ERG Theory

Fundamentals

ERG theory groups human needs into three basic categories—existence, relatedness, and growth. These three types of human needs influence behavior. Existence needs refer to fundamental physical aspects a person desires in order to achieve well-being. These include both physiological and material elements required for well-being, such as pay, benefits, safety, and security. Relatedness needs reflect the extent to which an individual desires healthy, meaningful relationships with people considered by this individual to be important or significant. Growth needs denote the desire a person has to make a meaningful contribution in what they do: to feel involved, to accomplish goals of consequence, and to personally develop and improve.

These needs categories are similar to the ones found in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Existence needs parallel Maslow’s physiological and security needs, relatedness needs are analogous to Maslow’s social and esteem needs, and growth needs are comparable to Maslow’s self-actualization needs. Alderfer intended his categories to be a refinement of Maslow’s needs sets by eliminating what he viewed as problems in Maslow’s theory with overlapping needs and by aligning these categorizations more closely to empirical research on human needs. In his description of ERG theory, Alderfer makes a distinction between relatedness needs and the other two needs categories; unlike the other two categories of needs, relatedness requires mutuality —a sharing or interaction with others to satisfy this type of need.

The three categories of needs represent separate, distinct constructs and are not necessarily intended to imply a specific ordering. Instead, Alderfer describes needs categories as running along a continuum according to their level of concreteness. Existence needs are considered the most concrete due to the ease with which an individual may determine their fulfillment or their absence. Relatedness needs are thought to be less concrete than existence needs, and growth needs are considered the least concrete. The notion of a continuum instead of a distinct, requisite ordering signifies an important difference between ERG theory and Maslow’s hierarchy, which will be discussed later.

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