International Baccalaureate: Psychology

How to handle emotions better. Understanding emotions helps to see the world form a different perspective and of course it helps to reach a better life quality.

"Emotions are the glue that connects you to other people and gives meaning to life. They are the foundation of your ability to understand yourself and relate to others". (Developing Emotional Awareness, 2011). There is a saying that emotions are like notes for music. If there are no notes, there is no music. The same happens with emotions. If person does not have emotions, it is just a body without ability to respond to the environment. Different emotions lead to various responses, so it is essential to be aware and be in control of your emotions.

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This essay will examine the various arguments that are brought up pro and against the nature and nurture debate.

I am going beyond my facts and I admit it, but so have the advocates of the contrary and they have been doing it for many thousands of years. [Behaviourism (1930), p. 82] Studies made on feral children who were kept in and raised isolated from humans support nurture; we become what we are from the things we learn. Amala and Kamala, the famous wolf like children, were raised by a she-wolf and were found by the reverend J. A.

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An Investigation of the Effect the Presence of Different Genres of Music Have on Reaction Rate to Visual Stimulus

Purpose: to compare the effect of heavy metal and classical music on reaction rate Independent Variable: Presence of music such as heavy metal and classical (songs provided by YouTube) Dependent Variable: Reaction rate (test measuring time it takes to click mouse once colour of object has changed from red to green via an online test) Constant Variables: * Same songs played * Both songs that subject would not know * Same test to measure reaction rate * Area in which experiment is being conducted must be very quiet and with no possible distractions such as people moving or other sounds

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Clive Wearing and HM - Two Evaluations of Brain Function and memory loss.

Each study could then be compiled according to the surgery, if any, that has been done on them, thereby creating a picture of which areas of the brain most cause amnesia or the severity of it in patients The cold virus is quite common in individuals, therefore scientists can monitor people who obtain the cold virus, and compare them to Clive Wearing to see how the cold virus reacts and how the body responds to it, and thus see the herpes simplex encephalitis' role in memory Very in depth, rich data can be achieved through a variety of research methods

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Explain how environmental processes can affect one physiological process.

Identified in 1965, that human brain structure was thought to be determined by genetics and thus fixed and unchangeable. But an experiment carried out by Hubel and Wiesel 1965, demonstrated that the brain could change in structure as a response to an environmental impact. The results of experimental studies were based on laboratory experiments with rats but it is now generally accepted that environmental enrichment can adjust the brain, particularly in the cerebral cortex, known as the area of higher cognitive functioning. It appears that the human brain is constantly changing as a result of experience throughout lifetime, as the brain changes with age to reflect new experiences and actions.

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Abu Ghraib Psychology Essay. What do you think you would do in a situation like Abu Ghraib? Do you think the military personnel who were involved in the Abu Ghraib incident should have been jailed or reduced in rank?

In 2002, the president dismissed the Geneva Conventions which was thought to be the most unpresidented act in the U.S. history. "The only way to conduct a war in a civilized manner is to ensure that everybody understand what the rules are to the maximum extent possible and when you start messing around with those rules when you say they don't apply, now you are in unlimited warfare", Rear Admiral John Huston US Navy 1997-2000. "This war was a war that would foremost depend on intelligence that is on information derived from prisoners at war therefore rules regarding interrogation, what

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Discuss the relationship between etiology and therapeutic approach in relation to one disorder.

In modern cases, eclectic approaches are commonly used to incorporate positive effects of each different therapy. Patients with bulimia, which is an eating disorder, feel inadequacy, vomit, imagine of negative self-image and has swollen salivary glands. Like other psychological disorders, Bulimia also can be explained biologically, cognitively and socioculturally. Like what was mentioned, treatment of the disorders is related to what is thought to be the etiology. Therefore, there are many different ways to treat this eating disorder. When psychologists think that the disorder is caused by biological factors, they use biomedical approach to treat their clients.

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Psychology - analysing myself.

In the terms of whether or not I an independent or interdependent I would say that I am independent. I don't mind being alone or doing things for myself. I personally feel that being self-reliant is a gift and not everyone can be or is that way. I like that fact that I work for my own things and that I don' have to ask anyone for anything most of the time. When it comes to self-serving bias I don't think that I have a defensive attribution. I say this because I don't think that outside sources cause failure.

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Social Psychology - Blue Eyes vs. Brown Eyes Jane Elliot Film Analysis

A study relevant to these occurrences was done by Ross et al (1977), in which college students were randomly assigned the roles of questioner, observer, or contestant, where the questioner formed a total of ten challenging questions used to test the knowledge of the contestant. Since the contestants rarely got more than four of the ten questions right, the questioner was consistently rated as the more intelligent individual, despite their ability to invent the questions. 5. The social identity theory was created by Henry Tajfel in 1971, and it says that individuals strive to improve their social image by trying to enhance their self esteem based on personal or various social identities.

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What is Memory and What Causes Memory Loss?

The hippocampus plays the single largest role in processing information gathered as memory while the amygdale helps imprint memories that include emotions. Although a memory begins with perception, it is encoded and stored using electricity and chemicals. There are billions of neurons in the brain, each one capable of connecting with over 1000 others. Each time the brain receives new information, the brain creates a new pathway of nerve connections called a memory trace. (See figure 1.2) As the connections break down due to lack of use causing a person to 'forget' certain information.

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Multicultural Competency. Prepare a 700- to 1,050-word paper based on your assessment, in which you apply these multicultural guidelines and standards to your personal life and workplace. Answer the following questions: o What biases, percepti

51). This is accomplished by a variety of modes. For example, encouraging the psychologist to view every client the same regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, or gender is one way to acquire cultural competency. Another way to acquire cultural competency is through research. A psychologists who researches and educates himself about various cultures, can more effectively communicate with his clients through discussions and questions. To become an effective psychologist, I have realized the necessity to become culturally competent. Through review of the referenced guidelines, I thought of how I interact with people I work with as well as my family and friends, and the bias or judgmental attitude I

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An experiment to investigate the difference in performance of participants doing a puzzle alone and in the presence of other people.

The aims stated that an improvement in performance could be produced by the mere presence of conspecifics. The results obtained from the experiment show the opposite of what was expected; participants took longer in the together group than they did alone. Introduction There is evidence that individuals do work better and more efficiently in group settings than when they are alone. The mere presence of other people may enhance performance, even when those people are not working together on the task. One of the first experiments on this theory, was conducted by Norman Triplett (1898), when he once discovered that cyclists attain higher speeds when they are being paced or racing in competition with other cyclists than when racing alone.

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Postive & negative effects of Schema. The Schema theory which was derived by Sir Frederic Bartlet (1886-1969) ascertains that the mind is organised into units called schemata. These units represent single concepts such as dog, they are abstrac

An example of this is the study conducted by Bransford and Johnson in 1972. The gave a group of people a text they should read which was as follow; If the balloons popped, the sound wouldn't be able to carry since everything would be too far away from the correct floor. A closed window would also prevent the sound from carrying, since most buildings tend to be well insulated. Since the whole operation depends on a steady flow of electricity, a break in the middle of the wire would also cause problems.

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To what extent does genetic inheritance influence behavior

The study of twins in the psychological world today elucidate the best clues into how genetics influence behavior. Researchers enthusiastically seek out twins that have been separated from birth to study their similarities and differences. Thomas Bouchard from the University of Minnesota has conducted studies on over 8000 pairs of twins some identical and some not. According to Thomas Bouchard's twin studies, which tested the twins' Intelligence Quotient (IQ), intelligence is "69-78% heritable", concluding that since IQ is heritable more than 50%; therefore, genetic inheritance influences human intelligence as well as their behavior to large extent.

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Internal Assessment : Loftus and Palmer Study

The first experiment that Loftus and Palmer conducted consisted of forty-five students from the University of Washington. They showed them seven videos of traffic accident, these videos were short and educational for safety driver education. After watching the video they were asked to write their memory of what they have seen. The students were also asked to answer some specific questions but the critical question was about speed. The result as they said that coud be due to a distortion in the memory of the participant, but they also argue that the results could be due to response-bias factors, on this case the participant is not exactly sure of the speed so they just estimate.

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Internal Assessment : Stroop Effect

In difference to the other stimuli, this one was the hardest one by the results; this stimulus consisted in the names of colors written in different font color and on a white sheet of paper. The experiment was conducted in the American School of Tegucigalpa and each student was taken out of their class for 5 minutes to perform the experiment. The study was being replicated because that is exactly what J R Stroop did when performing the original "Stroop Effect."

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Internal Assessment : Loftus and Palmer Study

Loftus and Palmer also wished to discover whether or not a person's memory can be influenced by this information. The aim of the study was to determine how memory is influenced by circumstances and prompting surrounding memory storage and recall. Past studies had concluded that memories were not accurate representations of actual events but were actually formed using past experiences and other influences . The original study consisted of two separate experiments however this replication consisted of only the first of those two. The study was tested on forty-five students split into five categories, each with nine students. In the study forty-five students from the University of Washington were shown seven film clips of car accidents.

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Neuroplasticity - Biological Level Of Analysis

Though, it was not until the 1970s that a clear demonstration of this type of experiment was presented. The research psychologist Mark Rosenzweig proposed the idea that the brain continues to develop after infancy through human life experiences and that one's behavior is heavily influenced by one's environment. In the early 1970s, Mark Rosenzweig and his colleagues conducted an experiment in order to find to what extent the environment affects the development of neurons in the cerebral cortex. Rosenzweig and his colleagues were interested in how high levels of simulation would affect the chemistry of the brain as well as brain growth.

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observational

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Cognitive and Biological factors influence behavioural change

In a study conducted by John Garcia, cayotes were taught to abstain from eating sheep. This was done by giving the cayotes sheep meat containing lithium chloride, hence making the cayotes feel nausea, vomiting and discomfort. The cayotes were wrapped in sheep skin, whist they were feeling sick, thus they became to dislike the smell of sheep. Consequently, they learnt to develop a phobia of sheep. This study illustrates that phobia can be 'learnt' through the concept of one-trial-learning. Another similar study on the influence of biological preparedness in learning phobias is the study conducted by Minoke.

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Cognitive perspective memory model

Firstly, the central executive plays a role in organising and distributing information gathered from the long-term memory. It has a limited capacity, and it connects the various functions from the other two components of this memory model, hence it controls the phonological loop and the visuo-spatial sketchpad. The phonological loop is another aspect of this model, which consists of two parts. The first is the articulatory control system. It is also commonly known as the "inner voice". The role of the articulatory control system is to repeatedly rehearse information internally, not verbally. Hence materials are sounded mentally, to oneself.

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Explain the formation of stereotypes and their behaviours

This creates a sense of social belonging. This brings a linkage to social categorization (cognitive process), where it's the result of humans stereotyping and favouritism towards in-group group members and group activities. Categorizing an individual from a social perception helps to differentiate between groups easily (rather than thinking of an individual's unique qualities), whether an individual is in their in-group or if others are in out-groups. Being in an in-group gives an individual a sense of social belonging. However this gives them a different perspective of how they belong to society, which is 'outgroup homogeneity effect'.

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Examine the role of two cultural dimensions on behaviour.

Although individualism and collectivism cultural dimensions are not commonly researched, a few studies had been carried out. Such as Markus and Kitayama (1991) research on contrasting two different cultures; the 'westernized' and the 'non-westernized' culture, that is Japan and the United States, to see individuals from two different social groups dimensionsm, Geert Hofstede (1980) study on the IBM organisation's worldwide employees, David Trafimow et al (1991) study on university students from two different cultural backgrounds to fill in sentences, Heine and Darrin Lehman (1995) study, yet again, on university students from different cultural backgrounds of positive and negative events that would happen to them and their views, and lastly Trafimow et al (1997)

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The behavioural approach is the assumption that behaviour is learned. Experience and interactions with the environment make us what we are. This perspective has been called environment determinism because it suggests that we are determined by the environm

This is a mild view of behaviourism- it is the view that the perspectives is not a ''stand alone'' approach but is part of all explanations. * Radical behaviourism; the view that all behaviour is learned. ''The theory of B.F. skinner is based upon the idea that leaning is a function of change in overt behavior. Changes in behavior are a result of an individuals response to events that occur in the environment.'' (tip.psychology.org/skinner.htm.) Neo-behaviourism- this is a newer development and an extension of behaviourism.

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