramid. They believe that it is very difficult to apply its principles in practice, because the scheme itself can lead to completely inaccurate results.

If you do not take into account the various statistics, then immediately there are a lot of interesting questions. For example, how strongly depressed is a person who is not recognized by society, that is, who has a lame level 4 of needs?

Or is it correct to consider a persistently malnourished person (Level 1) to be completely hopeless or unhappy? Agree that in the world you can find hundreds, if not thousands of examples that managed to reach heights in various fields of activity due to this or that type of dissatisfaction. This, for example, can be unrequited love or even poverty.

There is another version, according to which Abraham Maslow abandoned his own theory, and that at a later time his concept was significantly modified by him.

And the pyramid, which is used today in psychology and in the field of marketing, does not have any serious weight at all.

Criticism

The main criticism of Maslow's pyramid is the hierarchical ladder and the fact that, ultimately, human needs cannot be met.

Other researchers argue that according to this pyramid, a person seems to be some kind of animal that constantly needs something.

There are also those who are critical of Maslow's theory because its “laws” are not applicable in practice. Especially when it comes to business, advertising or marketing.

However, here it must be said that the author of Maslow's pyramid of needs did not set himself the goal of building a theory for business or advertising. He was more eager to find answers to important questions that could not be explained by behaviorism or Freudianism.

Maslow just wanted to define the different motives of a person's actions. It is necessary to treat his theory not from the methodological side, but to consider it philosophically.

Advantages and disadvantages

Obviously, the pyramid of needs is not just a classification of them, but expresses a certain hierarchy: instinctive, basic and sublime needs.

Any healthy person has all of these needs. But here a clear pattern comes into force: the basic needs of a person are considered dominant, and more lofty needs can be activated, provided that the basic ones are satisfied.

However, it is very important to remember that each individual's needs are expressed differently. This can happen at any stage of Maslow's pyramid.

It follows from this that each person is obliged to analyze his desires in the correct way, learn to interpret them and correctly satisfy them.

If these conditions are not met, he will be in a state of dissatisfaction and may even be depressed. From the point of view of Maslow himself, only 2% of all people can reach 5, the highest step.

An alternate version of Maslow's pyramid

Finally, it is worth noting that there is a more detailed classification of Maslow's needs. There are seven main levels (priorities) in this system. The first 6 are considered the lowest needs, and only the last, 7th level is considered the highest:

1. Physiological needs: hunger, thirst, etc.
2. Need for security: a sense of confidence, getting rid of fear and failure.
3. Need for belonging and love.
4. Need for respect: achievement of success, approval, recognition.
5. Cognitive needs: to know, be able to, explore.
6. Aesthetic needs: harmony, order, beauty.
7. The need for self-actualization: the realization of their goals, abilities, the development of their own personality.

Now you know what Maslow's pyramid is and why people often talk about it. If you have any thoughts about this classification of needs, write about it in the comments.

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Let's say that you come home and you really need to finish reading a chapter of some interesting book, but you feel incredibly hungry. In this case, will you first of all take up the book, and not the door of the refrigerator? Unlikely. It all lies in the basic needs that every person has, and Maslow's pyramid systematized them.

The basic concept is as follows - until a person satisfies his basic desires, for example, satisfies his hunger, he will not think about high things. Naturally, there are exceptions, which only confirm the rule - after all, all people are different. But still it turned out to put forward several main assumptions, which later formed the basis of the diagram, where the needs are arranged according to the hierarchy - step by step, from the lowest to the highest.

Maslow's theory is based on these ideas. The pyramid, according to many sources, appeared later - the psychologist's thoughts were simply designed in a more convenient and visual form.

However, one cannot be equal only to this table, since everyone has different goals in life. For some, the priority is power and its achievement, for someone there will be enough respect in the family circle.

Maslow's pyramid consists of 5 main categories, also called steps:

1. Basic, physiological needs: hunger, thirst, procreation.
2. Protection and safety needs; comfort.
3. Social needs: having a couple, family, friends, the need for care and love.
4. The need for success and recognition.
5. Spiritual needs: self-development, self-expression, self-identification.

The further a person goes in his aspirations, the more he is spiritually and emotionally developed, the more vividly the qualities of his personality and character are manifested, the more he is aware of his great actions. There are also those people who go far for the sake of their ideals - they may even neglect the satisfaction of basic needs, just to achieve what they want.

First step: physiological needs

The needs of this category are those that are also called instinctive. They are the most basic, and it is to them that a person pays attention in the first place. If he does not satisfy the desires of the first level, then he simply cannot exist normally. As an example - the feeling of hunger. It is unlikely that you will go to achieve success in business without first having a hearty breakfast. This level also includes:

• oxygen;
• sex drive;
• besides the food itself - water (drink).

While these needs are important, they do not dominate the individual all the time. It is enough to satisfy them minimally in order to move to the next step along the Maslow pyramid. Frequent diet breakdowns are also a good example.

The average woman, who does not have too strong a desire to lose weight, will sooner or later break loose, because she has a need to satisfy her hunger.

Stage two: the need for protection

When a small child is afraid of monsters under the bed, he absolutely does not care what his peers think of him at that moment. The only thing he wants to do is call his parents for help. This is what he does. This is the manifestation of the needs of the second level: a person needs comfort. If he is not there, then he feels uncomfortable, cannot concentrate on doing other things, and becomes irritated.

That is why constant contact with the mother or father is so important for the child. You can see safety in your loved ones, a loyal friend who will always save and support.

The popularity of religion is also driven by the need for protection. Feeling the protection of higher powers, a person calms down, believes that everything is good, and that help will definitely come if something bad happens.

Third step: social needs

A person wants to join the society and become a part of it. He is afraid of being alone. Such a need becomes significant when the needs of the previous stages are satisfied.

All their life people are looking for a company - a soul mate, family, loyal friends. In adolescence, the need to be part of something becomes dominant, overshadowing everything else. That is why there are subcultures, groupings where there is a clear leader - everyone else follows him. Teenagers very often look for an idol for themselves in order to inherit his behavior.

Over time, the circle of acquaintances narrows. Usually, a few close friends remain next to a person, the rest remain at the level of friends. Of course, everything here also depends on a certain type of personality, because there are those who, even in adulthood, strive for new acquaintances. However, people usually try to become a full-fledged, formed unit of society. For this, there must be a constant partner, children, several good friends. When this need is satisfied, a person thinks about success.

Fourth step: the need for success and recognition

When there is both a family and a home, thoughts come to mind that something else needs to be done so that the name is heard, so that others will talk about you. However, as noted at the beginning of the article, Maslow's pyramid also admits that some have enough reliable reputation only in the circle of relatives. The majority begins to look for themselves in something else. This is how ideas are born about creating new projects, about starting a business. Most often, this satisfaction of this need becomes a priority for adolescents (to do something that others do not do to look cooler) and people who have more or less settled down.

Anyone will be pleased if others appreciate what he does, respect him not only as a unit of society, but also as a person. That is why the assertion is so popular that a job that you like ceases to be a job - a person who has internal motivation and a desire to do something will do it even if there is no reward for it, except attention and approval from others. Because of this, the fourth level is so connected with the fifth, last, highest level.

Stage Five: Spiritual Needs

When a person finds his recognition and does everything to achieve mastery in this area, he is at the topmost step of Maslow's pyramid. Many people want to engage in self-development, since this feeling is inherent in all people, but few really begin to develop spiritually. Maslow believed there were several reasons for this:

• fear of being rejected, misunderstood (usually comes from childhood);
• stereotypes that have taken root in society (it is they that prevent women from mastering “male” professions, and men - “female” ones);
• fear of taking risks (the sense of security is violated, there is no satisfaction of the second level of Maslow's pyramid).

A person who is able to resist is ready to move forward. Usually she already has a set of qualities acquired through life experience - creativity, democratic character, acceptance not only of herself, but also of human nature, resistance to social stereotypes, independence, willingness to learn from herself and others.
Abraham Maslow believed that only 2-3% of people reach the last stage.

Maslow's pyramid also has a more detailed classification, consisting of 7 levels. The first four needs remain the same as in the first classification (physiology; safety; care and love; success and recognition). The fifth stage is divided into three levels:

• the need for knowledge of the surrounding world;
• needs for beauty, aesthetics, improvement of the bad;
• self-development.

Five (or seven) steps only reflect the basic needs of humanity, and Maslow's pyramid can be useful in that it teaches you to correctly understand and, most importantly, accept your desires and needs. It is worth remembering that everything, first of all, depends on the person himself, on his way of thinking and goals for the future.

20th century American psychologist, still carry enormous weight in psychology, pedagogy, management, economics and its branches.

He is best known as the creator of the famous pyramid of needs, each step of which denotes a specific group of human needs.

In an extended version of Maslow's pyramid - 7 levels, and in the base - 5 levels... There are also developments by other specialists based on Maslow's ideas, for example, the Henderson model, which includes 14 needs... An explanation of the levels will be presented below.

Maslow's theory - in brief

What is the pyramid in Maslow's theorem?

Psychologists and psychotherapists of the early and mid-20th century focused primarily on study of deviations from the norm, and the areas related to the study of mentally healthy people, their needs, difficulties, developmental features, were not studied so actively.

Abraham Maslow (pictured) was one of those researchers who worked in the field of the study of mental norms and everything related to it.

Abraham was born into a family of Jewish immigrants in 1908, and his childhood was difficult: he was an outcast among his peers because of his pronounced Jewish features in appearance and spent most of his free time reading books.

The craving for knowledge helped Abraham in many ways: he became one of the most outstanding students in the school, and then entered the law college. But he was not destined to become a lawyer: he, realizing his love for psychology, changed his educational institution.

Initially, Abraham was attracted by ideas, but later he became interested in other approaches and founded humanistic psychology.

The first concept of human needs was presented by Abraham Maslow in the early 40s of the 20th century, but later he several times returned to her and refined.

Initially, describing human needs, the American sociologist Maslow singled out a number of the most essential and sorted them into levels (see picture), depending on on the degree of importance for a comfortable existence.

If a person does not properly satisfy the "lower" needs, he will not be able to fully satisfy the "higher" ones and, in principle, may not feel that it is necessary to do this. It is difficult to have the need to enjoy beautiful paintings if you are constantly starving.

Later, as it was refined, the concept became more perfect and received two additional levels of higher needs.

Classification of needs

Table with the classification of needs according to Maslow (7 levels):

These levels are precisely the very ladder or diagram of needs with which most people associate Abraham Maslow. Initially, it had only the first five levels, but after revision there are seven of them.

At the same time, the five-level pyramid is still actively used, since not a very large number of people get to the sixth and seventh levels.

Drawing of a hierarchical scale of needs according to Maslow - 7 levels:

In medicine and human care, the following model is common, created by Virginia Henderson based on Maslow's needs and having 14 needs that need to be met in everyday life:

1. The ability to breathe fully.
2. Eat and drink enough.
3. Defecate.
4. The need to move, to change position.
5. Enough sleep and regular rest.
6. Put on and take off clothes, be able to pick them up.
7. Maintain body temperature.
8. Take care of the purity of the body.
9. Maintain your own safety and not be a threat to others.
10. Communicate comfortably.
11. Concerns religious people: observe the canons of religion, perform the necessary rituals.
12. Have what you love and devote time to it regularly.
13. Have fun.
14. Satisfy cognitive needs.

This model is taken into account when working with patients, especially those who require care, support.

Primary and secondary

Primary needs- a group of inborn needs, the need to satisfy which in one form or another is present already from the moment of birth.

The main support, a kind of foundation for all other needs are physiological needs: those thanks to which a person has the ability to continue living. If you stop satisfying them, the person will die.

And their lack of satisfaction leads to the emergence of somatic and mental abnormalities that can significantly reduce life expectancy and worsen its quality.

Also, the primary needs are the needs that are at the second stage of Maslow's pyramid: the need for security, the desire to be sure that nothing bad will happen in the future. This group of needs is also called existential.

At the heart of secondary needs lie those needs that arise in a person under the influence of external factors. They are not congenital.

The formation of secondary needs is influenced by:

Secondary needs include:

1. : desire to be accepted by society, to have close social ties, to love and be loved, to feel community, involvement in a common cause.
2. Prestigious: the desire to succeed, feel the respect of others, earn more, and so on.
3. : the desire to know yourself and the world around you, to develop intellectually, physically, morally, to enjoy and create beauty, to achieve all your goals and to fully reveal your inner potential.

As a person develops, new secondary needs may arise.

Violated

- needs that a person is not able to satisfy for any reason.

Long-term unmet need can lead to serious mental health problems.

And if vital needs are not satisfied, then in the physical, up to death.

The topic of impaired needs is considered most closely in the context of helping people with serious medical conditions who, for health reasons, cannot provide themselves with care.

This topic is included in the programs of medical and some pedagogical educational institutions, courses to train nurses.

The task of the person caring for the patient is to identify what needs he is not able to satisfy and help him: for example, to keep the body clean, talk, read books aloud, help change posture, feed, give medicine.

If the patient cannot properly explain what he needs to the person who will take care of him, it is important to ask his relatives, get acquainted with the recommendations of the attending physicians and with the medical record, assess the situation in the house and the general condition of the patient.

Even relatively mobile old people cannot always fully meet their needs due to health problems.

Therefore, it is important that relatives are interested in their condition and helped as far as possible: installed handrails and non-slip coatings in the bathroom, brought purchases, talked, went out with them for a walk.

In some cases, a violation of needs is observed in people who do not have serious somatic diseases.

This often indicates that a person has mental illness, for example, in which there may be no strength to perform elementary actions.

In such cases, it is important to see a psychotherapist as soon as possible.

Timely satisfaction of needs will enable a person feel comfortable and enjoy life, therefore, it is important to take care of yourself and the people around you more often, who find it difficult to meet their own needs on their own.

About Abraham Maslow's pyramid of needs in this video: