Two frameworks here, and the exam mostly checks that you have not blended them. McGregor is about what managers assume; self-determination theory is about what motivation is made of.
McGregor
Douglas McGregor developed Theory X and Theory Y, published in The Human Side of Enterprise in 1960, later voted the fourth most influential management book of the twentieth century by the Academy of Management Fellows.
- Theory X assumes employees naturally resist work and require strict control.
- Theory Y holds that employees should be trusted and empowered.
Get the direction right; reversing the two is the most common error. A plant director who installs badge-in monitoring, removes discretion over work sequencing and requires sign-off on routine decisions because people will not work otherwise is operating from Theory X. Theory X and Y are not hygiene factors and motivators (Herzberg), and they are not the intrinsic-extrinsic distinction (self-determination theory).
The three basic needs
Ryan and Deci define them experientially, not by observable proxies.
- Autonomy: a sense of initiative and ownership in one's actions.
- Competence: the feeling of mastery, and the sense that one can succeed and grow.
- Relatedness: a sense of belonging and connection.
Wrong answers substitute measurable stand-ins: freedom from supervision, formal credentials, training hours completed, team tenure, reporting-line stability, social event attendance. The theory does not define the needs that way.
Intrinsic and extrinsic
Intrinsic motivation is based in interest and enjoyment. Identified and integrated motivations are extrinsic but based on a sense of value. Intrinsic motivation is the prototypically autonomous form, not a controlled one, and the theory draws no paid-versus-unpaid boundary.
Extrinsically motivated behaviours vary in how autonomous their regulation is. The least autonomous is external regulation: behaviour performed to satisfy an external demand or reward contingency. Order matters here: external is the controlled end, introjected sits above it, and identified and integrated are the more autonomous subtypes.
Carry in: three needs by their felt definitions, and external regulation as the least autonomous.