The alternative to a behaviorist approach to psychology is Cognitivism. And cognitivism focuses on opening up the black box, figuring out what actually is going on in there that motivates people to behave in certain ways. Now, as with everything I talk about here is psychology, I'm over simplifying and just taking certain aspects from very rich, sophisticated, complex and longstanding debates. But for our purpose is, the important thing to focus on is that if we start to think in a cognitivist way, start to think about what's actually going on in motivation, we need to start distinguishing between different kinds of motivation and different kinds of rewards. And in particular, think about two broad categories which can be called Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation. Intrinsic rewards means that you do the thing for it's own sake. You do it not because of any external stimuli whatsoever, you do it because you want to, because you find the thing rewarding, engaging, enjoyable, fun, exciting, just for doing the thing. So, this is what we mean when you hear people saying, I love my job so much I'd do it for free. And it's what we think about when I say something like, I love just sitting on a beach taking it all in. I'm not focused on the tan I'll get nor am I even focused on, I'll relax, and that'll recharge me for work, and I'll do better. I'm focusing on, I want to do this thing for this thing. And there are lots and lots of things that can produce intrinsic motivation. It varies for every person, and every person is different at different points in time. Some of us might find our families to be wonderfully, intrinsically motivating. Mm? Some of us, at least sometimes, not so much. But the point is we can understand what it means to say about something, I'm doing it because I want to do it, I want the thing, I'm not focused on the consequences, the other kinds of benefits that I might get. And the second category, naturally, is extrinsic rewards. And extrinsic rewards means that you're doing something for some reas on other than the thing itself. Might be, money. Might be, fame and fortune. Might be, someone asked you to do it and you value that person. Maybe it's a family member. Maybe it's your boss. The point is, whatever the reason is you're doing the thing, it's about the reward not about the thing itself. Gabe Zichermann who is a gamification consultant and conference organizer talks about four different categories of rewards, which are predominantly different kinds of extrinsic reward motivators in gamification. And he talks about them as what he calls the SAPS framework which stands for Status, Access, Power and Stuff. And this is a useful way to think about the different kinds of extrinsic rewards. That are frequently employed in gamified systems. The first one is status. We do it because we think that it will make us cool, that other people will value and respect the fact that we're doing this. And so if you're at the top of the leader board, then you improve status. If you have the American Express over Black Card, you have status. Lots of things give people status and gamification, especially when it involves things like leader boards and so forth, tends to often have a status component. The second one is access. And here the notion is by doing the thing you get some access to something that other people don't have. So, for example, if you answer lots of people's questions on a discussion board, you get access to an additional part of the discussion board. You get access to a special room or channel just for moderators. And maybe that's status, maybe that's a social network that you want. There's some reason why you feel like you're getting access to something new. Content unlocking in games also has some of this aspect. You're trying to get to the certain achievement in the game because then it gives you access to new content that only you get for that reason, that's about access. The second, the third one, excuse me, is power, and this means that you are enabled to do certain things as a result of your activities. So again, think about the moderator example on the bulletin board, or the question and answer site. The fact that you have enough points may give you the ability to edit certain posts. If you don't have enough points, you can't or you have to submit your answer to be reviewed by a moderator. But if you're high enough in the totem pole, or on the totem pole, then you get that ability to directly modify posts or maybe to create new topics, you get the ability to do other things that other people can't do. And finally, stuff. Tangible rewards. Things that you actually get in response to your actions that's the final thing in Zichermann structure. And he makes two claims about this structure both of which are based on the notion that it's a hierarchy. The first claim is that, it's more advantageous for companies to do the things higher up, like the status because they're cheaper. Here you've gotta actually give people the stuff and come up with things that may cost you money. Here people just feel the status and you don't necessarily have to give them anything of real value. And so these are rank ordered in terms of preferences for the companies designing the systems in terms of being efficient and not giving up anything they want. The second claim he makes which I think is more questionable, is that this is also rank ordered in terms of how powerful these motivators are. That status is the most significant and most powerful thing that motivates people. I think that some of the time that certainly true but as we talked about in the previous video there is a danger in assuming that status is the primary thing that motivates you. It gets you potentially in a gamified system the people who care the most about status. But that might not be the majority of the people in the pool and it might not be the people that you most want in the pool. Maybe you don't want the status clubbers as your primary customers, maybe you want the people who care about things for other reasons. Those who actually going to be your best customers. So may be your focus in status is problematic in that way. But this way helps us see some of the different kinds of extrinsic motivators and different ways they can function in gamefied systems. The fundamental question that we are going to have to ask them is with any form of gamefication, any example like the infamous Foursquare badges which I have referred to several times, where do they fit? Are these intrinsic or extrinsic motivators? And the short answer is they're both. They can be one, they can be the other. It depends on the context. It depends on the system overall and what specifically is being rewarded, and how it's placed within the system. Whether it is something about status or about getting people some stuff or something else. Or whether it's an intrinsic motivator. Maybe I get this badge here, I don't even know what this Mr. Bill is here but it looks kind of fun, maybe I get that just because it's fun. Because I enjoy the thought of having a Mr. Bill logo on my profile page on Foursquare not because of anything I get in any tangible or intangible way for it, I just like it. That's intrinsic motivation and that can be the result of something like badges just as much as the extrinsic motivators. But as I talked about, the behaviorist path towards gamification tends to miss that. It tends to focus more on the other kinds of motivators.
