Defence Mechanism

Have you ever rationalized?

In trying to decide whether to go to a friend’s party or stay home and study for an important exam, a student would experience increasing levels of anxiety. Freud reasoned that anxiety is a sure sign of the id–superego inner conflict and that in order to reduce levels of anxiety, the ego may use defense mechanisms (Cramer, 2003, 2006).

Defense mechanisms are Freudian processes that operate at unconscious levels and that use self-deception or untrue explanations to protect the ego from being overwhelmed by anxiety

According to Freud, a student’s ego has two ways to reduce anxiety over deciding whether to party or study. The student’s ego can take realistic steps to reduce anxiety, such as motivating or convincing the student to stay home and study. Or the student’s ego can use a number of defense mechanisms, which reduce anxiety by deceiving the student to think it’s fine to party and then study tomorrow. Here is a brief summary of some of Freud’s more popular defense mechanisms.

Rationalization involves covering up the true reasons for actions, thoughts, or feelings by making up excuses and incorrect explanations.

A student may rationalize that by going to a party tonight he or she will feel more motivated to study for the exam tomorrow, even if he or she will be very tired and in no mood or condition to study tomorrow.

Denial is refusing to recognize some anxiety-provoking event or piece of information that is clear to others.

Heavy smokers would be using denial if they disregarded the scientific evidence that smoking increases the risk of lung cancer and cardiovascular disease and in addition would be using rationalization if they say they can quit any time they want.

Repression involves blocking and pushing unacceptable or threatening feelings, wishes, or experiences into the unconscious.

Having feelings of jealousy about your best friend’s academic success might be threatening to your self-concept, so you unknowingly block these unwanted feelings by also unknowingly pushing them into your unconscious.

Projection falsely and unconsciously attributes your own unacceptable feelings, traits, or thoughts to individuals or objects.

A student who refuses to accept responsibility for cheating during exams may look at other students and decide that they are cheating.

Reaction formation involves substituting behaviors, thoughts, or feelings that are the direct opposite of unacceptable ones.

A person who feels guilty about engaging in sexual activity may use reaction formation by joining a religious group that bans sex.

Displacement involves transferring feelings about, or response to, an object that causes anxiety to another person or object that is less threatening.

If you were anxious about getting angry at your best friend, you might unknowingly displace your anger by picking an argument with a safer individual, such as a salesclerk, waiter, or stranger.

Sublimation, which is a type of displacement, involves redirecting a threatening or forbidden desire, usually sexual, into a socially acceptable one.

For instance, a person might sublimate strong sexual desires by channeling that energy into physical activities.

Conclusions.

Freud believed defense mechanisms are totally unconscious, which means that, if a best friend or spouse points out that you

are being defensive, you will absolutely deny it. We all use defense mechanisms at some time, and they can be helpful or

harmful. For example, the occasional use of defense mechanisms is normal and helps reduce conflict and anxiety so we

can continue to function as we work on the real cause of our anxiety. However, the overuse of defense mechanisms may

prevent us from recognizing or working on the real causes of our anxiety.

There is growing scientific evidence that we do indeed use unconscious defense mechanisms much as Freud theorized, which is to reduce anxiety and conflict. In fact, many of us have a dominant or most-often-used defense mechanism, which may be effective in reducing short-term but not necessarily long-term anxiety (M. C. Anderson,2009d; Cramer, 2003, 2006).

Takemn from Plotnik

My Current Reading for Semester 3 - Social Psychology & Human Nature

My Current Reading for Semester 3 - Personality

Major Specializations in Psychology

Specialization

General Interest

Example of Interest or Research Topic

Biopsychologist

Relationship between brain and behavior

What body signals indicate hunger and satiety?

Clinical psychologist

Emotional difficulties

How can people be helped to overcome severe anxiety?

Cognitive psychologist

Memory, thinking

Do people have several kinds of memory?

Community psychologist

Organizations and social structures

Would improved job opportunities decrease psychological distress?

Counseling psychologist

Helping people make important decisions

Should this person consider changing careers?

Developmental psychologist

Changes in behavior over age

At what age can a child first distinguish between appearance and reality?

Educational psychologist

Improvement of learning in school

What is the best way to test a student’s knowledge?

Environmental psychologist

How noise, heat, crowding, etc. affect behavior

What building design can maximize the productivity of the people who use it?

Evolutionary psychologist

Evolutionary history of behavior

How did people evolve their facial expressions of emotion?

Human factors specialist

Communication between person and machine

How can an airplane cockpit be redesigned to increase safety?

Industrial/organizational psychologist

People at work

Should jobs be made simple and foolproof or interesting and challenging?

Learning and motivation specialist

Learning in humans and other species

What are the effects of reinforcement and punishment?

Personality psychologist

Personality differences

Why are certain people shy and others gregarious?

Psychometrician

Measuring intelligence, personality, interests

How fair are current IQ tests? Can we devise better tests?

School psychologist

Problems that affect school children

How should the school handle a child who regularly disrupts the classroom?

Social psychologist

Group behavior, social influences

What methods of persuasion are most effective for changing attitudes?

Taken from James W Kalat Introduction to Psychology

HELP Psychology Open Day!

Interpersonal Communication Joseph Devito

This is an excellent book for learning interpersonal communication skills.

Child Development Laura E.Berk

This is the book I use for Semester 2 Year 1 Psychology.
It's a very comprehensive book on Child Development

VYGOTSKY’S SOCIOCULTURAL THEORY

Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934) was a Soviet psychologist whose research work focus on the role of environment in children’s cognitive development, where it moves largely ‘from the outside in’ through understanding contextual knowledge. Learning occurs through interactions with the environment where the children have the ability to internalize new skills and information within zone of proximal development.


According to Vygotsky, infants direct contact with the environment during their first two years lead to the development of their innate perceptual, attention, and memory capacities (Vygotsky, 1978). Collaborative dialogues with more experienced members of their society enable children to learn most of the culture’s problem solving skills. Learning, he asserted, should be more like an apprenticeship instead of personal discovery.



Learning is also a culture specific process. Children learn mathematics in school has different learning experience than those who learn counting through selling things in their parents’ grocery store in Brazil.


Private Speech

Children construct cognitive structures by listening to the social speech they hear daily from others. They adopted parts of it and produce private speech – speech they say aloud to themselves.


They use self-talk strategies whenever they face cognitive challenges. For instance, when solving a jigsaw puzzle, we may get to hear, “Hmm, where’s the snowy mountain cap part? I need it now. Wait, it’s here, alright. What about the sky? It’s all blue.”


Vygotsky stressed that children engage in random thoughts and verbalise them freely. They use private speech to regulate their actions and plan their strategies. It will gradually internalize as silent speech when they become adults, where the inner voice speaks inside their head as they encounter problems (Berk and Spuhl, 1995).


Zone of Proximal Development

Zone of proximal development (ZPD) is defined as the range of distance between children’s actual developmental level as they perform tasks alone and their potential level of development as they are assisted by a more knowledgeable and competent peers and adults.



Vygotsky asserted that since learning occurs in the ZPD, their level of comprehension will increase tremendously. Analyzing the ZPD realistically enables appropriate assessment of the difficulty level of learning. In the long run, necessary accommodation can be made and thus ensuring effective individual learning.


Scaffolding

Generally, efficient learning progress can be achieved through scaffolding method. Scaffolding takes place when more accomplished adults and peers adjust the cognitive support offered to children throughout the learning process until they can handle the challenges on their own.


When children have no clue on how to proceed with a task, the adult will explain directly at the children’s listening pace and deconstruct the task into smaller manageable units. When the children begin to show progress, the adult will reduce the amount of direct assistance. The verbal exchange occurs earlier may be internalized by a child and lead to their private talk, that continues to build their confidence and competence at accomplishing the tasks fully on their own (Hedegaard, 1995).

Case Studies - Intercultural Dilemma of a Muslim student in Australia

To Mr. CP Rajah, Vice President (Academic Affairs)

From Deryk Ng

Academic Counsellor

Faculty of Pre University Program

16th September 2011

I am writing this report on behalf of a student in our college, Mohammad Azman Khaldun. He is currently pursuing a pre-university program, with the intention of pursuing a university degree next year.



Recently, he applied for a scholarship from various universities in Australia. One of the universities approved his application. The representative of the university will be coming to our college soon to present information to all the scholarship recipients in preparation to travel to Australia for further studies.



I am writing this report in my capacity as the academic counsellor to present an introduction to student’s religious background, statement of problem and possible solutions in the following sections. The report concludes with best solution, recommendation, and conclusion.



Introduction to Student’s Religious Background

A Muslim is defined as an individual who espouses the Islamic faith.

One of the most important practices is that a Muslim prays 5 times a day at specified times throughout the day, namely 6:00 am – “Subuh”, 1:30 pm – “Zohor”, 4:15 pm – “Asar”, 7:30 pm – “Maghrib”, 8:15 pm – “Ishak”


If one misses the first one, muslimin (male devotee) and muslimah (female devotee) can conduct prayer before the second one. For example, if Azman missed the 6:00 session, he can pray at any time before 1:30pm. Most of the time, the problem is to perform the Zohor (afternoon) prayer and Asar (evening) prayer. In this situation, it is permissible to adopt rukhsah (concession) like adjusting the prayer times. Both solat (prayer), Zohor and Asar, can be combined together in one time either in the afternoon or in the evening (whichever is preferable as long as it is performed as Solat is one of the 5 Pillars of Islam.). However, a Muslim should adhere to the time as strictly as possible to fulfill their religious duties.



They can perform worship preferably in a mosque on Friday. However, in the absence of a mosque, they may carry out their duty in the direction of Ka’abah, also known as kiblat in their own personal room. In an actual mosque, there will be a spiritual leader known as imam who will lead the worship to Allah. If there is no mosque in the vicinity of the university, they may find a place approved by the university administration to have their worship session.


A Muslim dietary practice is very different from other cultures or religions. Halal food, or food confirmed to be not having unclean ingredients (such as pork or dog meat) are compulsory for Muslims. They must not consume non-halal food at all times in their life, unless they are under dire circumstances such as starvation or unavailability of halal food. Nevertheless, the exceptions must only be carried out under emergency situations.


Mohammad Azman Khaldun was born in Iran. He is an Iranian by nationality and Muslim by faith. His religion dictates that he must go for prayer session 5 times a day, towards a certain direction. In a certain month called month of Ramadan, he needs to go for fasting from morning 7am till 7pm, breaking fast after 7pm. During these hours he needs to abstain from food (Yaran, 2007).



Statement of Problem

Azman is currently pursuing his studies at pre-university level. He has excelled in his studies and extra-curricular activities. He applied for scholarships from various Australian universities recently.



After waiting for a month, he was awarded a scholarship to pursue tertiary education in Australia.



However, he came to realise that his religious obligations and commitments might not be given considerations fully, especially the prayer times. Clashes of academic timetable with the prayer time will occur. He wishes to strive for academic excellence as well as continuing his religious practices.



He has visited me for assistance. There are three possible solutions for us to consider. Let’s look at the following:


Solution 1

Mohammad Azman Khaldun must make a decision to concentrate on either studies or religion. He should realise that whatever decision made means there will be compromise between the two.


Advantage and Disadvantage

The advantage of this solution is that he is able to make a firm decision on either focusing on academic excellence or performing religious practice.


Disadvantageously, setting priority on one aspect will end up in neglecting the other.


Assuming that he sets priority in fulfilling academic goals, he will have to attend all lectures and put aside all religious obligations. If his family members come to know this, he may be perceived as not devoted to his religion. There will be disapproval from the relatives as well as his religious community in Iran.


On the other hand, he would miss some lectures if he puts religious practices as first priority. Consequently, he will not perform well in his academic work.


Jeopardising a bright future for the sake of religion may not be wise as it is a private practice which can be carried out in his personal time. He should be able to focus on it once again any time after he completes his university degree.



Solution 2

He should stay in Iran and further his studies. This enables him to accommodate both studies and religion.


Advantage and Disadvantage


It is advantageous for Azman to stay in Iran as he gets to pursue tertiary education and adhere to his religious commitments simultaneously. Handling both effectively will give him satisfaction and spiritual wholeness.


The downside of this choice is that Azman will not have the opportunity to experience cutting edge education in Australia. The university that offers the scholarship is assumed to have a higher quality education than Iran. Scholarships are not always available and only given to well-deserved individuals who excel academically.


Besides that, he will not have the opportunity to interact with people of various ethnicities, cultures, faiths and religions. He will not gain exposure from understanding perspectives that are different from his own if he declines the offer to study abroad.



Solution 3


Azman should seek help from the university. They will assess the circumstances and make special arrangements for him. Alternatively, he may choose academic schedules that will not clash with the time of religious practice.


Advantage and Disadvantage

Some believe that it is equally imperative to preserve spiritual roots and pursue academic excellence. They assert that the ultimate meaning of life should consist of excellence in both endeavours.


This advantageous approach allows him to acquire good time management to maintain his religious practices while benefitting from world-class education.


The university will be seen as being culturally sensitive to students coming from various backgrounds. Consequently, it will receive excellent reputation as a multi-cultural institution.


On the contrary, it may cause inconvenience and additional costs to the university administration and students as adjustments and accommodations have to be made solely for the minority community.

Besides that, such considerations may cause resentment to others. They may begin to make all kinds of request. If the university does not comply, there may be irreconcilable conflicts. Based on this case alone, they may be accused of practising bias.

Best Solution

Based on the three proposals, the third option is the best choice to solve Azman’s dilemma.

In the era of globalization characterized by accessibility of international travel and rapid communications through the Internet, individuals from various cultural and religious backgrounds begin to interact dynamically. Conflicts between different groups may arise due to miscommunication and misunderstanding.

The university bears the social obligations to accommodate to the needs of the international students. The skills of being culturally sensitive must be adopted by both the university administration and its students. An academic institution that is free from bias and discrimination is very conducive for studies and involvement in research work, thus attracting excellent students from all over the world and propel the university to international fame.

Azman will be able to excel academically and fulfill his obligation as a Muslim. He will not have to experience emotional tension due to neglect of any of the two aspects.


Recommendations

I would like to recommend that we convey this information to the Australian university representatives. We can prepare a report that describes Azman’s religious background as well as his academic achievements. Then we will proceed with highlighting Azman’s areas of concern which may consist of the prayer time and information on the availability of halal meals, Muslim’s Students Club, and worship facilities.

We would also do research on universities in United States, United Kingdom and Australia which have successfully implemented cultural-friendly strategies. The summary of the findings will be presented to the Australian representatives.

We are confident that there will be enrolment of many Muslim students in that university. Therefore, such requests will not cause any complications as they will not be perceived as having to make adjustments merely for one student. Instead, it’s a good opportunity for them to cultivate the administrative style of being culturally sensitive to the needs of, not just the Muslim community, but other cultural, religious or racial groups as well.

When all these policies are carried out efficiently, cultural diversity will be flourishing in the academic institution. In time to come, its reputation will increase tremendously in the eyes of the public.


Conclusion

In this era, universities all over the world should be more open-minded, considerate and flexible in formulating important policies that caters to the needs of students from different ethnic and religious backgrounds. We must not implement policies that may unintentionally violate their religious rights. As an international university, it is wise to contemplate on the cultural and religious backgrounds of the recipients before awarding the scholarships accordingly.

It is our greatest hope that we will be able to establish good communication with the Australian representatives in order to reach a common cultural understanding.

Thank you.


Deryk Ng


ACADEMIC COUNSELLOR


REFERENCE

Yaran, C. S. (2007). Understanding Islam. United Kingdom: Dunedin Academic Press.

Research Methodology - Validity & Reliability

Reliabilty is the measure's consistency in leading to results on different but comparable occassions.

Observation on a child's behavior was conducted by two different clinicians. Their analysis were compared and finalised. This is called inter rater reliability.

A similar test, arranged in different format, is given to the same person one week apart and the results are compared. This is another concept of reliability called test-retest reliability.

Validity refers to the extent of which a test measures what it is supposed to measure. A car speedometer is supposed to measure the speed of the vehicle, not the air pressure of the tyre. 
 
There are two types of validity - internal validity and external validity.

Internal validity refers to what extent the the test measures what it supposed to measure within the parameters of various variables.

For instance, in Zimbardo deindividuation concept,

Case A : a group of anonymous people, encountering an obnoxious man,

Case B: a group on non anonymous people, encountering pleasant woman,

In Case A, did they act aggresively due to being anonymous or due to the obnoxious man, or both?

In Case B, They didn't act aggresively, was it because they are non anonymous, or because there was a pleasant lady or both?

So internal validity is very concerned with what you are supposed to be measuring.

Just like a speedometer of a car is not supposed to measure air pressure even though it produces reliable and consistent figures.

External validity, on the other hand, concerns with how much extent the test in the laboratory setting can be generalised into a real life circumstances.

Delivering electric shocks in the laboratory setting is quite different from obeying the authority to carry out evil acts in the dark night.

Adult Attachment Interview

Investigations are carried out to observe the correlation between the parent’s attachment and their children’s attachment to them.


Three major factors affecting the caregiver’s characteristics of responsiveness are identified, namely:


 The parent’s early childhood experience of attachment and their internal working model.


 The risk factors experienced by the parents such as mental illness, depression, or substance abuse.


 The availability of help from other caregivers in raising children


An assessment called Adult Attachment Interview is carried out to elicit information about parents’ working models of attachment. They are required to recall and describe their past and current relationship with their parents. Eventually, the reports are analysed together with the attachment classification of their children. There is a strong positive correlation of their attachment and the attachment of their children (Bretherton & Munholland, 2008, p. 118; see also, Riggs & Jacobvitz, 2002).


Characteristic of Secure Adults

Based on the Adult Attachment Interview, the parents who were identified as having secure working models had five primary characteristics, they:

 place great value on attachment relationship;


 have faith that their attachment relationship serve as a major influence on their personality;


 describe their relationships in objective and balanced manner;


 are at ease in recalling and discussing attachment due to good reflection on their experience;


 have a realistic perspective of their parents and own attachment experiences instead of idealistic ones (Main et al., 1985).


Many secure adults reported good early experience and relationship with their own parents, while some of them described their traumatic history. What differentiates between secure and insecure adults was not the actual incident itself but on how they understood and integrated those positive and negative experience easily and openly.


Characteristic of Insecure Adults

Insecurely attached adults are generally feeling pessimistic about attachment relationship, not being objective in describing experiences, and being in denial on how attachment experiences could influence their personality. Insecure parents can be classified into three main patterns, listed in the following.


Dismissive Adults

This type of parents who dismissed the importance of attachment was discovered to have avoidant infants. Children turn away from parents and tend to rely on themselves rather than seeking attachment.


Preoccupied Adults

Preoccupied adults blame themselves for the uncaring and inconsistent responses from their parents, struggle to please their parents and develop the self-image of unlovable or undeserving (Bowlby, 1980; Bretherton & Munholland, 2008). Their infants are usually classified as ambivalent,

Unresolved Adults

Some parents experienced traumatic incidences in their childhood such as physical and sexual abuse. There are also other parents who, in a disordered manner, mourned the death of their parents when they were young.  

They have the irrational tendency to blame themselves for being the cause of abuse as well as the parents’ death (Main and Hess, 1990).

If they are asked to describe their negative experiences, they will unknowingly demonstrate incoherent flow of thought and abruptly changed topics (Hess & Main, 2006). Their children will be most likely disoriented. 

Mary Ainsworth’s Strange Situation Procedure

Ainsworth and her team developed a laboratory-based methodology for verifying Bowlby’s theory, leading to Strange Situation Procedure (SSP).


How Does it Occur?

Newborns form attachment after birth and continue through early childhood.

All the following gestures assist the formation of good parent-child attachment (Thompson, 1998).


 Crying serves as a powerful social signal that induces sympathy.



 Infants of 4- to 6-week-old demonstrate social smiling that will elicit joy and pleasure.



 At 6 months old, they give happy greetings such as smiling and extending out their arms when their parents return.



Are There Different Kinds of Attachments?

Ainsworth and her team conducted this 20-minute long SSP session to observe how children react to separation from their caregivers. Infants will be crying in distress if they discover that their parents leave them.



A mother and her baby entered a laboratory room that was redesigned to resemble a comfortable living room. The mother sat down and the child began to explore the surrounding. Then, a stranger, being unfamiliar but appeared friendly, entered the room. Next, she got up and left the place, leaving the baby alone with the unfamiliar adult.



Moments later, she came back to the room and the stranger left the place. She was alone with the baby for several minutes. The whole session was secretly videotaped, so that the child reactions and behaviors could be analyzed later.



SSP is a useful tool for assessing attachment security. Infants’ reaction on separation and reunion of their parents at home can be linked to the quality of parental responsiveness as well as how the infants regard their parents as the secure base in which they can explore the surrounding confidently (Pederson and Moran, 1996;Pederson et al., 1998).


There are four categories of attachment, namely secure, avoidant, ambivalent, and disoriented.


Approximately 60 % of North American infants in middle-SES families possess secure attachment.


Baby explored the room freely when mother is around. Next, stranger came and conversed with mother. She left inconspicuously and the stranger attempted to respond to the baby by offering comfort if feeling upset. The baby cries because they prefer mother over stranger. When mother returned, the baby actively established contact and the crying ceased immediately.


Mothers of secure infants provide more affection and stimulation to their babies. A caregiver’s responsiveness to infants can contribute to a more harmonious relationship later in life between the child and parents.


There are approximately 10% of North American infants in middle-SES families with this ambivalent attachment.


Baby explores very little and spends more time clinging to mother. Baby is extremely distressed when mother left. The child displays inconsistent behavior such as clinging angrily while being carried.


What Are the Effects of Attachment?

The children need the parental support to gain emotional stability in unfamiliar surroundings. They react to unresponsive mothers by expressing anger and hostility due to the internalization of the episodes of unresponsive treatment they experience in the past.


Bowlby suggested that early experiences of infant-parent interaction would eventually form working models for adult relationship. It is internalized in the form of unconscious expectations about relationship that exert powerful influence on adult interpersonal communication.


If children feel neglected, or find it difficult to trust their mothers to take care of them, they may begin to form the impression that others will neglect them too. On the contrary, if they are confident about their parents’ love for them, then they will anticipate others to find them lovable as well (Bowlby, 1988).



High dependency, poor coping skills and social relationship are closely associated with insecure attachment (Burge et.al, 1997; M.S. Howard & Medway, 2004). Unless intervention is implemented, she will likely to have difficulty forming healthy bonds with parents or other adults in the future.


Sensitive caregiving, regardless of the difference of parents or caregivers, cross cultural variance, or socioeconomic status, is considered the key element in enhancing attachment (De Wolff & van IJzendoorn, 1997; Posada et al., 2002, 2004; Stams, Juffer, & van IJzendoorn, 2002; van IJzendoorn et al., 2004)

Bowlby’s Attachment Theory

Attachment is defined as the basic and intimate emotional bond that develops between the infant and caregivers. Unconvinced with the psychoanalytic view that the child’s love of mother derived from oral gratification, psychologist John Bowlby began to formulate an attachment theory based on evolutionary concepts proposed by Lorenz and Tinbergen.

He asserted that attachment behavior that evolved through a process of natural selection has adaptive value that enables the infant a greater opportunity of survival. His work was a major departure from the Freudian views, which put less emphasis on actual interaction and relationship (Bowlby, 1969).

Face Enhancement & Detraction Strategies among the Chinese

Chinese regard the concept of face with great significance. The closest meaning of “face” are “good reputation”, “dignity”, “prestige”, and “high standing”.

The following shows various types of “face”.

 丢面子 (diumianzi, losing face).

It refers to one’s embarrassment when shameful deeds have been exposed.

 给面子 (geimianzi, giving face)

It refers to using face enhancing strategies to show respect. A subordinate should not point out the mistake of a superior. This applies to other interpersonal relationships such as children with parents, students with teachers, and athletes with coaches as well.



 留面子 (liumianzi, granting face)

It refers to giving someone the opportunity to recover lost honor and reputation.



 讲面子 (jiangmianzi, emphasis on face)

It refers to the habit of preserving and upholding one’s honor in any social circumstances.



 争面子 (zhengmianzi, competing for face)

It refers to “keeping up with the Joneses”. When the neighbor bought a new car, Thomas buys a more expensive car to preserve his “face” in the public.

Cultural Communication

Cultural communication norms are the proper, commendable and respectful communication patterns acquired through cultural socialization process between individuals of different cultures and ethnicities.


They play significant roles in molding the cultural identity of an ethnic group. Communities of various ethnicities formulate and establish guidelines and regulations for social activities such as meeting and greeting, accepting and declining invitation, presenting and accepting gifts, expressing and withholding emotions, etc. Norms construct the boundaries for acceptable behaviors and prevent the violations of personal rights. Simultaneously, the uniqueness of a culture can be compared to others based on its specific set of communication norms and ultimately preserved for generations to come.


Despite the exponential growth of human population, culture is preserved, maintained and passed down from one generation to another. In view of this, there is an increasing need for individuals to develop cultural intelligence to deal with the multi-cultural aspects of human interactions.



The effort to develop such awareness requires one to achieve proficiency in both verbal and non-verbal communication norms of the target culture. It will be beneficial to both our personal and professional lives as we begin our journey of exploring a culture different from our own.


It will take much patience and effort to cultivate mutual learning of each other cultures. Cultural differences should not become an excuse for us to dismiss other cultures and solely honour our own culture.


The learning journey begins with

 identifying the communication norms of others compared to our own,

 learning to understand practices that we are not familiar with or accustomed to,

 having the desire to tolerate and adapt to the norms of others as much as possible.


Intercultural miscommunication and misunderstanding can be minimised or eliminated when a certain level of mutual understanding is attained. Cultural knowledge about acceptable and unacceptable norms will assists us in building effective intercultural relationships with one another.


We will begin to see the transformation of human relationships in terms of the reduction or elimination of conflicts. Ultimately, we can achieve a higher level of interracial unity and harmony as we develop greater cultural awareness between different cultures in the world.

Harlow's Contact Comfort

            Harry Harlow conducted an experiment involving a rhesus monkey and two dolls posing as mother monkey (Harlow & Harlow, 1962). The baby monkey was deprived of any physical contact but was fed with milk. Days later, he was put in a cage where the terry-cloth (TC) and wire-mesh (WM) “surrogate mothers” are placed. WM doll was fitted with a milk bottle. Meanwhile, TC doll was covered with comfortable cushion but did not have a milk bottle.  

            The baby monkey was observed to cling on to the TC doll all the time until hunger pang set in. It crossed over to the WM doll to drink the milk but was feeling uncomfortable with the wire structure. Immediately after feeding himself, he returned to the cushioned doll. The baby monkey found comfort in clinging to a cushioned TC doll which he thought was his own mother.

            The case of contact-deprived monkey coupling with observational studies on orphaned infants from World War II (Spitz, 1945) served as confirmation that humans and infrahumans alike possess the essential needs for comfort of physical contact as well as sustained closeness with a caregiver.    

Lorenz’s Imprinting Theory

The concept of natural selection was first formulated by Charles Darwin. Ethology is primarily concerned with the adaptive, or survival, value of behavior and its evolutionary history (Hinde, 1992).

            Two European zoologists, Konrad Lorenz (1952) and Niko Tinbergen (1973) have made observations on animal species in their natural habitat. They discovered a type of learning that is different from Skinner (operant conditioning), Thorndike (trial-and-error learning), and Pavlov (classical conditioning).

           

Young goslings followed Lorenz everywhere as he was the first moving object they saw when they were hatched. This concept, known as imprinting, refers to inborn responses or tendencies displayed by newborn when they are exposed to certain stimuli in their environment. This unlearned behavior ensures that they will stay with or follow their parents instead of wandering off into the predator’s territories.  Imprinting occurs best during the first few hours after hatching, namely the critical, or sensitive, period. They are prewired to be socially attached to their parents for support as newborns have yet to acquire any survival skills. 

The Difference between Male and Female Brain Structures

A glimpse into how women’s brain process emotional situations assist us in understanding why females develop traits of being sensitive, concerned, and nurturing to others.

In one study , fMRI brain scans were taken when men and women were shown series of pictures such as book shelf and dead corpse that would evoke both neutral and emotionally intense responses. Weeks later, they were instructed to select pictures that they had earlier rated as emotionally intense. Women accurately remembered 10 to 15% more than men.

During the fMRI scans, amygdala and certain additional areas in women’s brain were discovered to be have more intense activation compared to men’s brain. The researchers concluded that women’s brains are more effectively wired for processing, coding and remembering emotional experiences compared to their male counterparts.




Researchers have discovered higher rates of clinical depression among women compared to men (Canli et al., 2002) due to their greater focus on emotional events. Besides that, the findings were consistent with evolutionary theory of behavior which states that in the ancient times women developed specific emotional traits which were beneficial in raising children and maintaining a stable family structure (Caporeal, 2001).

Men and women differ in brain functioning. Men process language through the left hemisphere of the brain while women use both sides (Clements et al. 2006). Apparently women are better at processing words and performing language tasks (D.F. Halpern, 2000).

At the moment, I would say that the neuropsychological research explains why women are more emotional than men. I am not a sexist, but knowing this helps me to choose to keep silent when dealing with female bosses.

Attribution of Control

Self serving bias

If you won a competition, you believed that your own ability led to the success. However, if you lose, you would blame it on external circumstances such as microphone problem, judges were biased.


Over attribution

You focus on one or two characteristics of a person and attribute everything he does to these attributes. For instance, you form a perception that Jin Siong is always late because he is fat.


Fundamental attibution error
 
Overvalue internal factors and undervalue the contribution of external factors. You assume that Tan did not perform well in her work because she is lazy, not because (truthfully) she was not given enough resources and time to complete the work

The Moral Dilemma (Gun Metal Grey HK TVB Series)

Kohlberg's theory of moral reasoning gave us a glimpse into how the concept of morality is formed. It consists of three stages, namely :

• pre-conventional level 
• conventional level
• post-conventional level

In the theory, we were presented with moral dilemma. The story goes like this:

Your wife is dying of cancer soon. You found out that there was a chemist who has developed a drug that could potentially save your wife's life. But the chemist wants to charge you USD2000 even though the cost of developing the drug was only about USD300. You frantically asked for your friends' help and managed to collect USD1000. The chemist still refused to sell it to you despite your promise of paying the rest later.

In desperation, you decided to steal the drug even though you know you would end up in jail.

I leave it to you to decide what course of action you would be taking. I would like to g straight to the story involving 2 police investigators named Carlson and Stone, a woman called Jodie, a car wreckage operator called Jeson, and a guy called Robert. The story is taken from episode 19 of a HK TVB series titled Gun Metal Grey.

Jeson was a racing car driver. One day while he was not racing, he drove his girlfriend out to the city mall. Along the way, there was a reckless driver who crashed into his car and killed his girlfriend instantly. Despite this, the reckless driver was acquitted of the crime of reckless driving as there was not enough evidence. Jeson was very devastated and angry. He wanted to commit suicide but there was a social worker, Jodie who advised him not to take his life away. She promised him that she would plan something for him.

Jodie had the similar experience years back when a reckless driver named Robert drove cross the traffic red light and killed his 6 years old son.

Jodie and Jeson decided to start a car-burning ritual in the middle of the night and gather all the family members of car accident victims. They chanted, curse the driver and burn the car belonged to reckless drivers (Jeson worked as car wreckage cutter 劏车佬)

Carlson and Stone are the police investigators who wanted to find out the truth about all the hit and run car accidents that led to the deaths of many reckless driver.

To cut the long story short, they managed to trace the potential suspect of the brutal killer who murdered those people who have killed many through their reckless driving.

They asked Robert to meet up with Jodie to clear the air and seek forgiveness. Jodie agreed to meet Robert. He came to the place where years ago he accidentally killed the 6 years old boy. He carried flowers, and kneel at that spot. Jodie sensed that was the best opportunity to revenge. She drove at high speed and hit Robert on the spot. He died of serious injury.

She felt a sense of satisfaction of revenge. Her mum saw her at the graveyard of her son, and told her how she missed her. They went to her mum's place. A priest came over to pass some money to her mum. Jodie wanted to know who the donor was. Her mum said, it was Robert who kept asking the priest to pass money and paid for her dad's hospital bill, and even funeral. Jodie was devastated. She now realised that she had done something really terrible.

On the other hand, Carlson and Stone managed to trace Jodie's home and found a notebook chronicling the murder of three reckless drivers. Stone was imprisoned to life sentence for a murder he didn't commit years back.

Despite able to turn off the false accusation 15 years later through Court of Appeal, Stone became a firm believer of social justice rather than the judicial system that sometimes do not provide real justice to victims. He deliberately threw the notebook into a container for burning incense to detroy evidence, in order to help Jodie to be freed from criminal prosecution. Carlson was really angry with Stone as he believes that judicial system must be the ultimate yardstick of prosecuting criminals, whether they are killing the reckless drivers or not.

Carlson went up to Jodie's mum's place. They were having dinner. Jodie confessed the crime and agreed to be arrested. However, she requested to change clothes. After a while, she screamed. Carlson rushed in, she stabbed herself with a huge knife.

Stone told Carlson off on his insistence of arresting her.

I think this is a moral dilemma for Carlson. He has different perspectives from Stone.

What do you think about this story?

My Second Semester Year 2011

In the second semester of 2011, I have taken the following subjects:

1. Cross Cultural Intelligence [5]

2. Interpersonal Skills [5]

3. Child Development [5]

My First Semester Year 2011

In the first semester of the year 2011, I have taken the following subjects:

1. Introduction to Psychology [5]

2. Learning Skills for University Studies [3]

3. University Mathematics for General Studies [5]

This Site is Under Construction

Hello. 

I am a Psychology Year 1 student in a university located in Penang.

Beginning from today, I will put in my thoughts on :

1. The academic subjects that I have taken in Year 1 as well as subjects that I plan to take in Year 2. 

2. Evolutionary developmental psychology, educational psychology, cognitive neuroscience and Industrial / Organisational psychology.