...My Personal Take on Psychology Christopher M. Hart Johnson and Wales University Author Note [Include any grant/funding information and a complete correspondence address.] Abstract This paper explores my personal experience and take on psychology. It starts with what I believed psychology was before starting the class, to what I learned in the class. All the way from the components of the brain and what they do; to behaviors are linked to the brain. Psychology is an interesting topic in today’s world and not many people think about it. Without psychology we would never understand how people work, think, and act in today’s world. Keywords: Psychology, Brain, Behavior, My Personal Take on Psychology Psychology is the scientific study of the human mind and its functions, especially those affecting behavior in a given context. (Psychology) When I think of psychology the first thing that comes to mind is the brain, and how it works. There is more to psychology than most people think. I learned more and more about psychology over the course of this trimester. What I Thought Psychology Was Before I started...
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...lead me into an education concentrating on Human Services, Psychology, and Criminal Justice. When I started attending school, I hadn’t narrowed down what field I really wanted to focus on. The following two tables will show what classes I have taken as required for core classes as well as major specific classes. I have highlighted, in yellow, the top five most influential classes that have inspired me in one way or another. CORE CLASSES Lecture Project Discussion Field Work Experimentation Research Senior Seminar x The Ancient World x Intro to Literature of the New Testament x Spanish I x Statistics for Social Sciences x Lifetime Fitness and Wellness x Music Appreciation x National Government x Survey of Math w/ Applications x Analysis of Text x New Student Seminar x Environmental Science x Development of Civilization x Intro to Speech Communication x Business Math x Composition I x MAJOR Lecture Project Discussion Field Work Experimentation Research Personality Theory and Assessment x Women and Crime x Intro to Philosophy x Techniques of Individual and Group Counseling x Psychology and Religion x Human Sexuality x Internship x Counseling Theories x Human Development x Addictive Behaviors x Abnormal Psychology x Intro to Human Services x Psychology Intro to Sociology x Gangs of America x ...
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...My Outside the Classroom Perspective Since changing my major to psychology as a freshman, I’ve been exposed to many interesting topics, theories, and techniques. Many of the things that I was learning inside the classroom where readily applicable when I exited it. By this I mean that I was seeing a lot of the things that I was learning about immediately after leaving class and being out amongst my friends. I’ve also learned quite a few things that have made me become more persuasive. I would say manipulative, but that is a very strong word. For example, in my introduction to psychology class I learned about this technique of persuasion called the door in the face technique. This is basically when you ask somebody for something outrageous that...
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...Ever since graduating from high school the question that always came up to me was what do you want to major in once you start your college career. Unfortunately I never really had a solid answer for that question; I was always trying to figure out what I was interested in. My mentality was to take it day by day and see where life took me possibly figuring out what I want to study for the next four years of college. My first year of college was a great experience from me, I was able to live at school and take on the responsibility as an adult. At of all the class I took at St. Thomas Aquinas College I still had no idea in what I wanted to major in. It became a frustrating process because I had felt like I had wasted a year in not coming to a decision. I had a couple of ideas but when I looked at the big picture on what kind of jobs I can get with that specific major and the classes I had to take for the future, it never became promising so I let it go. I chose to stay undecided and take life as it came to me with getting discouraged. My main concern then was now to obtain a strong GPA. Even though I had no major I took core classes which every major required in order to start setting myself up. Setting a path for myself in order to be successful for the future was very important to me. Figuring out what I wanted to do came later, for now my goal was put myself in the best possibly situation so I can be prepared when I do choose a major. My first step was to take those core requirements...
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...Psychological Perspective Paper Introduction Psychology is the study of human and animal behavior. There are various perspectives within psychology and the upcoming paragraphs deal with 6 psychological perspectives: Behavioral, Cognitive, Biological, Developmental, Psychodynamic, Sociocultural and Evolutionary. Psychological Perspectives All six perspectives seek to explore and examine human behavior and makes use of varying techniques in order to do so. Each perspective tries to search for answers to different questions, which exist about behavior. Each of these perspectives is different hence they have there own reasoning and explanation. Among the perspectives of psychology, many have been accepted some whereas others have had difficulty in being accepted. Behavioral Behavioral Psychology is a branch is psychology that claims that all behavior is learned through conditioning. The field is also known as behaviorism. The idea behind it is that all people acquire their behavior by interacting with their environment through classical condition or operant conditioning. Classical conditioning is the involuntary, or automatic, response to a stimulus (i.e. fight or flight response) where as Operant conditioning is that of a learned behavior through positive/negative reinforcement (consequences) or positive/negative punishment. (What Is Behavioral Psychology, 2011) Cognitive Cognitive psychology is the branch of psychology that studies mental processes including how people...
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...2014 Psychology 105 The purpose of this paper is to share a significant event I've had in my childhood. The event I would like to share is when I was in the fifth grade. This event in my life became very world-shattering when I was eighteen years old in Navy boot camp. When I was in the fifth grade I have had the most undesirable opportunity of seeing a little boy drown in our city pool. Actually, I was taught how to swim when I was in the third grade. After that fifth grade summer, I was afraid of the deep end of the pool. Seeing the little boy drown at the age of ten did not give me the desire to swim in any depth pass my waist line. As stated in the textbook Introduction to Psychology, “Cognitive behavior focuses on the processes such as memory, thought or reasoning” (Page 10). As I stood on the diving platform at the pool in Navy boot camp, my mind went back eight years to where I saw the little boy drown in the city pool. Deep inside my mind I knew I was trained well and I knew without a doubt that the instructors were highly trained in not letting me drown in that pool. However, I was still in fear that I would drown like the little boy did eight years ago in the city pool. I approached this situation with what psychology calls cognitive perspective. The memory of the kid drowning in the pool had my focused on only one thing, I may drown rather then I can swim and I will make it. How did I forget how to swim? I don't think I forgot how to swim, I think...
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...Personality Theories Robert Dan BEH/225 June 01, 2014 Philip Mulvey Personality Theories Psychology is the study of our minds and our behavior and there are scientific methods that are used to study these connections. While there are a multitude of fields, most come after the main four theories on psychology. We can look at four main theories of personality as it is studied today. These would be psychodynamic, humanistic, trait, and social learning. These can represent most all of the assessment tests that we use today. Some of the most famous personality psychology theorists were Sigmund Freud and Erik Erikson. Behavioral theorists include B. F. Skinner and John B. Watson. Humanist theorists include Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow. Now it does appear that what we have learned so far came from these men of psychological science. We have learned that behavioral theories will demonstrated just how conditioning can be used to learn new information and behaviors. While we may not all agree with each theory, or maybe we only fully agree with just one, all have contributed greatly to our understanding of humans think, act, react, and behave as a person. We have learned that behaviorism (behavior psychology), is a theory of learning based on the idea that all behaviors are learned through conditioning. We go around and about our lives every day using these elements of psychology and we may not even be fully aware that we are doing this. We evaluate other people constantly. We...
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...My love of psychology did not begin with my first psychology class, advanced placement general psychology, it started with my second. Enrolling in a dual-enrollment social psychology class at the community college in my neighborhood is what sparked my interest in psychology. I became fascinated with the subject and knew from that moment that I wanted to pursue a degree in this field. Working with children is what I always pictured myself doing. My first job was at Quality Swimming, where I taught children (and adults) swimming lessons, and helped many of them get over their phobias of the water. To help the children overcome their phobia, we were trained to use systematic desensitization. We would begin with gradually exposing the children to the pool: starting with the children sitting on the top step, and slowly moving into deeper and deeper depths of the pool. The ultimate goal was to “teach water safety and instill in all students a love for the water.” While at Quality Swimming, I was able to apply knowledge from the classroom into my teaching. For instance, because of differences in the development of age groups, and individual differences I was able to create specific lesson plans to meet...
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...4.1 Define language and lexicon. Language can be defined as a system of words used by humans to express their feelings and thoughts to one another. This definition of language aligns with the text that states, “to be a language, a system must exhibit regularity (that is, be governed by a system of rules, called grammar) and productivity (be able to express an infinite number of ideas” (Galotti, 2014). Lexicon is a mental dictionary that holds “knowledge of words, including their spelling, pronunciation, definition, part of speech, and so on” (Galotti, 2014). 4.2 Evaluate key features of language. Communicative, arbitrary, structured, generative, and dynamic are key features of language. Communicative language includes verbal and written communication. Arbitrary language deals with the connection between the meaning of words and sounds. “One of the central ‘design features of human language is the relationship between the sound of a word and its meaning is arbitrary” (Monaghan, Shillcock, Christiansen & Kirby, 2014). Structured language describes the meaning behind thoughts as well as the rules of language. Generative language deals with the production of new ideas, inventions, and concepts and dynamic language defines language that is active and purposeful. 4.3 Describe the four levels of language structure and processing. Language processing involves cognitive, language, and auditory mechanisms being intertwined successfully, but phonemes, words, sentences, and texts can...
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...Module 5 Homework Assignment PSY140: Introduction to Psychology November 21st 2011 1. Define cognition and name the basic units of thinking. Cognition is defined as mental processes of perceiving, believing, thinking, remembering, knowing, and deciding. Concepts are the basic units of thinking. Concepts are general categories of things, events and qualities that are linked by a common feature or features, in spite of their differences. Which help us make sense of information in the world. Concepts also enhance our memory and guide our behavior. Lahley, Benjamin B. / Psychology an Introduction/ 9th Ed. 2. How is language learned and how does it relate to thinking? Language is learned so early that it is difficult to explain how it is managed. Some psycholinguists have proposed that language is learned by special genetically programmed procedures that are unique to language learning. Others contend that the general analytic capacity of the human brain is such that even complex language rules can be worked out without any innate knowledge or special language acquisition procedures. Regardless of which view is correct, experience with one’s native language must be critically important. Narrative skill differences are connected to the way that mothers converse with their children. If they use an elaborative style, engaging in lengthy discussions about children’s past experiences, providing lots of details, asking questions and encouraging children...
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... Psychology for Children and Adolescents: Development, Prevention, and Promotion What I learned Positive Psychology is used to determine how well a human will flourish and have optimal functioning in life. The four levels of optimisms include genetics, environment, criticism of parents, and life experiences. Question What are the techniques that are used in family centered positive psychology? Research on Wellness of College Students What I learned College students experience a variety of stressor including classes, careers, and family. College students are a difficult group to study but are used to conduct research due to the fact that college students range from 20-25 years of age a readily accessible. Question Are there any longitudinal research studies done on the same college students based on their wellness throughout their undergraduate studies? Subjective Well-being What I learned There are two aspects of subjective well-being which includes emotional reactions to life events and cognitive judgement of satisfaction and fulfillment. In order to have subjective high well-being you must have a positive outlook, meaningful goals, and close social relationships. Question Can subjective well-being be used as an intervention to help individuals that are suffering from depression have a positive outlook on life? Wellness in later life: Research implications What I learned According to the 2013 statically data there were 44.7 million people...
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...Kadejah Hairston PSY 225 Final Evaluation Paper I took this course in evolutionary psychology, not only because I needed it for my minor credits, but because I wanted to learn how evolutionary principles shape the body and the mind. In the same way that physiological systems can be described as products of natural selection, psychological systems can be described as mental adaptations acquired by the same processes. People can learn a lot about the mind if they were to take a course on evolutionary psychology. I did not have much knowledge about evolutionary psychology when I signed up for the class, but I did have expectations about the class when I signed up. I expected to do a lot of the things that we did end up doing, such as watching videos and reading about different things. This was not a class where I had to always read the book for a good example, because examples of psychology could be found anywhere. If it was not a video that I could watch I would try to find another source other than the book after reading the assigned chapter so I could see it from different prospective. Yes, this course did meet my expectations. We did majority of the things that I expected to do plus more. I was not expecting us not to have a limit to how much we posted each week, but I think without the word limit on our post it made the topics easier to talk about. Some people would just get straight to the point while others would go into a lot of detail in their post. The...
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...What is the point in studying psychology? Psychology is so important in many aspects because it’s the basis of how you understand people’s behavior and the human mind. The reason for studying psychology is different for every person. Personally at the beginning it was just because I have to take this course for my major. I soon came to learn this class is going to help me in a lot more ways than one. I started becoming more excited about it because it will help me with my future goal of becoming a nurse. A huge point in studying psychology for me is because in my future goal of becoming a nurse it will not only benefit me but it will benefit my patients due to an understanding of how their feeling, reacting, and also what they are thinking. Understanding a patient’s brain can be a huge factor in your job. A nurse must always be aware of how her interaction with her patient affects that patient, the patient's family, and ultimately the patient's outcome. For example a patient suffering anxiety over his illness may refuse to get out of bed, which could cause complications such as a respiratory infection or pneumonia. As a nurse if you suspect a patient won't participate in his recovery, you will need to provide emotional support and encouragement while adapting his treatment plan to his psychological health. A way you as a nurse could help the patient is set up a short term goals list where you could encourage them to do something small like attempt to get out of bed four...
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...I was required to take English 160, or discovering Language as a freshmen here. A first I didn’t know what to expect from the course, but I learned some pretty interesting things. And some not so interesting things. I would have to say the most surprising thing I learned from this course was when we talked about peoples feelings towards people speaking different languages aside from English. After watching the videos and actually interviewing a few people, I was surprised to learn that so many people really are against foreign languages being spoke in a public setting. One of the most meaningful articles assigned to read in this course was the article on the Chinese students who came to America and tried to learn English. Before reading that I never understood how difficult it would be to come to a different country and try to learn the native language, without really any help at all. We learned a good amount of useful things in this course. It is hard to really pick out what I feel was most useful but if I have to choose I think the most useful thing we learned was the different dialects that are spoken around the United States and around the world. I think it is useful to know how people from different areas other than the one you are from speak. Although I believe this subject was the most useful one taught, I also feel it was the most difficult to accept. It was hard to accept the many stereotypes against people who speak in a southern, or a New England or midland...
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...dislike (one to two (1-2) sentences). There is one thing in life that I deeply dislike and fear and that is a spider. The sight of this eight legged creepy, web spinning, hairy, ugly creature sends me running for cover. Describe the subfield (e.g., cognitive psychology, developmental psychology, psychoanalytic psychology, etc.) you believe is best suited for providing psychological insight into your preference (the fact that you like or dislike the thing you do) and why you believe it is so. I believe that both cognitive and behavioral psychology provides me with the best psychological insight into my arachnophobia. Cognitive psychology explains my irrational fear of spiders because their perspectives of are based off of cognition which is memory, thinking, reasoning and decision making. This area of study suits my preference because my initial fear of spiders was based off of the memory of my grandmother, and her severe reaction to these small creatures. Behavioral psychology also offers insight into my fear because it focuses on observable behaviors, such as classical and operant conditioning, which are learned behaviors. Classical Conditioning is an originally neutral stimulus, which elicits a reaction and after repetition becomes a conditioned response, and Operant Conditioning is learned behaviors from positive/negative reinforcement and punishment. Behavioral psychology explains my fear because I was classically conditioned to fear spiders as a result of a bite by...
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