Within the field of sociology there has been a long-standing tension between individual agency and social motivation. This historical disciplinary tension is evident in the scholarship on motives and motivations within sociological social psychology. In this chapter a review of scholarship on motivation and motives is made with consideration of key conceptual and methodological advances and approaches in these literatures. Mills' (Am Sociol Rev 5(6):904–913, 1940) concept of vocabulary of motives is described extensively and the empirical applications of Mills' vocabularies of motive framework reviewed. In this chapter, empirical applications of vocabularies of motive are explored and examined for relevance to situations of deviance, within relationships, and in social movements and social institutions. This chapter concludes with discussion of directions for future theoretical and empirical work on these topics. These topics include expanding methodological approaches, specific attention to the role of motive talk in creating a cohesive sense of self, attention to motive and motivation in prosocial behavior and wellness, attention to context, and finally, attention to how individuals interpret the motives of others.