AP Psychology 5

Christina Leas: Intrinsic Motivation

2010-02-02T15:02:00.002-05:00

Here is an interesting take on the theories behind motivation. We just learned about instinctive, biological, cognitive, psychoanalytical... but what about spiritual? These "Laws of Motivation" come from the philosophy of Kabbalah, a branch of Judaism. However, it reminds me a lot of the 5 Noble truths from Buddhism that we learned in world history.

This view seems to imply that all extrinsic motivation will ultimately leave us dissatisfied and that the only thing that will keep us truly happy is fulfilling intrinsic motivation. It then claims that the purest form of intrinsic motivation is to help others. So go and be nice to someone today!

Solitary - Victor Le-Vu

2010-02-01T21:53:00.003-05:00

This is the trailer to last season's "Solitary 3.0." This show puts 9 individuals in pods where they stay 24/7 until the competition is over. In these pods, their sleep, eating and resting cycles are controlled by a computer and they have no sense of what time it is or how much time has passed. The only communication they have is with a computerized voice through a machine named "Val." This is the only voice that the people hear during their stay in Solitary. The competition is over when the competitor is the first to give up on a challenge or when they press the red button to give up. The challenges test the people mentally and are usually crazy or frustrated tasks.

This is related to psychology because you can see who people really are when taken away from their comfort zone. After a while in solitary and being there alone for an extended periods of time, people have mental breakdowns where they just cannot take the feeling of being there anymore, even when there is nothing happening in the pod. Season 4 premiered a couple of days ago on the Fox Reality Channel. TUNE IN

Ben Kim Interventions for Individuals with Mental Retardation

2010-01-29T07:11:00.002-05:00

Although children with mental retardation may have ongoing medical needs, the primary focus of intervention is to assist them in developing to their highest potential. This program focuses on aspects of these interventions, including the multidisciplinary team, teaching strategies to increase learning, and the development of the Individualized Education Plan (IEP). Also discussed are the specific challenges in education related to auditory learning and methods to reinforce learning as it occurs. The program also looks at the roles of the counselor, the special education teacher as well as mainstreaming. Behavior modification, as a way to assist the child in working effectively within the classroom and the family, is explored as well. Finally, the program describes the various levels of achievement possible for adults with mental retardation, including joining the workforce and living independently or within a group home.

Varun Gupta - MENSA

2010-01-17T14:51:00.002-05:00

Alice Roberts, a two year old genuis, has become the youngest person in Britain to join MENSA, the largest and oldest high-IQ society in the world. The society accepts members who score above the 98th percentile of special standardized intelligence test. The parents of this girl say that she has an IQ of 156. The parents said that they also need help from the society so that her daughter can take full advantage of her intelligence.

Alex Rubis

2010-01-09T14:21:00.002-05:00

This is just a simple "IQ test." Draw 9 dots on a piece of paper as shown in the video. You must connect all dots using 4 straight lines without lifting up your pencil. The video goes on to say that because the dots are set up in a square, they set up perceptual boundaries that are fixed in the mind. It also says that in order to solve this problem, you must drop such boundaries and look outside of them. This ties in to our unit on intelligence, as it shows that not all "IQ tests" are valid ways to show intelligence. It also ties back to our unit on perception. This relates to the demonstations in class we did that required us to look outside of our perceptual boundaries to solve the problem, such as the O,T,T,F,F,S,S,E,N,T pattern.

....And if you can't figure it out, here is the solution:

Kathryn Hahne

2010-01-06T22:50:00.002-05:00

This is a clip from the old show on Nickelodean, Kenan & Kel. In this episode, Kenan & Kel sign up to take an IQ test together. Kenan stays up all night studying for his test because he is worried about failing it. They both take the test and once Kenan finishes, he draws a funny picture of the Principal, calling her Principal Dimwit. The two get their scores back and Kel got a score of 96/100 and Kenan got a score of 3/100. Kel starts wearing a shirt saying "I'm a Genius" while Kenan beigins to act dumber than he actually is. In this specific clip from the episode, the two go to talk to the principal about their scores because Kenan thinks that his was scored incorrectly. When the picture of Principal Dimly goes missing, Kel uses his "genius" and ends up creating chaos.

Though this is mostly just a fun clip, we can see the effects that the results of the IQ test have on the two boys. Kenan, who is very smart, becomes discouraged by his score and acts dumber than he actually is and Kel on the other hand becomes almost cocky about his IQ because it proves that even though he does stupid things, he is still intelligent.

CARNEA SHIN

2010-01-05T16:57:00.002-05:00

IQ test
An IQ test is a test designed to meassure intellience on an objective, standardized scale.
Your intelligence quotient, or IQ score reflects your relative stadard within a population of your age
INTELLIGENCE QUOTIENT(IQ SCORE)- an index of intelligence that reflects the degree of which a person's score on an inteligence test devites from the average score of others in the same age group.
GO TO THIS WEBSITE AND TRY THE TEST!!!
http://www.iqtest.com/

Ellen Huff

2009-12-16T21:20:00.002-05:00

This video is basically about easy/simple ways to hypnotize people. There are a lot of ways and some can be used in normal conversation a It reminds me of the kinds of things derren brown does with distracting people with one thing while you do another. You should try them :)
(The video above is the really quick ways and the video below has different less simple ones)

Polyphasic Sleep - Mike Shearer

2009-12-16T21:19:00.003-05:00

Polyphasic sleep is a sleep schedule in which one takes several short naps throughout the day, without getting sleep in a block schedule. The purpose of this is to condition the subject's body to enter REM earlier in the sleep process. REM deprivation can lead to serious consequences, but once your body is conditioned to enter REM quicker, you can get more time out of your day seeing as you only end up sleeping about 4 -6 hours a day. Success stories cited having more vivid dreams, lucid dreams, a higher state of awareness, and more energy. Experiments have been conducted and results sway both ways. One experiment, conducted by NASA, found that longer naps were better. The Canadian Marine Pilots and the Italian Air Force conducted experiments and found that shorter naps tend to relieve sleep deprivation and reduced the total time of sleep needed each day.

This video is a polyphasic sleep experiment conducted on an artist. His brain waves are recorded 24/7, and they appear normal. He adapts reasonably quickly to the sleep schedule, and he falls into REM very quickly. He is given a sleep bonus, in which he sleeps 10 hours for just 1 day, and his performance exceeds his pre-experiment stats.

Justin Nicholls- Sleepwalking Dog

2009-12-15T22:05:00.002-05:00

This is an interesting video of a lady who in fact is the owner of this dog is tape recording her dog named Bizkit while the dog is asleep. She realizes that Bizkit does some odd things while being asleep so she tape records Bizkit. Bizkit starts out peacefully asleep then just starts kicking his legs viciously and then just gets up on all fours very awkwardly and just starts barking at the wall. This is very odd as I have never seen such an event like this with a dog before. Very funny video!

Chris Yun - Lucid Dreaming

2009-12-11T23:16:00.002-05:00

The following is a video clip of a Discovery Channel production containing information about the brain, sleep, and dreaming. The focus of this blog post is lucid dreaming (awareness that a dream is a dream while it is happening), which is mentioned near the end of the video clip.

In the complex world of our dreams, anything is possible. The idea of harnessing the power of controlling our dreams has long been thought of, and many different methods have been developed. It's been said that it's possible to condition oneself to allow lucid dreaming to occur more frequently. For fun, here's one of the many video tutorials on how to have lucid dreams.

This specific tutorial contains some of the information Mr. Douds taught us in class (keeping a dream journal nearby and telling yourself you are going to have a lucid dream). Now, get to sleep and explore the endless possibilities!

talking monkey (!)?(!) Conrad Berkompas

2009-12-07T22:01:00.003-05:00

This video is not all that amazing. The monkey has simply learned to say one word through a process of operant conditioning. Why is it that monkeys cannot talk, though?

A web search revealed that the larynx of a monkey is much less developed than that of a human. This prevents them from forming the same sounds that humans form when speaking.

obviously monkeys are capable of intelligence. This monkey is much better at memorizing numbers than I am. Does this mean that they only thing holding monkeys back from world domination is their misshapen larynx? In several hundred years (assuming the world is NOT ending in 2012) monkeys could get the correct shaped larynx through evolution and will start communicating. Then they will start the slow path to control over humans.

Maybe some day a monkey will feed me a piece of licorice to do simple problems.

How is this linked to psychology, you ask. well, it has to do with language, which is part of this chapter. Also, it raises an interesting point. How much of human success relies on language? The only reason we are able to progress is the spreading, developing, and communicating of ideas. If our larynx was slightly misshapen, then we would probably be eating licorice and saying "mama," because so much of our knowledge is passed down through a long line of people.

Maybe humans aren't so badass after all. The only thing that places us ahead of monkeys, retrospectively, is our larynx(ii?).

Jimmy Corish

2009-12-06T19:41:00.002-05:00

This video is an interview of Noam Chomsky discussing some of his ideas about the English language such as "universal grammar". He also discusses how language has changed with the advent of technological innovations such as email, cellphones(texting), etc.

Annie Gauf

2009-12-06T18:48:00.003-05:00

This video is similar to the activity we did in class trying to memorize a list of words. It provides a technique of elaborative rehearsal which helps improve memory. It is much like mnemonics or associating someone's name with something funny, and is proven to be more effective than just maintenance rehearsal. Try it!!

This is another video about Derren Brown (the same guy who can go up to people and steal their phones, wallets, etc.). He goes to a library and tells the librarian to pick any word in the dictionary, by just knowing the position on the page Brown can recite the word. He continues on proving his ability by reciting a line of a random book the librarian selects. Brown claims he has a photographic memory.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFGG6zWByhM
(youtube doesn't allow this video to be embedded)

TARA SENFI:)

2009-12-05T22:35:00.000-05:00

"A small docuclip of a man with the "most severe case of amnesia." With only a memory of his wife and his musical abilities, he essentially has no place in time."
Clive Wearing is a British musicologist, conductor, and keyboardist suffering from an acute and long lasting case of anterograde amnesia. Specifically, this means he lacks the ability to form new memories. On March 29, 1985, Wearing, then an acknowledged expert in early music at the height of his career with BBC Radio 3, contracted a virus which normally causes only cold sores, but in Wearing's case attacked the brain (Herpes simplex encephalitis). Since this point, he has been unable to store new memories. He has also been unable to control emotions and associate memories well.

Amazing Memory Test: Alex Kim

2009-12-02T17:35:00.004-05:00

This videos is about a guy that tests his fellow co-workers on memory.He turns on a television that displays several words, and he instructs them to write down as many words that they can remember. Before he begins the experiment, he explains that the first three words would most likely be remembered due to the primacy effect and the last three words would be remembered due to the recency effect. He also claims that the majority in the group will regurgitate words over and over which is known as maintenance rehearsal. It is the most common method of memorization. Eventually, they begin the experiment and they quickly find out that many of them, wrote down words that was not on the original list. This phenomenon occurs because memory is sometimes misleading and acts as a lousy videotape.

Gene Kang, Period 5

2009-11-29T16:02:00.002-05:00

This video shows the remarkable memory of a chimpanzee. The chimpanzee participates in a game in which, after a random series of numbers are shown and then immediately concealed by identical blocks, it must correctly tap the cubes in chronological order. After watching the video, you'll quickly realize that the chimpanzee is definitely not using maintenance rehearsal, because there is hardly enough time for all the cubes to enter one's sensory memory and become encoded for storage, let alone repeat them in one's mind. Rather, the chimpanzee is most likely using elaborative rehearsal by making connections between the new information and the old information already stored in long term memory. Speaking of long term memory, another explanation to this incredible feat is the possibility that the chimpanzee may have just memorized the visual appearance of a specific number of "random" series via visual encoding, and the required hand movements that follow. You could argue that this could be short term memory, for a human being could easily learn the procedure in an hour give or take, but you must acknowledge the greatly inferior mental capacity of a chimpanzee, or any non-human animal for that matter, and thus, something that takes an hour for a human to learn may take months, if not years, for an animal. If this was the case, then the experimenters most likely used operant conditioning, specifically shaping, in order to get the chimpanzee to do what it has done in the video.

Beautiful Mind-Seokmin

2009-11-22T23:36:00.002-05:00

This is not one of the recent movies, however, i personally enjoyed it a lot, and i thought it has some kind of relevance to psychology. This is a true story about a famous mathematician named John Nash who came up with Game Theory. He suffered schizophrenia, which is a mental disorder that displays split mind. One who has this disorder cannot distinguish reality from hallucination therefore experiences hard time dealing with others. If you have not watched it yet, go watch.

Sean Rowshandel

2009-11-21T14:31:00.002-05:00

I have a bunch of links for you children today and we mustn't waste precious time on smalltalk.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090623090705.htm

This is about a study that showed people to be more likely to want to listen to speech/someone asking them for a cigarette with their right ear, and that when they were asked to their right ear, they were more likely to give a cigarette. And this has been found many times previously to have the same result.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091119193632.htm

Part of this is cut off. Subjects in this were shown a computer screen with pictures and tried to put them in the same places the next day. The half who heard sounds that correspond to the pictures during sleep did better at putting the pictures back in their places.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091118143259.htm

This is just another plasticity study showing that blindness affects size of parts of the brain involved with vision and hearing.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/videos/2007/0710-brain_scans_of_the_future.htm

Thought patterns of the past and future are really similar. Sounds about right.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/11/091120000140.htm

Gamma waves and how they might affect thought.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081223091308.htm

So I thought I should add some about drugs, because those are usually lots of fun. This one is about cocaine making bees do 'the honey bee dance' more exaggeratedly, accept worse quality food so others can have better food, and just generally be more 'altruistic' to one another.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/02/080226193113.htm

"Activation of the glutamate receptor blocks hallucinogen-specific signaling and changes behavioral responses in mice."

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080428120701.htm

Salvia peaks 'nearly 10 times faster than cocaine.'

Sorry this is so much, I hope it isn't.

Miranda Osterheld Round Two: Positive Reinforcement!

2009-11-17T21:03:00.003-05:00

This video is pretty self explanatory. No, no, I don't think it could be any creepier or more ridiculous.

In this video, the baby's bizarrely adorable laugh is the positive reinforcement, which increases the likelihood that the man will make the "BLING" noise again. As you can see, this 'reward' never gets old and is on a continuous schedule of reinforcement, because the baby laughs every time.

In this 'instructional' self defense video, watchers would acquire knowledge of how to stop a mugger (most likely your friend that's tied up in the trunk of your car-she wants your money to buy crack!) by observational learning. Observational learning or social learning is efficient and adaptive. Kids are especially influenced by observational learning by watching their peers and parents. Good thing my little brother saw this video, so he's prepared with a gun when our neighbor is trying to mug him at the next barbecue.

The World Of Conditioning... SydZwick

2009-11-16T10:00:00.002-05:00

So as most of you know, conditioning is part of our everyday life. From the time you are a little kid you learn, usual by trial and error, and with some classical, operate and vicarious conditioning what is right and wrong and what is nice and what hurts.

In this case, as 133,953,935 people have already discovered, Charlie and Harry are well on their way to joining the millions of people who have been affected by conditioning...
...It might just take them a little longer than most...

Pavlov's Law - Maggie Baxter

2009-11-15T19:14:00.004-05:00

Okay, so we all have a pretty good idea about Pavlov's Law (Classical Conditioning). We know that he made his dogs drool, but its more interesting to think that we condition a human. In the video below that's what a group of kids did. They made an employee at a take-out joint associate the sound of the kids yelling with a customer coming in the door. After several times of yelling and a customer coming through the door, the employee looked up when the kids yelled expecting to see a customer come through the door. The video is a good example of our vocabulary words so take a look!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5j85k8Epgas

Neggin Assadi --- Classical Conditioning

2009-11-15T19:08:00.002-05:00

Ah Classical Conditioning... remeber Ivan Pavlov and his dogs? Of course you do ( you've just learned about it). But, what happens when it is applied to a different situation? Here's a video clip of a college student abusing his roommate through classical conditioning.

The uncondition stimulus ( US) : The airsoft gun being shot at the roommate

The unconditioned response ( UR): The roomate flinching

The condition stimulus ( CS) : The sound the button makes

The conditioned respose ( CR): the roomate flinching

US ---> UR ( Unconditioned Reflex)

CS + US ---> UR ( Conditioning)

CS---> CR ( Conditioned reflex)

Megan Darnell

2009-11-06T10:59:00.002-05:00

After we talked about the Little Albert experiment in class the other day, I was curious as to what other unethical experiments were most famous in psychology. I found this top ten list and surprisingly, there are experiments SO much worse than Little Albert (believe it or not).

CLICK HERE TO SEE FOR YOURSELF

Sean Rowshandel

2009-11-06T09:02:00.003-05:00

Annie Gauf - Optical Illusions

2009-11-04T21:36:00.002-05:00

These two videos give examples of common optical illusions. There are three different kinds of optical illusions: physiological illusions are the idea of afterimages, literal optical illusions create images different from the objects that make then, and finally, cognitive illusions are "unconscious inferences." Optical illusions are effective because they change your perception of an object or image.

Maggie Baxter -Taste and Smell

2009-11-04T09:10:00.003-05:00

Do you ever walk into the kitchen when your mom is baking a tasty treat and then BAM! you have an emotion come back to you from a memory you had with that treat. Why does this happen? Many of our likes and dislikes of taste and smell is due to the association of emotion. Smell receptors relay to the cortex which is the main cognitive recognition area of the brain and the olfactory receptors connect to the limbic system (emotion control area). So its no wonder that we have emotions and memories when we taste or smell. Here is a link describing how closely related the olfactory and glutamate systems are. Check it out!

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

Conrad Berkompas- synesthesia.

2009-11-03T20:45:00.003-05:00

This video is supposed to be kind of like the visual effects of synesthesia... This is such a cool condition that I had never heard of before AP psychology.

I did some more research on synesthesia... there are many different types of it. In one type, numbers, days of the week, or months of the year are paired with certain personalities. In another, different letters and numbers are seen in different colors. Overall, there are over 60 types.

It doesn't seem that psychologists care that much about synesthesia, probably because it doesn't really have that much of a negative effect on people. I think that the understanding of this disorder will just bring us closer to the understanding of the interactions within the brain.

I kind of wish that I had sinesthesia... I think it would make my life more interesting. Then again, it might get annoying. I guess it just depends on which type of syhesthesia you have.

Tara Senfi- LAUGHTER IS THE BEST MEDICINE- SECOND VIDEO

2009-11-03T12:48:00.003-05:00

This video is again on laughter, however it's more informative. Robert Kowalski describes why laughing is good for heart health. He shows how blood pressure can be lowered by laughter because of the signals it sends to your brain- the *serotonin* neurotransmitters. Also, how being in a bad mood and frowning can raise your blood pressure because of corisol and *norepinephrine* being released by the body.

For example, the documentary "The Secret" (which is all about the “law of attraction”, i.e. the power of the mind to help shape our reality) apparently features a lady who cured herself of cancer by purely watching comedies and telling herself repeatedly that she was in great health.

You should check out this for more information on THE POWER OF LAUGHTER!

Tara Senfi- LAUGHTER IS THE BEST MEDICINE

2009-11-03T12:34:00.002-05:00

This is a cute video made to show the significance of laughter! Laughter has been known throughout history to cure different types of illnesses from cancer to blood pressure. Laughter may be the best medicine, but even looking forward to having a good laugh can boost your immune system and reduce stress, according to US researchers at the University of California-Irvine.

"A clown is like an aspirin, only he works twice as fast."
Groucho Marx

"The art of medicine consists of keeping the patient amused while nature heals the disease."
-Voltaire

"Laughter in and of itself cannot cure cancer nor prevent cancer, but laughter as part of the full range of positive emotions including hope, love, faith, strong will to live, determination and purpose, can be a significant and indispensable aspect of the total fight for recovery."
-Harold H. Benjamin, PhD

Stroboscopic Motion

2009-11-01T22:39:00.002-05:00

http://faculty.evansville.edu/rl29/art105/img/muybridge_horse.jpg

And

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSrDnIVgVv0

Both of these links are examples of stroboscopic motion. Stroboscopic motion is an illusion when lights or images are flashed quickly and the brain perceives them as moving. A great example of stroboscopic motion is a flip book. One image is quickly replaced by another image with slight alteration to the original ,resulting is a 'motion' picture. The brain perceive these flashing images as a whole rather than seeing the pictures as separate images, following the concept of Gestalt Theory.

Chris Yun - Mind Trick Video

2009-10-30T20:45:00.002-04:00

This video shows multiple still images. However, if looked at closely, they appear to be moving. This sensation, motion perception, works similarly to depth perception. Motion perception is the inferring of speed and direction based on visual inputs. Like Mr. Douds explained in class, the brain takes a bunch of still images and converts them into a single flowing process. Watch the video and see if you experience motion perception!

Gene Kang: Opponent Process Theory

2009-10-30T20:05:00.003-04:00

Note: This works best if watched in full-screen.

This video shows a "color illusion", similar to the the U.S. flag and the Jesus one we saw in class. The only difference is that this illusion has a much wider range of colors, and thus is more visually impressive.
Color illusions such as this usually provide a picture with opposite colors(for example, a picture of an originally red ball would be green). There is a small dot in the middle, and the viewer must stare at that dot for a given period of time, usually 15-30 seconds. Then, after the time is up, either a blank page or, in this case, a color-less photo is shown. Remarkably, the viewer somehow sees a fully colored and very visible picture of whatever they were staring at, whether it be a flag or a beach.
This phenomenon occurs because of the Opponent Process Theory, or the theory of color vision stating that color-sensitive visual elements are grouped into red-green, blue-yellow, and black-white elements. In other words, if one part of a colored pair is no longer stimulated, then the other part is activated. Thus, we see a blue beach and green trees, because the picture we were staring at before had a roughly yellow beach and slightly reddish trees. These colors were probably not completely yellow or red due to the fact that the human eye can perceive over millions of different colors, meaning that the shading would have to be precise and not simply a solid primary color.

SeokMin Yang- CIA Mind Control

2009-10-30T19:16:00.002-04:00

This video is about series of programs conducted by CIA during World War II to use mind control as a weapon. This is quite interesting because it deals with destroying people's thinking patterns using drugs, sounds, and visions.

Tara Senfi

2009-10-29T18:12:00.003-04:00

This cute video shows with great detail how light enters the eye in an easy and fun way. It shows in three steps how the light enters the eye, labeling all the diff. parts of the eye. Hope it helps!

Carnea Shin: Top-Down Processing

2009-10-28T20:25:00.003-04:00

This is the F.U.N. song from SpongeBob Squarepants...
Top-Down Proccessing is information processing that focuses on expectations and experiences in interpreting incoming sensory information.
So if you didn't see the subtitles for the song played backwards you wouldn't be able to tell what they were saying.
I hope you enjoy it..

Michael Glazer- Color Blindness

2009-10-28T19:03:00.003-04:00

Color blindness is not being able to see certain colors the way normal people would see them. Having been color blind my entire life, i understand when other people are color blind too. It doesnt necessarily mean that you cant see any colors (which is called Achromatopsia), it just means that you have a problem with the pigments in your cones. About 1 in 10 men have color blindness, so its not that uncommon.In this picture if you are able to see a boat, then congrats, your not color blind. I myself have never seen this brown boat.

Erin Kavanagh- CIPA

2009-10-26T19:32:00.002-04:00

This video is about a four year old boy named Roberto who has a very rare disease known as Congenital Insensitivity to Pain with Anihidrosis or CIPA. The disease makes it so that Roberto physically cannot feel the pain that normal people experience from a fall from a bike or a cut on the arm. While this may sound like a good thing to people who do not have the disease, it is so dangerous that most people that have CIPA do not live into adulthood. Since children can usually tell their parents or an adult what is hurting them when they are sick and injured, their parents can seek appropriate help. However, children with CIPA could have any number of internal or external problems that are hidden from their parents that for a normal child would be easily treatable, but for a CIPA child could be life threatening. I thought that this video was really interesting and gave me a whole new perspective on the sensation of touch and pain.

Synesthesia - Jimmy Corish

2009-10-15T14:48:00.002-04:00

This video is about a man, Sean Day, with synesthesia. Sean describes his sensations when he eats certain foods or hears certain sounds. A scientist, Dr. Eagleman, performs an experiment with Sean to see what he experiences when he hears these sounds. Dr. Eagleman also explains the reasoning behind how synesthesia occurs and research that is being conducted on the condition of synesthesia.

2009-10-08T21:05:00.002-04:00

Religion and the Brain

Out-of-body experiences, such as meditation, can now be linked to specific parts of the brain, according to a Gale database article titled "Neurotheology."

Scientist Michael Persinger hypothesized that electrical impulses in the temporal lobe caused by epilepsies would produce mystical experiences. To test this theory, he placed helmets on participants that let off a slight electrical charge. Participants described having supernatural and divine experiences.

Persinger suggests that these religious experiences are triggered by anxiety, personal crisis, lack of oxygen, low blood sugar and fatigue.

Why the left temporal lobe? This area of the brain is thought to “maintain our sense of self”

The power of rituals: Many cultures participate in religious ceremonies characterized by drumming, dancing, incantations, etc…

Intense sensory stimulation + powerful emotions = sends brain into “hyperdrive”

What happens in hyperdrive? The hippocampus stops the flow of signals between neurons (much like during the sensation of fear). Certain regions of the brain no longer receive input from neurons. One of these areas is the orientation area. The brain no longer receives sensory input. The body can no longer detect “where the self leaves off and the world begins”.

All very interesting. Of course, as the author says, it is up for you to decide whether our brains are responsible for the idea of some higher power, or whether some higher power is responsible for the wiring of our brains.

Kathryn Hahne

2009-10-08T21:00:00.002-04:00

This is a preview for a TV show called Lie to Me about Dr. Cal Lightman, the world's leading deception expert. If you lie to Lightman, he can see it in your face and your posture or hear it in your voice. If you shrug your shoulder, rotate your hand or raise your lower lip, Lightman will spot the lie. By analyzing facial expressions and involuntary body language, he can read feelings ranging from hidden resentment to sexual attraction to jealousy. However, his scientific ability is a blessing and a curse in his personal life, where his family and friends deceive each other as readily as criminals and strangers do.

I not only love watching this show but I loved this preview when I saw it on TV awhile ago. It demonstrates the fact that even though humans are a very diverse species we all have underlying behaviors and traits that are similar.

Ellen Huff

2009-10-08T20:58:00.003-04:00

http://www.spring.org.uk/2007/10/why-we-dont-help-others-bystander.php

I tried to make the link clickable but it didnt work so copy and paste it people, sorry :(

This is a cool article about how people are less likely to help others when there are more people present. Its called- Why We Don't Help Others: Bystander Apathy.

Halo Brain

2009-10-08T19:06:00.001-04:00

This would have been really helpfull for the test.

Ben Kim

2009-10-08T19:03:00.002-04:00

Have you ever heard of supermarket psychology? Probably not.
Check it out. You will learn about how marketers trick customers
into buying stuff that are against their interest by the
use of color.

Alex Kim: Stampede!!

2009-10-08T18:48:00.000-04:00

This video is about a prank that was conducted by a Japanese t.v. show. It's a really funny video that had me constantly laughing. Basically, it displays how people's behavior can be influenced by other groups depending on the situation.
Hope you enjoy.

2009-10-08T12:36:00.001-04:00

This is Tony Robbins, a self-help professional speaker. This is, I believe, closely related to psychology because of the subjects he talks about. Self-improvement, conditioning, and development, are all closely related to Humanistic Psychology. In further detail, Tony Robbins discusses the importance of our way of thinking and how it affects our improvement. He talks about what shapes us, our emotions, background, and how it can all be ultimately improved based on the individual’s approach.

The Uninvited- Justin Nicholls

2009-10-05T21:38:00.003-04:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJ-ptYjksxU

this movie is very confussing. It is about a girl who goes to a mental hospital because of her phsycological problems due to the fact that her mom and sister died in a house fire. she is always seeing strange things and throughout the movie she imagines that her sister is still alive and she is talking to her through the entire movie but really she is talking to nobody but herself. viewers can see that she is talking to her sister but really her sister is dead. numerous times she tries to commit suicide but something always occur. this movie is veryyyyy confusing and i didn't understand it after i watched it because someone had to tell me what was going on.

Syd Zwick

2009-10-04T19:11:00.002-04:00

So the first thing that pops into my mind when i think of Fun Science is Bill Nye. So of course i searched Youtube for videos on the brain... he has a WHOLE EPISODE ON IT!!!!! EXCITING!!!! and a great study guide... big test on tuesday YEAH!... so here are the links if you want to watch it its three different videos... but the third section is the best... it has cool mind games to play wowahahawa!!!

then Bill as the cool guy he is likes to add some sweet 90's music to add to the hip coolness that is the BRAIN!!!!!!

Michelle Devlin - Peer Pressure

2009-09-24T19:59:00.003-04:00

For this blog, I chose a short video clip that I found on the topic of peer, or 'group' pressure, in an elevator. It relates to psychology in that it shows a willingness to conform when a person feels uncomfortable, awkward, or out-of-place. For example, these people on Candid Camera readily mimicked the actions of the strangers surrounding them. This displays that, in most situations, people perceive the behavior of the group as the norm of how to behave.

Funny Elevator Psychology
An old video from the TV show Candid Camera. They show us what happens if everyone on an elevator stands backwards. LOL!

Victor Le-Vu - The Colony

2009-09-24T18:59:00.002-04:00

http://dsc.discovery.com/videos/the-colony-a-test-of-faith-full-episode.html

Ok, so for this blog, I'm going to talk about the show on discovery channel called "The Colony." The season might be over but you can still view some of the episodes online at the link I provided. If you have not heard of this show yet, its about 10 people who are presented with an "end of the world" scenario. They are staying in downtown Los Angeles where there is basically no other people besides other survivors called "marauders" that are scattered around and are completing for the same necessary resources. Their job was to re-create civilization and to survive. This show relates to psychology because after a while, they start to believe the situation they are in is real and they are not able to control themselves. They easily get irritated and frustrated while they grow paranoid waiting for another attack by the marauders. They stay in an abandoned factory where they use their knowledge to help them survive. They work water filtration, electricity, plumbing, and transportation. It's a very interesting show and I recommend it anyone interested in science because it shows how some things we learn in school can be applied to real life situations.

Alex Rubis - Derren Brown Robs a Guy

2009-09-23T18:33:00.005-04:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j25qV5RO-nU

This video shows Derren Brown, a well-known English magician and illutionist. Derren is able to pickpocket a man right in front of him just by distracting him. He ends up taking this guy's tie, wallet and phone and giving it back and taking it again multiple times. This video relates to psychology because it demonstrates how the mind can only focus on so many things at one time. This is why it is so hard to text and drive, talk on the phone and drive, etc.

Miranda Osterheld-Frayed

2009-09-16T15:32:00.002-04:00

Okay so here's a scary movie that me and my friends watched through Cox on Demand. I think its still there if you wanna check it out...the endings kind of confusing though. But it applies to psychology because its about a psychopath and repressed childhood experiences.
Here's the trailor:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYDpuwW-uOw

SPOILER. YOU DONT HAVE TO READ THIS!
If you end up watching it, the ending is kind of confusing. This is what I thought happened. Kurt was sexually molested by his dad on his sisters birthday. His dad was wearing a clown mask, so thats where the mask comes from. His mom walks into the room with a videocamera because she was taping the party. All you see is her being killed by a blunt object. You think its Kurt doing it, but its really the dad. Kurt is blamed and sent to the asylum. There is a picture of his dads softball team outside his room. All the other characters in the movie come from that picture and the bulk of the movie just happens in Kurts mind. But anyways Kurt escapes from the hospital and his dad kills him. The whole clown mask-killer is Kurt's angry thoughts projected into a make believe world. So he really didnt kill anybody. Just got molested, grew up, escaped form a mental hospital, then got shot by his dad so he never tells what happened to him. Meanwhile, at the end of the movie, the dad goes home to his new family. The ending is him peering into his other son's room while the kid is facing us looking really scared. I swear I almost cried it was DISGUSTING.