Chapter 5 in Psychology

Okay, I think from now on each of my blogs are going to have a question (pertaining to psychology) and an answer to that question. This week, the Chapter is devoted to learning.


Question: What is "operant conditioning" and what are the more significant concepts?

Operant conditioning is defined as "the kind of learning that applies to voluntary behavior" (White 180). One of the more important concepts is called reinforcement, or any event that when following a response, increases the probability that the response will occur again. The concept of reinforcement can be basically represented by the question "What's in it for me?" Generally, reinforcement is a consequence that is somehow pleasurable to the person, animal, organism, etc. There are two main types of reinforcers, primary and secondary. A primary reinforcer is something that fulfills any basic need such as hunger, pleasure, thirst, etc. A secondary reinforcer is something that receives its importance from being associated with other primary reinforcers. Here is an example that illustrates both concepts; someone hires you to move furniture and you are allowed to pick from 2 rewards: $25 or an ice cream cone. Anyone that understands the concept of money would choose $25 without having to think about it for long. Money is an example of a secondary reinforcer because the paper itself is next to useless, but that money can be exchanged for more valuable primary reinforcers such as more ice cream or anything else. To someone that doesn't understand money, for example, a three year old, the more probable choice would be the ice cream cone. Since the ice cream cone satisfies a basic need (hunger) it is considered a primary reinforcer.  The reinforcing properties of an ice cream cone do not need to be learned unlike the properties of money (ice cream/food/ basic needs are learned about much earlier). Also, there are two main types of reinforcement, negative and positive. Positive reinforcement is the addition of something pleasurable or wanted, therefore negative reinforcement is the opposite or removal of something pleasurable/wanted.  

Hypnosis

Maybe I'm just going to do all of these blogs about psychology topics.. I mean I am "studying" and doing this blog at the same time so why not. Alright, anyways, this week one of the concepts in Chapter 4 was hypnosis. Hypnosis is defined as "a state of consciousness in which a person is especially susceptible to suggestion" (White 147). There are 4 steps that every hypnotists follows in some way. These steps are to  tell the person being hypnotized: to focus on what's being said, to relax, to "let go"/accept suggestions easily, and finally, to use vivid imagination. The main component is the "accept suggestions" part. People can be hypnotized only when they are active and alert, also if they are willing to be hypnotized. Overall, 80% of people can be hypnotized, but only 40% are good subjects for hypnosis. The most susceptible people are usually those who fantasize/daydream a lot, have vivid imaginations, and people who are able to get "really into" whatever they're doing.
There's a table in our textbook that has some interesting information regarding what hypnosis can do. According to the book, hypnosis can: help people relax in situations that would normally cause stress, remove pain, alter sensory perceptions, and actually create amnesia during the session (for a brief time). There are also some myths that aren’t true, hypnosis can’t give extra strength, enhance memory, or regress people to some time in the past.
There are 2 main theories on why hypnosis works, one deals with dissociation and the other deals with a sort of social “role-playing.” The dissociation theory is somewhat self explanatory; it suggests that people are able to dissociate with a certain part of their brain/thoughts and sometimes their body. The social “role-playing” or cognitive theory suggests that people who are hypnotized aren’t really in a different state of mind, they are “merely playing a role” and that role is… a person being hypnotized.

I'm not sure if I believe it, but anyways, here's a random guy using hypnosis to get out of a speeding ticket: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gcQDuv_Kb0

Chapter 2 in Psychology

Alright, now it's the second blog and of course I still can't decide what I'm going to blog about, so I'll just do what I did last week and be boring/talk about what I'm learning this week in Psychology. This week the chapter we're reading is titled "The Biological Perspective" which basically means you're going to be forcing yourself to read all of this unless you genuinely like Biology. Anyways, the chapter starts off by talking about the Nervous System and its components. The Nervous System can be summarized as a large network of specialized cells that carry information to everywhere in the body. This system is made up of two smaller systems called the Central and Peripheral Nervous Systems. The Central Nervous System's main components are the brain and the spinal cord. The brain deals with information and sending orders to the body and the spinal cord is a pathway for the brain. The Peripheral System, overall, is also a pathway but it is a pathway to and from the Central Nervous System. Overall, The Peripheral System does everything that the brain and spinal cord don't do. Such as: regulating the body, helping with skeletal muscle movement, maintaining body functions, saving energy, dealing with stress, and others. Here is a simple diagram that more simply describes both systems.  
The second concept in this chapter is the structure of a neuron. A neuron is the specialized cell in the nervous system that deals with messaging. Since neurons are messengers, their structure, like any specialized cell, is unique and designed for what neurons do. The part of a neuron that receives messages is called a dendrite. Numerous dendrites are attached to the soma (or cell body) which contains the nucleus and can be considered the center of a neuron because the soma is what keeps the cell alive and functioning. The axon is another fiber attached to the soma and instead of receiving messages like dendrites, axons send messages away. The axon is well covered by fatty substances called myelin. The purpose of myelin is to increase the speed of electrical impulses (messages) by having them jump from node to node (gaps in the myelin). The myelin also protects the axon as well as its electrical impulses (messages) the same way a plastic coating stops wires (such as a copper computer or telephone wire) from interfering from each other; it is an insulator. Below is a diagram that shows the structure of a neuron. 

Chapter 1 in Psychology

Well I really can't decide on what to blog about for this first one, so I'll be unoriginal and talk about someone I recently read about for Psychology. He was known as the "Father of Modern Psychology" and was arguably the most famous psychologist throughout; his name was Wilhelm Wundt. The overall idea of psychology started in Leipzig, Germany in 1879 when Wundt, in his laboratory, attempted to apply the scientific method and other scientific principles to the human mind. In his lab, students from various parts of the world came to study the structure of the mind.  Before psychology, Wundt focused on physiology and was a physiologist, he studied various topics that related to the brain such as reaction times, relfelxes, etc. He wanted to add reasoning to the different structures so he came up with an overall idea that is still talked about today. This idea, which focuses on mind structure and other (more basic) elements is known as structuralism. Structuralism, therefore was said to be created by Wundt. After Wundt, William James expanded his theory of structuralism and other psychologists came up with different theories that argued with what Wundt and James thought. Another important contribution Wundt had for psychology is called objective introspection. This is where someone is trying to understand the reasoning behind their own thoughts or basically asking “Why?” to anything that crosses the mind. An example of this would be placing a pencil or any object in someone’s hand and having them tell you everything and anything that crossed their mind. This experiment was considered the first attempt to “bring objectivity and measurement to the concept of psychology” (White 7).  Although Wundt didn’t provide many of the newer ideas in psychology, he was the first to attempt to think of psychology as a science. Below are some pictures of Wundt himself.