Criticism on Control Theory of Motivation

Control theory of motivation has faced severe criticism. The major areas of criticism are discussed as follows.

• Control theory is based upon cybernetics model that has been developed for self-regulating mechanism  of machines. The same concept, if replicated on human beings, does not serve any useful purpose for predicting human behavior as human beings act upon their conscious rather on some fixed pattern as in case of machines.
• Control theory is silent upon the formation of goal, which is central to the functioning of overall model.
• Control theory is not based upon the rigorous research and empirical evidence.
• Control theory does not proposes anything that significantly differ from the propositions of other theories of motivation. 
• It is faulty because its focus is on discrepancy-reducing behavior while ignoring completely discrepancy-producing factors, which are also critical to the motivation.
• The discrepancy is very subjective in its nature. An individual might not perceive a genuine discrepancy as a discrepancy as such.