A need is a fundamental requirement for the survival or satisfaction of individuals or groups. Needs can be physical, psychological or social in nature. They may vary in degree of urgency, intensity and importance. Needs are to be distinguished from wants, which are desires that must be satisfied.
The need for food, water and shelter are universal human needs. People spend much of their time, energy and resources trying to satisfy these basic needs before they can focus on higher-order needs such as belonging and self-esteem. The most widely known academic model of human needs is Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, which posits that people must satisfy lower-order needs (e.g., food, water and security) before they can move on to satisfying their higher-order needs (e.g., self-actualization).
In linguistics, the word need has both a noun and a verb meaning “the state of being in want of or requiring something”. The noun is more commonly used, being synonymous with the phrase “a need” or “a want”. The verb is also commonly used to mean “to be in need of,” “to be in a need of,” or “to have a need for.” A person who is in need has a pressing desire for the thing they need. Someone who is in a need does not necessarily have it, and may be unable to obtain it.
There are a number of different approaches to the concept of need in social work and other disciplines. Some view need as a subjective concept that varies by individual and situation; others, such as Amartya Sen, advocate a more objective approach based on the idea that people have capabilities that are intrinsic to them. The capacity theory is often compared with the capability approach developed by Martha Nusbaum and Amartya Sen, which focuses on the development of internal assets or capacities that allow people to fulfill their own needs rather than having those needs imposed upon them from outside.
The concept of need is a critical one in the field of public policy, as it is a necessary input into a variety of decisions and processes. For example, if a community wants to build a new school, it will need to determine whether the site can accommodate the size of the proposed building and if the land can be purchased at a reasonable price. The need for a new school is not necessarily an unmet need, but the community must take into account its budgetary constraints when making the decision.
The need surname has been recorded in the United States Census Bureau as having a frequency of 282 out of 100,000. People with this surname include: