One struggle that all instructional designers face is the ability to motivate their learners. In a paper published in 1943, Abraham Maslo proposed that learners need to fulfill the learner's needs in the pyramid before they are ready to learn. While we as designers cannot meet off these needs, it is essential to consider these needs and meet the ones that are within our control.

Maslow's hierarchy of needs is a motivational theory in psychology, comprising a five-tier model of human needs, often depicted as hierarchical levels within a pyramid. When one need is fulfilled, a person seeks to fulfill the next one, and so on. Every person is capable and has the desire to move up the hierarchy toward a level of self-actualization.