It really depends on the context of each where they will show such differences in different situations.
A
need, more specifically a
basic need is the bare minimum a human must have to survive. As it's been mentioned you need the following:
- Food
- Water
- Shelter
- Clothing
- Oxygen
Once you have these basic needs they do nothing for motivation. However, if you were on a conference call and all of a sudden you couldn't breathe, at this point you could really careless about hearing what the other individual(s) had/have to say. All you would care about is getting some oxygen which would be an only case where you would have motivation for the
basic need.
If we go a bit further, the needs can still continue. Let's say you're stranded on an island by yourself for 30 days with no chance of rescue in site. You happen to be on an island that you were fortunate enough to carry your basic needs to survive. However, you're alone. Your cell phone has no chance of working so you're shut out from all communication. The lack of communication with the outside world creates a chemical imbalance to your brain and as the days go on you keep hoping someone will find you. Before you know it day by day you're need to just communicate with someone else is eating at you. Days turn to weeks, weeks to months and before you know it you start to go insane. In this case, you lack the
psychological need.
Again, when you have this need you really don't think about it. Once you're satisfied there is no desire to have it. Take it away and the desire is there.
However, let's move away from the individual needs and move into a business level.
Let's say you have a very large and important business deal coming up. You look for your suit but you find out it doesn't fit as well as it used to or it is starting to show its age. This is an unsatisfied need which came into play as soon as you found out the suit wasn't going to work. Your need now surrounds around the fact that you don't have a suit and one should be acquired. This would be known as
need recognition. Now you
wanted the $5,000+ suit but the $200 suit covered your need.
A better example would be the people who stand at the food court giving out samples. You decide to try the sample and as soon as the food hits your taste buds it spikes your appetite. You're now going back to your
basic need and at the same time you are creating
need recognition to stimulate the buying process.
We can go further on this but there are sometimes needs that motivate. The suit you bought accomplished a specific task and would be a
utilitarian need. If you go shopping for pleasure or you drag race down the race track for the adrenaline rush alone you are after the
hedonic need.
Ever wonder why there's music in certain stores or certain scents in places you go? These stores are trying to satisfy the hedonic need.
a
want is typically something you don't need and is something you would like to have. You need a car to get from A to B but you don't need the top of the line car. When you purchase your dream car, you are satisfying your want cycle.
A want is a perspective that can differentiate from one person to another.
Now there are times where a need/want can fall very similar. Let's say you enjoy eating chocolate. While you need food to survive that doesn't mean that you need chocolate. Sure, depending on the type of chocolate we can go into detail about the positives and negatives but that is way off topic here. If you like chocolate you are satisfying a want.
- Devin
