Recently in Assignment #5 Category

What in the name of psychology had happen to the era where ladies who have a few extra pounds on themselves are viewed as beautiful and attractive. Back in the days, ladies having a few extra pounds on them showed that they are from a noble or rich family and are viewed as valuable "wife" materials where men would go out of their ways to "woo". But of course, that was a long, long, time ago. In the world today, being skinny is the new "it" look. And everywhere you look, be it the tv, or magazine, or the internet, being skinny is being promoted in one form or another. And the eating disorders appeared.

Anorexia is an eating disorder that make individuals have distorted images of themselves and they would see themselves as fat and ugly. Therefore, they would go on a quest, of the extreme, to stay thin. Girls who have anorexia would describe themselves as fat even though they are really bony. Even though anorexia is not as common as bulimia, which is another form of eating disorder, but standing at a 5 to 10 percent mortality rate, anorexia is one of the most life threatening of all psychological conditions.

There was a period back in high school, I was very obsessed with my weight. I had very low confidence in myself and thought that I was too fat. I could say what influence my thinking was actually my friends. I would always think that I am fatter than them and that I need to lose weight in order to not feel ugly around my girl friends. I remembered I kept a food diary to help me keep a close eyes on my eating. I also remembered being really proud of myself for eating very little in a day. But I don't think i was anorexic because after about half a year like that, something drove me to eat normal again, I don't remember what, probably because I'm a food person at heart. But I'm glad that I was able to think clearly to love myself again but most of all, I'm really glad I gave food another chance! We are now inseparable.

Positive illusion, in the text, is defined as the tendency for humans to perceive themselves more favorably than do others. These illusions allow us to have higher self-esteem and view ourselves as more attractive, intelligent, and likeable. There is much controversy as to whether positive illusions are healthy or damaging to a person. I think that slightly unrealistic favorable views of ourselves are healthy because they give us more self-confidence and keep us from being too insecure. An example of how lack of positive illusions can be mentally and physically harmful is anorexia nervosa. Anorexia nervosa is a psychological disorder in which a person has an obsession with weight loss and weight control. This disorder is said to be rooted from poor self-image and related to personal characteristics, such as high levels of negative feelings and perfectionism. "Possible factors that protect against the development of anorexia include high maternal body mass index (BMI) as well as personal high self-esteem" (http://www.medicinenet.com/anorexia_nervosa/article.htm). With lack of positive illusions, one can spiral into state of dissatisfaction with him/herself and end up with a disorder that can take over her life and ultimately damage his/her physical health.

In my opinion, repression is which means that you forgot some things that the memory makes you feel pain. In the book, it said that repression is means motivated forgetting of emotionally threatening memories or impulses. If when you remember someone or something, you feel ache or pain about that, forget it is a better way.
I think this topic is very important, because some people cannot have a happy life or even want to commit suicide all caused by the bad memories, if they can forget it then they have a better life.
There is an example for my best friend; she is good player for piano. Once she had a piano performance, however, she made a mistake for her playing, and her teacher and her parent feel really disappointment. And she felt sorry for them and guilt to herself. Since then, she became afraid of the performance, and never does it again. I know she was not happy now. To her piano is not only a instrument, but also a friend and a part of her life. So if she can forgot the bad memory about the performance, then she can does it again and live more happy which I wishes.
There are also many people who repress themselves and it is really important to help them out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xvnsIodU34

This was a very interesting chapter for me to learn about. I was unaware about a lot of things when it came to intelligence tests. I was always under the impression that intelligence test showed who the smartest people in the world were. Basically this test showed who the Einsteins, the Gates, and the Jobs were. But not I realize that even though the test at some extent does show this, it doesn't limit itself to just these types of people. IQ tests are to show a persons ability to problem solve and think on a individual basis. But what I think iQ test should be is a cumulative score between how book smart you are along with your personal skills. IQ test are not made to show how well a person can communicate with others or any other personal skills for that matter. If a person can communicate the things they know to others, I feel like that person should necessarily be considered intelligent. A test should be form to have a score that reflects your book smarts and street smarts combined. It was interesting to see in our discussion sections that all the teams that was on the side of being against IQ test always won. Employers realize that people with a high IQ doesn't mean they're the right person for the job. Interviews are great for weeding out those people that are sociably stable. I believe it would be smart to do a combination of interviewing and IQ test when employers are trying to select people for positions. This way you could find out how good a person is at problem solving but also find out about they're communications skills. Last thing I would like to mention is an IQ is really just a numbered and how people perceive it. There are a lot of people that do a lot for society with low IQs. To me it comes down to actions and how people apply themselves to really determine how intelligent they are.

IQ tests are something that are heavily debated in the hiring process in the workplace. With an IQ of about 100 being average, and the average college student around 115, the big debate is whether the hiring process should emphasize IQ over other factors such as experience and personal references.
My take on it is that IQ is very important, but should not be the only factor. Intelligence is key to being successful in most things, but that intelligence means nothing if you're not working hard and using that intelligence to get the job done efficiently and effectively. Hard work is just as important as intelligence, they should go hand in hand, those who are smart should know to work hard and succeed.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYZtcTxWf4U

pretty sure I wouldn't hire him...

Multiple intelligence is the idea that people vary in their ability levels across different domains of intellectual skills. This theory is from the mind of Howard Gardner. This theory, according the Lilienfeld, has been enormously influential in educational practice and theory over the past two decades. Each of the multiple intelligence is a "Frame of Mind" or different ways of thinking about the world. There are eight different types of intelligence according to the theory. A person can specialize in certain intelligence type, but can do terrible in a setting that involves an intelligence type that they are not dominate in. The eight intelligence test are linguistic, logico-mathematical, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalistc.

I find it amazing how teachers can now form their classes to fit their students types of intelligence type. A teacher can focus on using teaching techniques that can help a student in certain ways. A student with high Musical intelligence will probably learn better when what their learning is paired with some form of rhythm or tune. The multiple intelligence shows that people are smart in many different ways.

I just took the test and here are my results:

The results I find are quite accurate! I love music and I work better when there is music in the background. As I am writing this blog and studying for Psychology I am listening to music (as of right now Kids by MGMT)! Interpersonal Intelligence is also high, which I agree because I love working with people. I love nature and I love marching band (which is probably why Kinaesthetic is high, and also I love doing yoga and I want to take a ballet class here at the U). Overall I believe that I do excel in these types of intelligence.

Every second of everyday people have emotions. In my own words emotion is defined as how we feel based on what has happened to us or from what we have experienced. I think this concept of psychology is important because it is one of the main things of a person's life. Emotions can alter decisions and change points of views. Emotions can vary based on culture too because of what has happen to that culture in the past. Sometimes we fake our emotions to please other or to make things seem different than they really are. For example if a person is very sad but when they are around others they smile and seem happy than people in their surroundings figure that the person is indeed happy and not sad. Facial expression and tone of voice can determine how a person seems to be emotionally. There are seven facial emotions that are easily recognized, they include happiness, sadness, surprise, anger, disgust, fear, and contempt as the text book "From Inquiry to Understanding" states. Sometimes things that we do not even acknowledge can alter our emotions and we aren't even aware of it. Exposure to things has effects on our emotions. People who are interested in Object A are more likely to seek things dealing with object A than a person who is not interested in Object A. There are many different items that can effect out emotion and there are also many different theories and concepts as to why they do affect them.

Personality has been conceptualized from a variety of theoretical perspectives, and at various levels of abstration or breadth. Each of these levels has made unique contrabutions to our understanding of individual differences in behavior and experience. After research, psychologists find a general taxonomy of personality traits, the 'big five' personality dimensions. These dimensions do not represent a particular theoretical perspective but were derived from analyses of the natural-language terms people use to describe themselves and others. Rather than replacing all previous systems, the big five taxonomy serves an integrative function because it can represent the varous and diverse systems of personality descripition in a common framework. These five dimensions are Openness to Experience(intellectual,polished,independent-minded), Conscientiousness(orderly,responsible,dependable), Extraversion(talkative,assertive,energetic), Agreeableness(good-natured,cooperative,trustful) and Neuroticism(calm,not neurotic,not easily upset) .

I feel that an interesting aspect of this past chapter was the idea of the big five model of categorizing personality. I think it realistically portrays the various, diverse traits that compose an individual, in a more accurate way than simply measuring the dislikes or likes about basic concepts. The Big five personality model helps to explain the social situation of different individuals in different situations by showing the complexity and intensity of the feeling directed towards a specific action. I think it's incredibly interesting how applicable the ideas said to be the main categories determining major personality attributes are to my life and many of the qualities displayed in the people around me. It is proposed that certain attributes can determine certain outcomes given specific situations but I feel that there are many contradictions to what is often predicted or stereotyped. The five basic personality traits are said to be the tendency to be open to new experiences typically seen through the ability to seek out situations bringing unusual outcomes, the ability/ tendency to be responsible or steadily work towards a cautious or achievable goal, and the possibility of being outgoing in a situation with other individuals. The factor of being agreeable and willing to adapt constantly, to 'go with the flow' is also able to be measured through this theory along with the tendency of an individual to worry or feel anxiously tense about certain situations. Personally, I feel I have experienced all of these aspects said to compose a personality, and to an extent, I feel they do impact the predictability of feelings and reactions to some people, things or events. To illustrate my point i found an article describing the applicability of many of these aspects making up the big five model. This article discusses differences in gender for entrepeneurs but also many interesting concepts regarding psychological well-being. At one point the article says, "People with high self-esteem are more likely to take risks and enter difficult and unconventional occupations because they believe in their abilities. This is an important part of the adjustment factor as it relates to stability and confidence (Ellis & Taylor, 1983; Hollenbeck & Brief, 1987)." Things like these really interest me about the overall study of psychology and are incredibly applicable to everyday life.
Sources Cited: textbook references and http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb6005/is_1-2_9/ai_n29064696/

Reading a book upside-down and creating synonyms for the word "amazing" are two different skills. The thing that they have in common is that they both can measure general intelligence. General intelligence includes problem solving abilities, spatial manipulation and language acquisition. The study of intelligence has made many breakthroughs but has also been hampered with questions like how genes and environment interact to create one's general intelligence. Robert Plomin, a behavioral geneticist at the Institute of Psychiatry in London, has been conducting a study of just how influential your genes are on your intelligence. His research involves a study of thousands of children, asking them questions like "What do water and milk have in common?" Plomin will continue testing the children throughout childhood and into their teenage years. The trait that all of the children have in common is that they are all twins, and in twin studies researches can distinguish between the influences of environment from genetics. What he found was that the identical twins received closer scores than the non-identical twins did. I was interested in reading about what Dr. Plomin had discovered so I continued doing some research and found a new analysis of genes and intelligence. In the new analysis, researchers calculated that between 40 and 50 percent of individual differences in intelligence, both how much someone knows and how good they are at problem-solving, are due to genetic variations between people. The specific genes that effect intelligence have not yet been identified but this new study is the first that proves a significant amount comes from our genes.