Recently in Psychology Category

Once again I have a class with Dr. Hogan and we start off day one with selecting our topics. This is for Theories of Learning.

Which topic would you pick?

Topic 1: The cerebral cortex and memory
Topic 2: Habituation
Topic 3: The orienting response
Topic 4: Classical conditioning and conditioned emotional responses
Topic 5: Classical conditioning and spontaneous recovery
Topic 6: Backward conditioning in classical conditioning
Topic 7: Systematic desensitization of phobias
Topic 8: Aversive conditioning of alcoholism
Topic 9: Aversive conditioning of smoking
Topic 10: Aversive conditioning of drug abuse
Topic 11: Classical conditioning of bedwetting
Topic 12: Operant conditioning and superstitious behavior
Topic 13: Operant conditioning and shaping classroom behavior
Topic 14: Operant conditioningand toilet training
Topic 15: Operant conditioning and teaching language to autistic children
Topic 16: Token economies in inpatient mental health facilities
Topic 17: Token economies in classrooms
Topic 18: Learned helplessness
Topic 19: Biofeedback and pain control
Topic 20: Behavior modification and insomnia
Topic 21: Chunking
Topic 22: Teaching language to animals
Topic 23: Imitation of Achievement Motivation
Topic 24: Imitation of aggression
Topic 25: Television violence and aggressive behavior
Topic 26: Violent video games and aggressive behavior
Topic 27: Behavior modification of self-control
Topic 28: Observational learning of motor skills
Topic 29: Knowledge of Performance in motor skills training
Topic 30: Choice behavior

My correct Biopsychology textbook arrived today, via US Mail, so I got started on the course. The first quiz, due on Tuesday, has been finished, so now I can relax and work on getting ahead in the course. The instructor who wrote the course is not the same as the instructor who is teaching the course, although, we have him for a little while with him until the new instructor is finished with his Blackboard training.

One of the cool things about Dr. Van is he does not stay strictly with the “normal” course material, as can be seen in his choice of video for the brain anatomy overview he selected for our second set of lectures:

Just for fun, I am making my project on Dr. George Kelly available here.

For once… I have a plan.

but obviously, my plan is contingent on a few things, such as my department not fucking me over and my new advisor being of a higher caliber than his predecessor (shouldn’t be too hard).

Also, chances are, in reality, because I want to actually have some fun during the summer, I will likely place PSYC 342 (an elective) on Spring 2010.

The grade on my self-analysis paper came back this morning. I received 49 out of a possible 50 points. The primary comment that the instructor left was “Your paper was a pleasure to read”. My thought there when I read that was, “really? I guess I should read it some time”. I do not believe I have ever read a paper that I have written before turning it in, and I certainly have not let anyone else read them (not that anyone would volunteer to). I tend to be over-analytical of my own papers, therefore I do not read them before they are graded. Know how annoying it is to read something you have just turned in and then start thinking how much you hate a paragraph? Instructors do seem to like my writing, but I can not figure out why. Other comments on the paper included “very well organized. It flowed very well.” My internal response involves how weird I write things and the schizophrenic way that I jump between topics in my papers.

The one point off on the paper: “you cited your references inconsistently: some had caps, some didn't.” Oops, that’s the way the journals listed them in EbscoHost.

I guess I did not do bad on my first APA paper in a very long time.

http://www.outofservice.com/bigfive/results/?oR=0.8&cR=0.639&eR=0.406&aR=0.639&nR=0.688&y=1980&g=m

I am still trying to digest this and determine what I think about it. I had to take this for an assignment in my Theories of Personality course. I would be very interested in how my friends do at this.

This evening while preparing for a quiz in Theories of Personality I discovered (or brought to consciousness, depending upon if you are a Freudian or not) that I really like Psychology because it is a very modern thing. People who wrote the theories I am learning about are still alive (most of them) and the theories are still being tested and expanded. In completing a degree in mathematics, a person might only get to the things that were discovered up until around the 1500s or so, and for the average student, about 300AD is the newest material you will find in your curriculum. The theories of personality I am learning are new, some as recent as 2005, since I graduated from high school (and since I took my first psychology course). Even computer science doesn’t really see material that new. A new language sometimes, but the concepts are all fairly old. Graduate students get to learn the absolute newest, but undergrads are seldom that fortunate. There are worse topics for that I suppose, such as Art, where learning old stuff first and then new stuff later is encouraged and is the standard operating condition (you must learn how it was done the old way before you can learn the new way), and well… History.. they play a different game altogether.

Aside from the more modern material, it is also kind of fun to explore something that is so versatile. Psychology spans the area of artificial intelligence, art development and so many other areas, especially as an extension of Cognitive Psychology. Cognitive psych proves that psychology is bridging between social science and actual science. As knowledge progresses, the bridge between social science and pure science will become wider.

The biggest disadvantage to psychology is that there is very little history. In art you can call back to what has been done before and put it into cultural context and determine how we got from there to here, but in psychology, that just is not very easy, brains only last as long as people and once they are gone, so is the record of what was. All that remains is filtered notes and of course a few social relics (music for example).

I have finally selected a theory to use in my self-analysis paper for my Theories of Personality course. I have decided to go with Erik Erikson’s “Crisis” theory. The theory has phases that related to Freud’s psychosexual phases, but are more psychosocial phases. The phases are dependant upon a “central crisis” that must be completed, either by passing it (resolving it successfully) or failing it (resolving it negatively). I can draw some similarities between Erickson and Maslow’s “Hierarchy of Needs”, so I may end up using both of them. I like a lot of the aspects of Erikson’s theory, including that after a phase crisis has been failed, it is possible to have other experiences that reverse the outcome of the crisis. I feel that Erikson is a match for me because I can clearly identify phases I have passed and failed and things seem to line up with me pretty well.

I still do not like the idea of self-analysis, but I suppose Freud did it, therefore, its good for all of us.