Partes del equipo.

Trait personality processes are relatively constant and suggest that individuals may adopt specific strategies when responding to situational pressures. These dominant coping strategies can be dissimilar to other strategies used by others with different personality traits in the same situations (De Raad and Schouwenburg 1996; Steyer et al. 1999; Deponte 2004). Whilst trait factors can change, this is largely due to gradual alterations or long term exposure to specific situations requiring different responses and these modifications may be considered effective adaptations to changing circumstances (Baird et al. 2006). Latent state-trait theory suggests that measuring a trait must encompass various state measurements and likewise measuring a trait in its simplest terms averages states measures across a range of situations (Steyer et al. 1999). Thus latent state-trait theory supports the notion of gradual changes in traits suggesting that an individual is exposed to diverse stimuli causing them to react differently even in similar situations as they may be in disparate psychological states in each different situation (Steyer et al. 1999; Awang-Hashim et al. 2002). However, from the trait theory perspective discussed earlier, the individual will have a dominant coping strategy for their current psychological state but this may be different for contrasting states. The latent state variable is characterised by a complex interaction between both the individual and the situation (Lu 1999) whereas the latent trait variable focuses only on the individual (Steyer et al. 1999). Where situational demands are perceived as more intense than personality responses, this may disrupt the individual’s dominant trait response causing unpredictable behavioural responses (Koestner et al. 1989).

Regulating behaviour and performance through motivation can be considered a trait-like

process, however, at the situational level, emotion, previous experiences and continual feedback may alter behaviour according to the changing demands of the situation (Hong and O’Neil 2001). Therefore, the most important factor in situational motivation could be how an individual identifies the situational constraints and interprets the situation (Rose et al. 2001). The

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flexible and individually moderated (Hardy and Gustavo 2005; Baird et al. 2006). Inflexible approaches are assumed to be a result of the individual’s inability to access or consciously understand the various systems involved (Robinson et al. 2005). Whilst certain personality traits can influence decisions to select particular activities, if perceived situational demands are not congruent with individuals personality traits this may result in internal conflict which can divert effort away from optimal performance (Hong and O’Neil 2001; Pushkar et al. 2002).

Individuals are however, more likely to have a mixture of strategies and processes to draw on with one being more dominant according to the individual’s personality traits (Bindarwish and Tenenbaum 2006). Thus according to Bindarwish and Tenenbaum (2006) it may seem that internal conflict would not arise, although if the dominant strategy was not effective for dealing with the situational demands then attention would be diverted towards accessing more

appropriate and effective strategies.

Aligning goals with the individuals underlying values can result in higher achievement through either a cognitive process, whereby individuals think about their values prior to making a decision, or an affective mechanism where individuals feel more positive when acting

consistently in line with their values (Parks and Guay 2009). Where individuals perceive value in a task this influences the motivational orientation of the individual in completing and

achieving within the task (Hulleman et al. 2008). It may be that those with different personality traits perceive different values in each activity, for example, extroverts persist more frequently at activity than introverts (Sutton and Lewis 2011), however introverts can internalise motives and values more easily (Henjum 1982; Opt and Loffredo 2003). Thus the value of activity for the extroverts could be related to quantity of performance or motivation whereas for the introverts the value of the exercise may be related to quality of performance or motivation (Elliot and Thrash 2002; Morossonova 2003) and this is further explored in study 1 (see page 50).

Situational motivation, according to the HMIEM, suggest that the individual’s response to perceived situational demands coupled with the underlying trait processes influences affect, cognition and behaviour (Vallerand 2000; Deci and Ryan 2008). State personality processes discussed above, suggest that, depending on the psychological state of the individual, the trait response would change resulting in altered behaviour. Therefore, investigating affect as part of the self-regulatory process for situational motivation is warranted.

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2.8 Affect

Distinctions between affect, mood and emotion constructs are acknowledged through the literature (Haddock et al. 1994; Bryant et al. 1996; Gendolla and Krüsken 2002; Jones 2003; Russell et al. 2003; Sutin and Robins 2005). The differences relate to the individual’s

experiences of these constructs, what caused them and their duration. Affect has largely been used to describe the overall experience of feeling positive or negative based on an individual perception of the valency regarding specific moods and emotions (Turnbull and Wolfson 2002; Lane et al. 2005; Miller et al. 2005; Kramer and Yoon 2007; Rhoden and West 2010). Mood and emotion are generally defined by how they differ, such that mood is not reliant on a specific stimulus, is usually less intense and of longer duration than emotion (Linnenbrink and Pintrich 2002; Lane et al. 2005). As emotions fade over time they can be classified as general mood states, becoming less intense (Crews 1992; Linnenbrink and Pintrich 2002). An emotional reaction to a stimulus primes the body for an immediate behavioural response which can be physiologically measured or subjectively felt by the individual (Jones 2003; Lane et al. 2005).

2.8.1 Affect theory

A circumplex model of affect (Russell 1980, see figure 2.8.1) ) suggests that the valency of affect is experienced as bipolar on two distinct continua; pleasant or unpleasant and activation or de-activation and as these two constructs are purported to be orthogonal they help to integrate various mood and emotion models. Positive and negative affect have been shown to align with the pleasantness and unpleasantness continuum in the activated state (Watson and Clark 1997). Affective states are ordered on the circumference of a circle and there are decreasing positive correlations between each particular affective state the further around the circle they sit from each other (Remington et al. 2000). For example at a 90 degree separation two constructs will have less positive correlation and at 180 degrees affective states should be increasingly negatively correlated, thus helping to explain effects of bipolarity amongst affective states (Remington et al. 2000). Yik et al. (2011) suggests that the circumplex model is a suitable fit for an overarching construct such as affect. However, there are two differing perspectives regarding positive and negative affect. One suggests that they are independent or bivariate (on two

separate continua) (Watson and Clark 1997), whilst the second perspective presumes an inverse or bipolar relationship where positive and negative affect are at opposite ends of the same continuum (Reich et al. 2003). A dynamic model of affect allows for both approaches under different environmental conditions. For example, under low stress individuals are able to process more complex information suggesting an independent assessment of affect while under

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high stress conditions, attentional resources are focused on the immediate demands thus supporting a bipolar assessment (Reich et al. 2003).

Figure 2.8.1 Russell’s (1980) circumplex model of affect with the horizontal axis representing the valence dimension and the vertical axis representing the arousal or activation dimension (adapted from Posner et al. 2005).

2.8.2 Positive affect

Positive affect relates to feelings of enthusiasm and alertness. A high level of positive affect is associated with pleasurable feelings of high energy whereas low levels of positive affect are suggested to relate to lethargy (Watson and Tellegen 1985; Watson et al. 1988). Positive affect is thought to influence an individual’s choice of activity more than negative affect (Kramer and Yoon 2007) and can result in increased exertion during difficult tasks (Gendolla and Krüsken 2002). Whilst participation in sport, exercise or physical activity does enhance positive affect (Turnbull and Wolfson 2002; Russell et al. 2003; Barnett 2006), this is further increased if the individual perceives it was their choice to participate in the physical activity (Miller et al. 2005). However, a lack of choice does not necessarily result in an increase in negative affect but generally results in decreased positive affect (Miller et al. 2005), a finding which provides additional support for independent continua of positive and negative affect.

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2.8.3 Negative Affect

Negative affect relates to unpleasant feelings of distress. Low levels of negative affect correspond with calmness, whereas high levels of negative affect are thought to include

contempt, fear and guilt (Watson and Tellegen 1985; Watson et al. 1988). Negative affect could arise from perceived situational demands or an over-reliance on outcome measures as opposed to process measures, regardless of eventual level of achievement (Ogden and Whyman 1996; Tomaka and Palacios-Esquivel 1997; Linnenbrink and Pintrich 2002). Some individuals report a need for themselves to experience negative affect in order to perform optimally (Gurthrie et al. 1997; Jones 2003). However, too much negativity may result in dropping out of the task due to reaching motivational limits (Eubanks et al. 2002; Gendolla and Krüsken 2002) or selecting maladaptive coping strategies (Pushkar et al. 2002; Robinson and Tamir 2005). High levels of negative affect are usually experienced more intensely than positive affect (Otani et al. 2007) and can distort the perception of task demands, with tasks seeming more difficult and requiring more effort for completion or success (Gendolla and Krüsken 2002). This increased intensity of negative affect can eradicate previous positive results or feelings, leading to further increases in negativity and higher risk of performance disruption (Turnbull and Wolfson 2002; Otani et al. 2007).

When an individual attempts to control their levels of positive and negative affect this becomes part of an overall concept of self-regulation where the individual undertakes a process of channelling and adapting affective responses and resulting behaviour. At the situational level of motivation this self-regulation is important to enable effective goal directed behaviour. The individual’s motivational orientations and perceived situational demands provide a framework within which the individual experiences drive and activation towards a task. As previously discussed, the individual’s tendency to select adaptive or maladaptive strategies will influence their behavioural response at the situational level of generality according to the HMIEM.