Oh Snap (Umichpolevault, 2016)
If you watch the video above you might wonder what would motivate someone to continue this irrational activity, but the risk is well worth the reward. Fear is not the only emotion involved, success brings feelings of accomplishment, satisfaction, joy, pride and affirmation. It is emotionally gratifying and clearing a new personal record height elicits a euphoria that is unparalleled by any other activity.
From my personal experience, I find that I pole vault because of self-improvement motivation, "motivations aimed at changing the current state to a level that is more ideal, not at simply maintaining the current state. Self improvement leads consumers to perform acts that cause emotions that help create hedonic value" (Babin, 2016, pp. 91-92). Pole vaulting offers a constant opportunity to set the bar higher and improve myself. I love activities like vaulting and weight lifting with quantitative results that consistently provide measurable goals and clearly reveal improvement.
To further explore what motivates pole vaulters to do the irrational, I asked a few of my teammates what motivates them and why they vault.
(Umichpolevault, 2016)
(Umichpolevault, 2016)
(Burkhalter, 2016)
(Umichpolevault, 2017)
These reasons are mostly emotional, affirming the hedonic value of the pole vault. Hedonic motivation, "the drive to feel something emotionally gratifying", played a huge role in getting each of us to vault at the B1G 10 level (Babin, 2016, pp. 93). It is an incredibly technical sport, taking many years to learn and the dedication that it takes to become successful at it can only come from serious passion. I believe that most pole vaulters exhibit emotional and enduring involvement in the activity. Learning more about the event and new approaches to technique drive them to better themselves. "Consumers with high enduring involvement typically find more hedonic value in learning more about that particular activity... Consumers often show passion for activities in which they are enduringly involved"(Babin, 2016, pp. 95). Pole vaulters are also emotionally involved, appearing irrational at times. Breaking a pole for instance and then immediately taking another attempt on a bigger one might seem irrational, but the passion of enduring involvement combined with the deep personal interest of emotional involvement would drive any vaulter to do this in a heartbeat.
Works Cited
Babin, B., & Harris, E. (2016). In CB 7 (7th ed., pp. 93). Boston, MA: Cengage Learning.
Babin, B., & Harris, E. (2016). In CB 7 (7th ed., pp. 95). Boston, MA: Cengage Learning.
Babin, B., & Harris, E. (2016). In CB 7 (7th ed., pp. 101). Boston, MA: Cengage Learning.
Bauer, Emma. (2017, Feb 4) Personal Interview.
Burkhalter, Nick. (2016, April 16) Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10209637165510432&set=a.1618909677120.2086135.1367749937&type=3&theater
Burkhalter, Nick. (2017, Feb 4) Personal Interview.
Haughn, Kevin. (2017, Feb 4) Personal Interview.
Uhlian, Sarah. (2017, Feb 4) Personal Interview.
Umichpolevault, (2016) Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/umichpolevault/?hl=en
Umichpolevault, (2017) Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/umichpolevault/?hl=en
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ReplyDeleteI've been around the track and field environment a lot during my life, but one event I never experimented with was pole vaulting. I agree with much of the sentiment conveyed in this article; it seemed intimidating, challenging, and extremely specialized to the point where I was not sure if I would succeed at it. From this perspective, I was rather dissuaded from ever trying.
ReplyDeleteHowever, from an alternate perspective, I completely appreciate your motivations for competing in the sport. I think yours, along with your teammates', desire to pole vault despite the dangers and challenges stems from the self-improvement motivation principle. "These behaviors are aimed at changing one's current state to one that is more ideal" (Babin, 2016, p. 91). So, like many of your teammates mentioned, I believe that the competitive aspects of pole vaulting and the constant desire to set the bar higher lead to very internal, personal motivation. Similarly, "self-improvement leads consumers to perform acts that cause emotions that help create hedonic value" (Babin, 2016, p. 92). Thanks for such an interesting perspective on why you and others pole vault!
References:
Babin, B., & Harris, E. (2016). In CB 7 (7th ed., pp. 91-92). Boston, MA: Cengage Learning
When I clicked on the link to your blog, I never would’ve guessed it would be about pole vaulting. However, your blog certainly made for an interesting read, and I am excited to see what your future posts will be about. Although I have never done pole vaulting or even entertained the idea of doing so, I felt as if I could relate to the emotional involvement aspect of your post. I was a ballerina for 11 years, and in some aspects, it is very similar to pole vaulting. There are many parts of it that seems quite irrational, such as forcing your body to bend in ways that it naturally does not and wearing shoes that balance one’s entire body weight on a narrow box made of dried glue and layered fabric. Still, as you mentioned, the emotional involvement associated with such intense sports is enough to inspire us to keep on going.
ReplyDeleteAs a consumer, I found a lot of my consumption decisions to be driven by my needs as a dancer. For instance, I was buying new ballet slippers and pointe shoes a few times a year, constantly purchasing new tights when my old ones would rip, buying packages of bobby pins and hair ties at the start of each new production, and purchasing leg warmers, warm up jackets and pants, and leotards every year. My point is, while my decision to do ballet was strictly hedonic, much like your decision to do pole vaulting, there were many utilitarian purchases I had to make in order to ensure my performance as a ballerina was as competitive as it could be (Babin, 2016, p. 29). It would be interesting to hear about the types of purchases you make with utilitarian value to ensure your pole vaulting performance is as flawless as possible.
Babin, B., & Harris, E. (2016). In CB 7 (7th ed., p. 29). Boston, MA: Cengage Learning.