CRITICAL THINKING AND PERCEPTION PAPER
by
Sharon Buhse
PHL251
Professor Vanessa Tom
UoP
November 19, 2003
Perception is reality! Oh really?
A couple of years ago, I witnessed what I thought was a man having trouble getting into his car. There was a man that must have been in his mid 60’s tugging on his door handle to his car. I watched him try to fit his arm into a small opening in the widow on the passenger side of the car. Because of the age of this man, it never entered my mind that this man was trying to break into this car to steal it. Another thing that didn’t fit the profile of a car thief was the way the man was dressed. He was dressed in a sports jacket and was wearing fairly decent trousers with nice shoes.
I walked over to the man and asked him if there was anything I could help him with or if he needed to call someone. He told me he did not have a cell phone, so I offered the use of mine. The man declined saying he just bought the car a couple of weeks ago, and had not had a chance to get a spare key made. He was in the parking lot where I worked at, so I asked him if there was someone he knew inside the building that could give him a ride to the dealership where he bought the car from, and once again he declined by saying he had just stopped by to fill out an application. I asked him again if there was anything I could help him with because I didn’t want to leave him just standing there helpless not able to get into his, and again he declined respectfully but started to sound irritated because of my repeated offers.