Prejudice paper for school

Prejudice

"Society and prejudicial attitudes seem to run hand in hand, though we usually hear it as people stereotyping or discriminating. It seems that a lot of people's opinions depend on where and how they grew up, as if their environment alters their feelings, thinking and behavior.

As an example, I grew up in very discriminative town especially towards racial differences. When there was the first black teacher at my high school. parents wouldn't even go up to talk to him and kids were dropping out of the class he took. Then when he came out as being bisexual, even more kids dropped and some parents had their children switch classes or schools. All of this because of what they had been taught, and now those kids are being taught the same thing.

For me, my personal identity is also how I grew up, but I saw how people around me were treating anyone who was different, so though I was taught that "different" was bad, I didn't like seeing the negative effect on the "victims". Just because someone is different doesn't make them less of a human. And that personal opinion has caused me to be different than how I grew up, I am very accepting of others. Though for personal identity in others, I see where it is a lot of how they are raised. If you are taught to fear or judge people who are different than yourself, then it is going to be hard to change that opinion.

Fear, negativity and looking for something to judge others off of. That is what is learned and taught generation to generation. These emotions and behaviors just keep the prejudicial attitudes going strong. It only takes one person in a large group to be an influence over everyone else. If one person yells a racial slur, then chances are others will start up and join as well.

It is hard to change something that you've learned or have lived with your entire life, but it is possible. To not fear and to be educated, each person is different and there is no point in treating others different than how you personally want to be treated."  

Case Study paper for school

Case Study

"Group think is when a person discourages creativity or individual responsibility by making decisions for the group. A few examples of it that are shown in our Appendix B is when Tom, Susie and Richard plan the paper into sections without Mark and Betty. To further on that one, the second example is that they already indicated what the different sections should include. Third example is that they also chose who should write each section. Then again when Mark and Betty bring up that the citations are required but the rest of the group turns them down.

A few things that I would have done is bring up that I'm a new insight to the paper and that I can do a lot more than what they had "assigned" me to do. As a group, though, it is important to remember that you're a team. Everyone needs to work together, and just because you might have worked with people previously doesn't mean that someone doesn't know that section better. Making plans as a team can really help. Also, in this case a reason why the team got a lower grade is because people weren't being listened to. If everyone had listened to Mark and Betty, they would have included the citations that were needed in each section, and they would have gotten a higher grade since that's the only reason they got a low grade.

If Mark and Betty had grouped together and listened to each other, they could have made their sections of the paper proper and the teacher would have been bound to notice that only two people followed the syllabus as it was supposed to be. Asserting yourself and following what you know can be the best way to go, even if it means going against the group's decision."  

Eating Disorders paper for school

Eating Disorders

"We all know that embarrassing and loud growl that our stomach makes when we're hungry, the one that gets louder the more we try to conceal it. Where does that come from? Well, obviously our stomach but why?

What causes hunger, other than the obvious thought of it being that we haven't eaten in awhile. Walter Cannon and A. L Washburn decided to do an experiment to find out exactly what causes hunger and what signals us to feel hunger. Washburn swallowed a balloon and Cannon was able to track the movements of his partners stomach. This showed that our hunger starts when our stomach is empty, so when the balloon was small in Washburn's stomach. But with this, they also found that there are many factors into hunger, the biggest one being the brain signals that tracks hunger and thirst. (Coon)

There are also external factors on our hunger. Seeing the McDonalds golden arches automatically make me want a large sweet tea and their salty fries. Having food be visible, plus easy to get makes it even easier to follow our cravings from our taste buds versus eating or drinking what our body needs. Then there is the fact that a lot of people are emotional eaters, me being one.

Emotional eating can be a good thing and a bade thing. It can cause different eating disorders to form, such as anorexia and obesity which are on two opposite sides of the spectrum. Its really hard in society on both males and females having these skinny and fit celebrities everywhere we look. We want to look like that. This can causes a lot of people to become anorexic due to not liking their own bodies. On the other side, some people eat their emotions, and find comfort in a snack when they are feeling stressed.

Our bodies are ours, and ours to take care of. With this, I'm not sure if it is extrinsic motivation or intrinsic motivation that eating disorders fall into since I could see how it is both. It could be extrinsic because the goal is to look like a supermodel but it could be intrinsic because its gets your own body to what you want.

Either way, the same goes for having a healthy diet. Its a choice and its better on our bodies if we take care of them. Our goals are to be healthy, and have the muscle tone and that isn't going to be accomplished by forming an eating disorder, no matter what the goal is."  

Careers in Psychology paper for school

Careers in Psychology

"For me personally, child and adolescent psychology, a family therapist or a sports psychologist. I love each of these fields for different reasons. I am interested in child or family psychology because I came from what people would call a "broken" family, I've seen abuse and I've lived moving house to house and I know how that can affect kids and everyone in the family. If I could help someone get through what I've been through, that would be a dream come true. Then sports psychology comes in because through all that I went through, one thing helped me express how I was feeling and gave me a place to release what I was holding on to: dance class. I love dance and would love to help others by getting them into an activity, such as dance, so that they can have an outlet and a place they can be free without fear or stress.

For my ultimate dream job, it would be the sports psychology which is also referred to as performance psychology. This is the person that helps individual players and teams realize their potential and helps them get through frustrating times. I would more used it as a relaxation exercise and as visualization techniques for people, rather than just athletes. As I said, sometimes the best therapy is having somewhere to go without judgment to be able to just release all stress and emotion.

Most performance psychology careers require a masters or doctoral degree in clinical, counseling or sport psychology. It is even more impressive if the individual specialized in applied sport psychology, clinical sport psychology, and academic sport psychology.

With children and adolescent, I would lean towards developmental psychology. This is the study of human growth and development over the individual's lifespan. This growth includes all physical, cognitive, social, intellectual, personality and emotional growth.

To work in a developmental psychology field it is often that a doctoral degree is needed. This is often accomplished by following the steps through undergraduate in psychology then getting masters followed by a doctoral.

As a different field, I would choose social psychology. This is the study of social influences, social perception and social interaction that has influenced the individual and the individual's behavior. For a social psychology career a person usually gets their bachelor's degree in general psychology or another psychology related field. It is then often that these people go towards their master's or doctoral, which can take up to five years for completion.

When looking at social psychology fields, it is often seen in teaching or research at a college. Social psychologists can be seen as consultants and help evaluate programs in education, conflict resolution and protection. There is also working in different clinical fields such as group psychology in hospitals to rehabilitate people to get ready to live in the "real world" again.

People with these backgrounds have seemingly unlimited options, whether it be my child psychology degree or sports psychology. With child psychology, developmental psychology and social psychology, there is clinical work in doctors offices and hospitals, schools or other psychology offices (or even forming your own office). With sports psychology, they are usually around athletes, so this would be more looking at working in a university or for a professional team. When looking from my stand point though, I would be more wanting to form my own office and use sports psychology as a physical outlet.

I got into psychology as my study because I've always had a want to help others, especially children and teens. I have more of a focus on younger adults and children because I know, for myself, that I felt I wasn't listened to or that my opinion didn't matter. That was really hard and I would have given anything for someone to look at me and ask if I was okay, because after watching my mom get abused and my dad get abused, of course I was far from being okay. Though, I had no one to express this to since I knew my parents didn't want me to know what was going on, even though I did. Holding that up in myself was the hardest part because I felt like there was a huge weight and a huge secret on my shoulders. With this, I want to be that person, the person a child or teen can come to and let all their fears out and tell me what is going on from their perspective. To have that one person can change an entire individual's life, and I want to be that person."

Problem Solving paper for school

Problem Solving

"The main strategy that I used was trial and error in being able to get all the animals to the other side of the river. With using this, it made it really difficult and I had to keep track of everything that I had previously tried. I honestly didn't try another strategy in this problem solving situation since trial and error seemed like the best strategy. I chose this strategy because using trial and error means that there is room for mistake and redo along many different steps, the difficult part comes into remembering the steps until you figure it out.

With trial and error, you of course run in to a few different obstacles such as repeating mistakes or losing track of what worked. I ran into both of these. I would get far enough to having each animal on the opposite side of the river, but then I'd forget what steps had gotten me as close as I was before I got stuck. I also found myself taking steps that I had previously taken which I found didn't work.

This problem solving simulation only took me one try since I had previously done this exact one. The first time I tried to solve this problem though, it took me around seven to ten tries."  

Psychotherapies paper for school

Psychotherapy

"Psychoanalysis is usually seen as a person laying on the couch as their psychologist says "mhm, and how does that make you feel", or at least that's what most movies and TV shows portray. In actuality, psychoanalysis and psychotherapies can range in different treatments to get the best result. Psychotherapy is a psychological technique used to help positive changes in a person's adjustment, behavior and overall personality (Coon).

Interpersonal psychotherapy is usually used to help people, especially people who are suffering from depression, eating disorders, and have social phobias, to help improve their relationships, bonding and social skills with others around them.

Free association is saying whatever comes to mind. Often people don't say how they feel or what they think due to worry of consequences of what they have to say. With free association the person is to say whatever the would like without worrying about pain, embarrassment or being judged. This is to help the person lower their defenses and let their feelings show versus keeping them bottled up.

Dream analysis is pretty much as it sounds, dreams are often seen to be something that was on our mind heavily before we went to sleep, our "forbidden desires" and "unacceptable feelings" (Coon). Dream analysis can help the patient get past these desires and feelings by making the meaning and symbol obvious and attainable or to where they are no longer desired.

Two more are the analysis of resistance and the analysis of transference. The analysis of resistance is when a patient doesn't want or refuses - resists - talking about important topics and conflicts. This causes walls to be nearly impossible to knock down or get over causing the session to be hard to move and resolve. Analysis of transference is when a patient "transfers" their feelings and often sees their therapist as an important person from their past, which can bring up different feelings and conflicts in the patient.

Each form of psychotherapy is individual and often times, the same one wont work for everyone or every problem. Finding the right one is usually based more on the patient's problem and reactions or personality."

Conflict Paper for school

Conflict

"Conflict is something we see every day and experience it seem multiple times a day as human beings. Whether it be something small like where to eat or something large like a conflict in a relationship, it is still hard to see how to resolve the issue and get out alive to the other side of the seemingly dark tunnel.

But what is the cause of conflict, well, it varies. It can be due to competition, social dilemmas, perceived injustice, or one that is common in my life, perceptions. I know that a lot of people experience the conflict of perceived injustice, it seems I hear the words "this isn't fair" on a daily basis, and that is exactly what perceived injustice is. The funny thing to me is that the way to resolve it is yourself. The way you respond, act and hold yourself is going to affect how people respond, react and see you.

As for my biggest conflict: perceptions. There are many different types like misperception, mirror image perceptions and shifting perceptions. Misperception is when is seems that the actions or goals are unattainable and are usually caused by the root motive. Mirror Image perception is when the conflicts are mutual as is the misperceptions. And shifting perceptions is when the conflict seems to appear and disappear. The best solution to all those above is communication, whether it be within yourself to figure out the problem on your own side, or with the others involved to figure out the different motives."

Not okay

Hey all,
 so, I just need to come out and say it: I'm not doing so well, I'm really not okay. I had a check up to see how I was doing last week, and the doctor upped my dosage and expressed that she would like me on my depression/anxiety medications for at least a year and that really scares me. I don't know how I feel anymore, I don't know why I cry... and I don't understand why everything hurts. I feel so empty and like I just want to run away, but I'm stuck.
It seems that every glimpse of happiness that I barely see or that starts to bloom, I mess it up by being too scared or too busy. I feel like I can't catch a break or do anything right.
I'm really struggling and I'm really not okay at all.

I want to be.... but I'm not.
I broke down majorly today.... just started bawling and couldn't stop. I don't know why. Nothing really happened and not much is wrong, but I couldn't stop.
I'm tired of all of this. I'm tired of just always feeling like I'm standing on the edge and that I'm even alking on egg shells around myself. This isn't fun and I'm already tired of it...


I just want it to stop.

Attitudes paper for school

Attitudes

"We are each born as individuals, but where do we get our behaviors and attitudes from? Are they taught to us? Do we form them ourselves? Well, both are true. As children we learn things from our parents and everyone we are around. This is how we learn what facials to make to show that we are sad or happy, it is also how we learn to express each attitude we feel. We are more likely to show the same attitude traits as those we grew up around, especially our parents.

Then as we grow up and become more of ourselves as an individual, we take on other traits and form our own by altering the ones we were taught. These alterations can come from anything that we expose ourselves to, friends, television shows, movies, coworkers and music. Everything we expose ourselves to can have an affect on us an alter our attitudes or behaviors.

Especially who we surround ourselves with. It is seen that people take on the traits and attitudes of the people they are around, causing them to change based on the social circle they're in. I know that I, personally, will not speak the same way I speak around my friends as I do at work. Around my friends, I am making jokes left and right and am not in a professional attitude mind set at all. Obviously at work, I take on a more professional attitude and persona. Its putting on different hats and knowing when to wear each one.

The three main components of attitude are referenced as the ABC model of attitudes. A is affective component, B is behavioral and C is cognitive. Though this model is used frequently, there is evidence that the cognitive and affective components of behavior don't always match with the individual's personal behavior.

Affective component is the area that involves a person's feelings and emotions about the attitude object. This can be any emotional response: fear, sadness, happiness. This would be sentences like when you state what you're fearful of, like for me it would be "I'm scared of clowns".

Behavioral component is the attitude that influences how we act or behave. So, to tie that into the effective component, behavioral component is how we respond to our emotional response. If I were to see a clown, chances are that I would try to avoid it or walk by it quickly. This is part of the behavioral component.

The cognitive component is what the individual believes or their knowledge about the attitude objects. For my example it would be that I have had a bad experience with clowns, so that is why I'm scared of them.

Since our attitudes are related to our enduring of different things around us, how we feel, what we believe and how our behavior is developed towards social times, events or symbols - there is no questioning on why human behavior is such a complex topic. There are many levels of each emotion and different ways to express each, an not everyone expresses each the same."