Final answer:
Maslow's hierarchy of needs consists of five original levels: physiological needs, safety needs, love and belonging needs, esteem needs, and self-actualization needs. These needs range from basic survival to achieving one's full potential and must be satisfied progressively.
Step-by-step explanation:
The five original levels of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, excluding cognitive, aesthetic, and transcendence needs, are as follows: Physiological needs: The most basic human needs essential for survival - such as the need for food, water, and shelter. Safety needs: The next level, including personal security, employment, resources, and health. Love and belonging needs: This includes friendship, intimacy, family, and a sense of connection. Esteem needs: Follows love and belonging, and involves the need for respect, self-esteem, status, and recognition. Self-actualization needs: The highest level, which is the pursuit of achieving one's full potential and exercising one's creativity.
Psychologist Abraham Maslow proposed this theory to understand what motivates people. He believed that needs at a lower level of the hierarchy must be satisfied before individuals can attend to needs higher up. From the base of physiological needs, which concern survival, to the pinnacle of self-actualization, which concerns achieving one's full potential, each level must be fulfilled to progress to the next. Maslow emphasized that achieving self-actualization is a life-long process and only a few reach this stage. It is suggested that when basic needs are not met, our energies are focused on satisfying them, with higher-level needs becoming motivating factors only when lower-level needs are sufficiently satisfied according to his theory.