Two terms used throughout the need discussions are defined below:

Need Conflicts: Within a particular dimension some needs conflict with each other because they evoke incompatible behavior if they are expressed synchronically (simultaneously). For example, the aggression and nurturance needs evoke incompatible behavior in all three dimensions. Needs that conflict in a particular dimension are located in opposite areas of that dimension (see Target Model) indicating that they are not normally activated synchronically in that dimension.

Mal Adaptive Need Fusion: Needs that normally produce conflicting behavior when synchronically evoked in a particular dimension are sometimes combined or fused despite resulting conflicts. Mal adaptive fusion creates frustrations and problems. For example, in the combative dimension, when the aggression and succorance needs are synchronically activated, the fused behavioral expression may take the form of whining and complaining that does not effectively express either the aggression need or the succorance need.

The Understanding Need
(The need to learn, understand, and find the meaning of things)

Learning and understanding are psychological processes by which one percept or idea is mentally related to (associated with) another. Mental relationships create meaning. A percept increases in meaning as it increases in the number of other percepts with which it is associated. Likewise with ideas. Memory is automatically formed when a stimulus is perceived, although our memory for most percepts is short. If something "impresses" us strongly, we keep recalling it until it becomes part of our long-term memory. The more associations we can make with an object-event, the more meaningful it is and the more retrievable it is in our memory.

The Understanding Need and Systems Theory

Our mind constantly works to incorporate and systematize new percepts in our memory. Association of a percept with similar classes of percepts stored in our memory helps develop a concept. Each concept or idea has a web of associations that is connected with other concepts, percepts, ideas, and beliefs. The more complex and systematized the web of associations, the more meaningful the concept and the more influence it has on our behavior. The understanding need and systems theory and thinking are thus inextricably related. Because of the complex relationships between the understanding need, systems theory, and learning, this discussion is quite long. Those not interested in the theoretical aspects of the understanding need may wish to skip to the section labeled "The Function of the Understanding Need."

When a new percept cannot be mentally associated with other percepts it is meaningless. We can choose to ignore it or we can conceptualize it by creating associations with the new percept. Verbal symbols may provide our first means for categorizing the new concept. We "name" it or give it some kind of verbal description, even if these labels only relate it to some mental filing system. For example, the first association we create for a new object-event may simply be a label such as "number 676." Concepts may be established via any of the sensory-perceptual processes such as smelling, licking, listening, touching, and looking.

Our minds also work at unconscious levels to systematize knowledge and information. A simple example of this occurs when something looks "familiar" but can't exactly be "placed." Hours, or even days later, a connection may be made and we remember that a similar experience occurred at such-and-such a time. Even though we were not consciously thinking about the event during this interval, our mind was seeking associations at unconscious levels until a match was made.

Associations are formed on two dimensions. Things can be associated that have no physical similarity if they are experienced at the same time (or very close together in time). This is the temporal contiguity association dimension. Things can also be associated on the dimension of physical similarities and differences.

Association via temporal contiguity allows us to relate stimuli that are not only dissimilar but are perceived through different senses (synesthesia). We connect the sound of a bird's call with the sight of the bird when we can perceive both at the same time. The word "rain" can be associated with the sound, the feel, and the smell of falling drops of water when all these stimuli are experienced together in time. Some of the types of learning that are based on simultaneous experiences include conditioning, stimulus-response (S-R) learning, and verbal or symbolic learning.

In the classical conditioning exercise, an association between the sound of a bell and salivation (along with a whole set of other responses that occur with salivation) was established in a dog by temporally pairing the bell with something that already caused the dog to salivate. In everyday life, our minds are constantly discovering naturally occurring temporally related events so that we are constantly being "conditioned."

Words, either written or spoken, have no similarity to physical objects or events. However, if a series of situations can be devised where a word and an object-event are perceived at the same time but in varying contexts, an association can be formed between the word and the object-event. This is a cognitive process by which two dissimilar percepts become associated in our mind. It differs from S-R learning by which a stimulus is associated with a response or an action rather than another percept. It differs from perceptual judgment or learning in that two stimuli are associated that have no similarity. As a symbol, the word can substitute for the object-event in our thought processes.

As stated above, the use of symbols allows us to associate dissimilar stimuli that occur at widely separated times. By letting symbol "A" stand for a particular object-event and "B" stand for another object-event perceived at a different time, we can recall both "A" and "B" at the same time and form an association between them. Our symbolic learning is thus independent of "real" time but does use our mind to bring things together by means of symbols in real time. We remember the past and anticipate the future by indexing images and memories symbolically so an object-event that is not presently occurring can be "brought to mind" ("tomorrow I will do what I did yesterday").

We can also conjure up images of object-events that are not presently occurring. The association of images is apt to be less organized and systematized than association via symbols, however. The human ability to use symbols has made it possible to develop and maintain civilizations and cultures that promote science and technology and the arts. By storing information in symbolic form in books and formulae, vast amounts of information can be accumulated and stored independently of memory. As Bertalanffy has observed in his book General Systems Theory, humans live more and more in a world of symbols, sometimes at the expense of their contact with reality through direct sensations and perceptions.

The stimuli involved in S-R associations are perceived as signs or signals rather than symbols. A sign differs from a symbol in that it directs us to do something - it stimulates a response or reaction that is not mediated by symbolic thinking. An arrow indicates we are to move in a certain direction; a referee's whistle is a signal to stop the play; a red traffic light directs us to stop; a green light to go, etc. Most animal training is sign or S-R learning.

Whereas the perception of a symbol may only stimulate cognitive reactions, a sign causes a change in overt behavior. The same stimulus can function as either a sign or a symbol. For example, a series of music notes directs the performing violinist to finger and bow a violin in a certain sequence. To a conductor or composer "reading" the score, the same notes are symbols that stand for certain sounds.

Association by means of physical similarities is usually studied as a part of our perceptual processes. Through perceptual processes we turn sensations into mental object-events. A botanist learns to perceive things about plants that a layman does not see (or rather perceive). Thus, knowledge is accumulated via perception. The Gestalt approach to learning and understanding emphasizes insight. Insight refers to the perception of new relationships between stimuli. For example, Kohler's ape had insight when it perceived a stick as something that would enable it to reach a banana outside its cage.

All types of learning involve associations established both by temporal contiguity and by the perception of physical similarity. Before we can associate stimuli via temporal contiguity we have to perceptually discriminate the stimuli from other sensations. For example, a symbol, such as a word, must be perceptually discriminated before we can associate it with its referent. On the other hand, to perceive physical similarity between two stimuli, we have to bring the stimuli together in time in our minds. Perceptual memories used for comparison may not reach a conscious threshold, however, so we are not always aware of matching by memory.

The understanding of complex patterns is usually acquired through the perception of similarities between new phenomena and object-events with which we are already familiar. Such complex matching is verbally facilitated by the use of similes, metaphors, analogies, fables, allegories, and parables. For example, when someone says "I slept like a log" we intuitively select certain characteristics of a log and understand that the person was in a state of heavy, inert, insensible sleep. When used metaphorically rather than denotatively, the word "log" conveys a package of information via its connotative associations. In this example, the imagery is applied in one direction - sleep is log-like; a log is not sleep-like. In some cases, similarities between two phenomena can be mutually enlightening, thus enhancing the meaning of both concepts. We can also perceive similarities between complex abstract patterns at a non-conscious intuitive level through music and the arts (see The Sentience Need ).

Perceptual processes are initially required for the understanding of complex phenomena because we can take in much more information synchronically by perception than we can by the linear linkage required for verbal or symbolic thinking. One picture is worth a thousand words when we are trying to communicate (or learn) how a number of different things are spatially related at a particular moment in time. To verbally convey the perceptual data in a picture would involve a linear process strung out over a long period of time. The results would still be inferior to what we can learn by rapid scanning or even more immediately by seeing the picture as a whole.

When a phenomenon has been adequately registered by perceptual processes, it can be associated with and represented by a symbol. This enables us to relate many complex phenomena that are not simultaneously experienced and to construct complex models of things we cannot actually perceive. For example, by working logically and analytically with symbols, physicists have constructed visible models of molecules and atoms. A carpenter can build a house by following the symbols and signs of an architect's design. Sometimes, it is a matter of physically converting energy we cannot directly sense into a form of energy that we can sense and perceive (e.g., radio waves transformed to sound waves).

With humans, our perceptual data are constantly being indexed and represented by symbols. This makes for more efficient storage and recall and it facilitates rational manipulation of information. Images cannot mentally be manipulated to perform logical, rational analyses as efficiently as symbols. The symbols we most rely on are words. Most words are "dead metaphors" in that they originally stood for commonly perceived physical object-events. In everyday use, a word tends to become divested of most of its original perceptual meaning and is reduced to symbolizing a different aspect of reality. For example, the words "grasp" and "comprehend" define a thorough or complete understanding of something although to words "grasp" and "comprehend" literally refer to the act of holding something in one's hand. By perceptual matching processes, similarities between the behavioral act of holding something in one's hand and the mental act of "holding" something in one's mind are noted. By convention and use, the words have now come to symbolize an unobservable mental act rather than an observable behavioral act.

Two object-events do not have to be similar in all dimensions to be useful for transferring experiences from one to the other. We often use metaphors and analogies to point out partial similarities between phenomena. Of course, when using complex perceptual matching processes
to facilitate learning and understanding, it is as important to recognize where the similarities end as it is to recognize where they exist.

Empathy is the symbolic label for a very complex and important type of understanding. Empathy is primarily a perceptual process based on perception of similarities between events involving another person and events we have previously experienced. It has a cognitive element in that we assume the other person has the same emotional and cognitive reactions we had in our similar experience. Remembering our reactions enables us to "put ourselves in the other's shoes" and thereby understand their reactions. Sometimes the clues we perceive are person related (e.g., expressions of crying, laughing, excited behavior, etc.) Sometimes we make our empathic inferences from situation factors (e.g., knowledge that the person has just heard of the death of a loved one). Often, it is a combination of both personal and situation factors.

From a systems perspective, there are two types of operations necessary for learning and understanding. The first type may be described as the synchronic analysis of elements. Synchronic analysis refers to differentiating and identifying a set of elements and noting the relationships among them at a certain point in time. The elements in a system must be identified and explicitly defined if our understanding is to go beyond intuitive feelings (see The Sentience Need). For example, to study and understand the solar system, astronomers first had to isolate a set of elements (the sun, planets, satellites) and note the spatial relationships between these elements at certain points in time. The second systems learning operation may be described as the diachronic analysis of process. Diachronic literally means "across time" so where there are changes in the relationships between a set of elements in a system, there is a diachronic process. For example, when a number of synchronic states of the solar system are studied, a diachronic pattern in the movements of the planets in relation to the sun was discerned. By locating the sun as the central element in the hierarchical arrangement of the elements and by applying the principle of gravity as the organizing or unifying principle, astronomers could understand the system and accurately predict the behavior of the elements of the system.

Some systems are static in that relationships between the elements show little or no change. A painting, a rock, or a piece of furniture are examples. A synchronic analysis of elements is sufficient for understanding a static system. All living systems and some physical systems are dynamic, however, so that both synchronic and diachronic analyses are necessary for their understanding. In many dynamic systems, change flows so rapidly that artificial means must be devised to "freeze" or otherwise preserve momentary synchronic states that can be registered in perceptual memory for prolonged study. Photographs, diagrams, or static models have been used to capture a synchronic state to study and analyze the components or elements of a dynamic system. In actuality, the identification of elements in a system may require a long period of study with much observation, analysis, experimentation, and revision before a set of relationships can be discovered that satisfactorily accounts for the systems phenomena. Synchronic and diachronic analyses are often alternatively applied in studying a system. The development of the periodic table of chemical elements is an example of a complex systems analysis involving both synchronic and diachronic analyses. The development of the Murray need system is another example although, in this case, the identification and definition of elements is much less complete.

Beliefs and the Understanding Need

Understanding, learning, and meaning all refer to the formation of mental associations between perceived object-events or between the images and/or symbols of object-events. There are two general types of associations. Reality oriented associations are derived from information about the world outside our mind. Creative or imaginary associations are formed when we select real object-events (by imagery or by symbols) and relate them in ways that are not intended to correspond with the real world. Reality oriented associations are intended to be true, valid, and factual. Creative associations are normally intended to be exciting, entertaining, stimulating, interesting, or dramatic.

Beliefs are based on reality oriented associations. Beliefs are formed when we perceive a relationship between two or more object-events and we feel that this relationship exists in the real world independently of our mind. The object-events that form the belief must be initially separate and distinct. The belief is based on a relationship between the object-events rather than an identity. Therefore, believing is not symbolization. The perception of the relationship does not automatically signal or call for an immediate reaction so it is not a conditioned response or an S-R association. The relationships that form beliefs are usually causative (I believe germs cause disease), or evaluative (I believe people are good), or descriptive (I believe Denver is the capitol of Colorado).

As stated above, beliefs do not cause actions. They can be maintained in our minds for long periods of time without affecting behavior. But beliefs, in combination with stimuli or situation factors, do shape and direct our behavior. They affect actions to the extent that they are considered to be relevant to the immediate situation. Conscious awareness of beliefs and the realization that they can be modified or abandoned increases self-determination and autonomy.

The philosopher Quine has pointed out (Quine and Ullian: The Web of Belief) that we accept relationships between object-events as realistic and therefore believable, when they are based on direct experience (seeing is believing) or when an accepted authority tells us things are related in a certain way. We stop and look before crossing a street because we believe that cars can be dangerous to pedestrians. Our belief about the danger of cars for pedestrians may have developed from our own experiences or from the admonitions of others. Several ideas, including our concepts of cars, danger, and pedestrians are mentally related to form this belief.

Amusing or fascinating unrealistic thoughts may be mentally entertained. We do not act on such thoughts or ideas although we may react emotionally to them if we momentarily treat them as real. For example, we can fantasize that our car can fly like a bird but we recognize this idea is unrealistic and would not attempt to fly off a cliff in the car. It is possible, however, to "think" about flying the car off a cliff and stimulate a little adrenaline excitement from our fantasy. Thus, we can mentally play around with object-event relationships without forming beliefs that affect our actions.

Creative associating can be more than entertaining and stimulating. Some imaginative ideas evolve into artistic expressions or scientific hypotheses or models that lead to creative invention and discovery.

The Function of the Understanding Need

A famous quotation from William James indicates the complex function of the understanding need. Through our need to understand we reduce the "great blooming, buzzing confusion" around us to perceptions, ideas, and ultimately to beliefs that enable us to find meaning in the world. If we perceive order in our experiences we feel that we understand them. Experiences that are understood are meaningful and produce beliefs that help direct our actions. Understanding thus provides us with the beliefs that combine with perceptions to activate motives that move us to act. If the beliefs are realistic, we can act effectively in our efforts to meet our needs.

Problems Related to the Understanding Need

Psychological problems develop from unrealistic beliefs. False beliefs come from poor understanding. Actions influenced by unrealistic beliefs tend to have bad consequences. There are four primary sources of unrealistic beliefs:

1. Invalid inference. Example: "I thought (believed) the group was saying bad things about me behind my back so I was hurt and became angry with them. It turns out they were planning a surprise birthday party for me."

2. Over-generalization. Example: "My parents gave me everything I wanted so I can expect (believe) that everyone will always give me whatever I demand."

3. Fantasy confusion. Example: "My dream that my lover was unfaithful is an extrasensory perception of what has happened or what is going to happen."

4. Unreliable authority. Example: "My parents told me that I should never do anything without their approval. My friends told me not to believe what any adult says. I believed all of them and got confused."

There are three important factors that determine whether or not we act on a belief:

1. The consciousness level of the belief.

2. The degree of subjective certainty we have about the belief.

3. The relevance or importance of the belief with regard to our needs.

A fourth factor, the reality of the belief, can be used as a reliable predictor of the positive or negative consequences of actions based on the belief.

Our most conscious beliefs are those that are most readily verbalized. These are beliefs that can usually be elicited by asking: "What do you believe in?" The answer is often a recital of statements such as "I believe in God" or "I believe in democracy," etc.

Belief certainty is independent of belief consciousness. Beliefs that are held with a great deal of confidence may be highly verbalized and conscious or be quite unconscious and unavailable for verbalization. For example, a strongly held belief that life is purposeless and meaningless may be a conscious part of a person's philosophy or it may be unconscious and experienced only indirectly as an unverbalized feeling of futility and despair.

Belief importance is also independent of belief consciousness and belief certainty. A person may consciously believe with considerable confidence that she or he had eggs for breakfast but this belief may be considered of little consequence or importance.

The most serious psychological problems caused by beliefs occur when a belief is highly conscious, is held with a high degree of confidence, concerns matters of great importance to the individual, and is very unrealistic. If such a belief becomes systematized, the believer has a thinking disorder called a delusion. Two of the most common types of delusions are delusions of persecution (e.g., "My enemies are radiating my brain") and delusions of grandeur (e.g., "I am God"). Delusional beliefs usually take the form: "I believe that (such-and-such) is true" rather than "I believe in such-and-such." Persecutory beliefs are also usually causal (e.g., "My problems are caused by such-and-such")

A delusion is systematized to the extent that it is supported by other beliefs that must be modified in unrealistic ways to avoid logical conflict with the core belief. For example, if I consciously and strongly believe that I am God, and I find myself in a mental hospital from which I am not allowed to leave, I must develop beliefs that account for this situation without threatening the validity of my belief that I am God ("I'm here on a sacred secret mission to help these lost souls").

When stress caused by psychological and/or physical frustration and trauma becomes very intense, perceptual processes may become distorted. Mentally created thoughts and images may be misperceived as external stimuli (hallucinated sounds, visions, odors, tactile sensations). Delusions and hallucinations are symptoms of a cognitive-perceptual disorder that is psychiatric ally classified as a psychosis or thinking disorder.

Anxiety and depression reactions are less serious disorders than psychoses and are usually classified as neuroses. These reactions differ from the psychoses in that rational analytic and perceptual processes are not as seriously affected. The unrealistic beliefs that cause neurotic reactions are unconscious (rather than conscious) and, in combination with certain signs or signals, they automatically set off emotional reactions. Since the belief is unrealistic, the emotional reaction is apt to be inappropriate for the situation. It may be inappropriate in type (anxiety where there is no real threat) and/or inappropriate in degree (violent anger in a situation that would normally elicit only mild annoyance). With the rational analytic thought processes relatively unaffected, the neurotic can use his or her judgment to counter or modify inappropriate reactions. The consequences, therefore, are not usually as adverse as those resulting from psychotic reactions. Unconscious unrealistic beliefs do create considerable psychological and physical stress, however, even if the behavior they produce is not as bizarre or strange as that resulting from conscious psychotic beliefs.

A phobia is an example of a common type of anxiety. If a man has a phobic reaction to elevators, he knows "in his head" that elevators are generally safe and, if asked, would probably agree that riding them is safer than many other things he does without anxiety. When he gets on an elevator, however, unconscious beliefs trigger a panic emotional reaction. His rational thinking is temporarily blocked by his strong S-R emotional reactions. Now all of his perceptual processes are set to pick up signs of impending catastrophe. If the elevator bumps or squeaks, he is quick to perceive these stimuli and prone to interpret them as signs of malfunctioning. These signs then reinforce his neurotic unconscious belief that elevators are terribly dangerous. According to some learning theories, his fear should extinguish if he keeps safely riding elevators. Desensitization therapy sometimes does lead to such improvement. However, an S-R emotional response based on an unconscious belief is often not affected by new and different experiences. To change this type of S-R association, the consciousness level of the belief must be raised so it can be explicitly stated at the time the triggering signal occurs and before the response is made.

All our actions are affected in some ways by unconscious beliefs. We are constantly abstracting and generalizing from our experiences and assigning the distilled products of these abstractions (in the form of beliefs) to our unconscious. This system frees our conscious perceptual and verbal processes so they can attend to and analyze new immediate experiences. For example, in the United States, drivers learn to drive on the right side of the road. After initial learning experiences, this rule is transferred to our subconscious long-term memory so we do not have to be continually verbally instructed by ourselves or others to do so. What was once a conscious verbalized decision becomes an automatic S-R reaction. If we go to some country where the custom is to drive on the left side, our subconscious belief about right-side driving would be forced into our consciousness by verbal or experiential information and we would have to modify our driving beliefs to accommodate the different custom.

A common general type of problem relating to the understanding need occurs when our rational analytic processes are distorted by strong emotional pressures. This is more apt to happen if we are unable to differentiate our thinking from our emotions and motivational impulses. If the understanding need is not well differentiated from combative needs, obsessive plotting or scheming may occur. Analysis and understanding are best accomplished before and after a battle or argument, not in the heat of the action when we must be reflexive rather than reflective. The understanding need can also be subverted by positive personal and social needs if it is not well differentiated from them. Lack of such differentiation can promote obsessive analysis in personal-social situations where spontaneous behavior is more appropriate. Lack of differentiation of the understanding need from the avoidance needs (harm, blame, and inferiority avoidance) can create obsessive fears of harm, blame, and failure. Obsessive analysis makes it difficult to act to avoid threats and danger.

Dimension Locations of the Understanding Need

The understanding need is located in the non combative area of the combative dimension. In this location, it inhibits combative impulses and actions. The understanding need motivates us to analyze and understand a situation before launching an attack or mobilizing a defense or asserting power. A military leader analyzes combat strategy before, after, or between battles - not during the conflict. When engaged in a conflict it may be desirable to interrupt action (when possible) to study changes and rethink strategy but a good fighter does not try to study and analyze while the action is in process.

The understanding need is located in the impersonal area of the personal-social dimension. This location indicates that we should not study and analyze personal and social actions at the time we are interacting with others. Personal-social interactions should be spontaneous and intuitive rather than calculated and analytical. Located in the impersonal area, the understanding need combines with other rational needs (order and achievement) to help resolve personal-social conflicts in a rational and thoughtful way.

The understanding need is located in the competitive area of the competitive dimension.. In this location, rational analysis supports and promotes efforts to attain competence and excellence. Skills, and abilities are acquired by work and practice and by understanding what we are doing and why we are doing it. Competence in learning and acquiring knowledge is obviously promoted by the understanding need.

Understanding Dislocated in the Combative Area of the Combative Dimension

If the understanding need is dislocated in the combative area of the combative dimension, it conflicts with combative assertive actions. Self-assertion may be hampered by ineffective obsessive analysis. The understanding need may mal adaptively fuse with combative needs to produce intellectual forms of combativeness such as hostile criticism, wit, sarcasm, or ridicule.

Understanding Located Too Near the Periphery of the Non combative Area of the Combative Dimension

Location of the understanding need near the periphery of the non combative area relative to other needs, provides it with considerable inhibitive power over combative needs when it is activated. Activation may cause swings back and forth between extremes of impulsive assertiveness and paralyzing obsessive analysis.

Understanding Dislocated in the Personal-Social Area of the Personal-Social Dimension

Dislocated of the understanding need in the personal-social area may block spontaneous intuitive personal-social interactions by obsessive analysis. In this location, it may also mal adaptively fuse with personal-social needs to produce studied, calculated, and manipulative personal-social behavior.

Understanding Located Too Near the Periphery of the Impersonal Area of the Personal-Social Dimension

Location of the understanding need near the periphery of the impersonal area relative to other needs, makes it an excessively strong inhibitor of personal-social behavior if it is activated. In this extreme location, the understanding need may not perform its normal function of moderate inhibition of social behavior while promoting rational efforts to resolve conflicts in personal-social relationships.

Understanding Dislocated in the Noncompetitive Area of the Competitive Dimension

In its normal strong (peripheral) location in the competitive area, the understanding need provides powerful support for the development of competitive skills and knowledge. The loss of this need to the competitive area can mean a loss of concern for why and how to improve competitive endeavors. Located in the noncompetitive area, it may create rationales for ways to avoid competition.

Understanding Located Too Near the Periphery of the Competitive Area of the Competitive Dimension

If the understanding need is located near the periphery of the competitive area relative to other needs, it becomes a dominant need in competitive activities. It may mean that knowledge and understanding are the ultimate goals in competitive endeavors. Knowledge may thus be sought for the sake of having knowledge (a type of intellectualism) rather than as a means to attain leadership and recognition (the usual leading motives in competitive striving).