In An Introduction to Social Psychology (1908), William McDougall argued that all human thought and action are energised and directed by innate instincts, organised patterns of perception, emotion, and impulse that give behaviour its purposefulness rather than leaving it as a mere mechanical response.
McDougall proposed that each instinct (such as curiosity, self-assertion, or submission) contains its own goal-directed “conative” force, allowing individuals to move intentionally toward meaningful ends and to construct coherent social life, a view that foreshadowed later motivational psychology and emphasised that wellbeing flourishes when people recognise and channel their natural drives rather than suppress them.
For personal wellbeing, McDougall’s framework suggests that understanding one’s instinctive motives can deepen self-knowledge, strengthen agency, and reduce inner conflict; for societal health, it highlights how shared instincts, such as those for companionship or justice, can be cultivated to support cooperation, moral development, and constructive collective purpose. Instinct can be a powerful force, but like any force, it must be harnessed to do good.
Purpose and instinct can be understood as the two primary sources from which life strategies emerge: instinct provides motives that orient us toward survival, attachment, security, pleasure, and the avoidance of harm, while purpose provides a consciously constructed sense of meaning, direction, and value that organises long-term behaviour. As we have seen, McDougall argued that human behaviour is fundamentally organised around innate instincts, each associated with characteristic emotions and goal-directed tendencies. In proposing that these instincts provide the motivational foundation upon which more complex habits, values, and social behaviours are built, McDougall anticipated later theories that view personality and life management as emerging from the interaction between biological dispositions and learned cognitive structures. The life strategies people develop - the cognitive and behavioural patterns used to manage life as a whole, reduce suffering, and enhance well-being - arise from the interaction of these instinctive foundations and consciously developed purposes.
Early psychoanalytic theorists such as Sigmund Freud (1900, 1920) emphasised instinctual drives as fundamental regulators of behaviour, whereas John Bowlby (1969) showed how attachment instincts shape enduring strategies for seeking security and regulating emotion. Later, Viktor E. Frankl (1946/1959) argued that the “will to meaning” enables individuals to endure pain and organize their lives around purposes that transcend immediate gratification.
Building on motivational science, Edward L. Deci and Richard M. Ryan (1985, 2000) proposed that effective life strategies are those that satisfy innate psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness, thereby aligning instinctive needs with personally endorsed goals and promoting sustainable well-being. From this perspective, successful life strategies are neither purely instinctive nor purely rational: they are adaptive systems that integrate biological motives with meaningful purposes, allowing individuals to navigate challenges, minimise unnecessary suffering, and maximise enduring forms of happiness and flourishing.
From a Christian perspective, human purpose is not merely the product of biological instinct but is grounded in God’s design and humanity’s vocation to know, love, and glorify God. Christian Psychology sees human instincts as best subjugated to the inspiration and guidance of the Holy Spirit in the life of the individual and society.
Early Christian theologian Augustine of Hippo argued in The City of God (completed 426 A.D.) that human beings find their true fulfilment only when their desires are rightly ordered toward God rather than toward transient earthly goods, thereby linking purpose to humanity’s ultimate end in God. Medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas further developed this view in Summa Theologiae (1265–1274), teaching that humans possess natural inclinations (often described as instincts) implanted by God, but that reason and divine law direct these inclinations toward the highest good, namely union with God and virtuous living. During the Reformation, John Calvin emphasised in the definitive 1559 edition of Institutes of the Christian Religion that the purpose of human life is to know God and live according to God’s will; because human nature is affected by sin, instinctive desires require guidance through Scripture and divine grace.
Together, these thinkers shaped a dominant Christian understanding that instincts are part of God’s created order but achieve their proper meaning only when directed toward humanity’s God-given purpose. Life Theme Psychology (Gibson 2023) proposes that this balance is best achieved through the adoption by the individual of loving and seeking God as their primary strategy for living.