Blog Post #13

I thought the experiments were all very clever, and it is a good idea to try and figure out why people conform and in what situations. All experiments showed similar results; people will conform to a group or situation and do what they are told. Most of the people who participated did conform and it was a larger number than expected by psychologists. In Asch's conformity experiment, most of the people agreed with the others who purposely said the wrong line. It is interesting that they agreed because they clearly thought something differently and were agreeing to a wrong answer just to fit in. In Milgram's obedience experiment, the teachers thought they were causing harm to a person, and they continued to do it just because they were told to. They could hear the pain and agony from the student and did not want to continue the experiment but not very many quit the experiment. A shocking 2/3 of the people in the experiment went all the way to the end even though they thought they were giving a very horrible shock to someone. It is amazing that so many people would be obedient even when they were knowingly cause harm to someone. It is kind of like the saying: "If your friends jumped off a roof, would you do it too?" If that saying were like the results of this experiment, most people would jump off the roof. In the Stanford Prison experiment, the guards and prisoners lost sense of reality and played their actual rolls. The guards were cruel and the prisoners obeyed their every command. The studies show that it is human nature to conform to what others are doing in order to fit in. I believe people do this to save themselves from the embarassment of being wrong or different.

Social influence is a great power and has to do with conformity, compliance, and group behavior. It is the influence is when a person's actions are affected by other people. Normative social influence is influence resulting from a person's desire to gain approval or avoid disapproval. Informational social influence is influence resulting from one's willingness to accept other's opinions about reality. An example is during a class election; voting for someone just because everyone else is, even though you know they are not the best candidate. Another example is if you are hanging out with friends and they are drinking; you drink too so you can fit in, even though you know there may be consequences. An example from my life is during class discussions or quizzes. I have gone along with answers that other people said even though I originally thought something different.

The most interesting thing I learned in this class is the other-race effect. This is the tendency to recall faces of one's own race more accurately than the faces of other races. I find this interesting because this is something I often do. I cannot tell the difference between Asian people and I know many other white people can't either, but I didn't know that it had a name until chapter 16. It is also interesting that it emerges during infancy, between 3 and 9 months of age. Babies become own-race biased before they even know the differences between the races. This is kind of sad and is probably a major reason for racial prejudice.

Blog Post #12

Often times it is hard to tell whether someone is just sad or has a psychological disorder, but their are some warning signs. The book says a psychological disorder is ongoing patterns of thoughts, feelings, and actions that are deviant, distressful, and dysfunctional. Deviant behavior is behavior that is different and not normal. Standards for deviant bhavior vary by contet and culture. There are examples of varying culture and normality in the text on page 594. Men of the West African Wodaabe triebe put on elaborate makeup and costumes to attract women. In Western society, the same behavior would break behavioral norms and might be judged abnormal. There are different types of deviant behavior, so in order for it to be considered disordered, deviant behavior must cause distress. Deviant behaviors are often times considered disordered when they cause dysfunction. Most of the time, deviant and distressful behaviors along with dysfunction are a clear sign of a psychological disorder. If someone is acting abnormally, it does not always mean they have a psychological disorder. Their abnormal behavior may be caused from a certain event, the environment, or stress. They will get over it and it will not cause them dysfunction. An intense fear of spiders may be deviant, but if it doesn't impair your life it is not a disorder.

I may have had obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) when I was younger. I was not dysfunctional because of my deviant behavior, but I did have many of the compulsive behaviors that people with OCD have. Obsessive-compulsive diorder is an anxiety disorder characterized by unwanted repetitive thoughts (obsessions) and actions (compulsions). Obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors cross the line between normal and disorder behaviors when they persistently interfere with everyday living and cause the person distress. An example from the book is washing your hands. Washing your hands is normal; washing so often that your skin becomes raw is not. OCD is a common disorder for teens and young adults. A study indicated that obsessions and compulsions of people with the disorder gradually lessen over time. I think I may have had OCD because when I was little I had to do everything a certain number of times. I couldn't just do or say something once. I had to do or say it over and over again or I thought it wouldn't count. I also had to do or say something and even number of times. Another thing I had to do is check my entire house before I could go to sleep. I'm not sure if i had OCD or not but either way the deviant behavior is annoying. It interferes with getting things done in a timely fashion, if you can even get them done at all. Living with the disorder would obstruct a person's living. They would constantly be thinking obsessive thoughts and it would get in the way of carrying out simple tasks.

Schizophrenia was the most interesting thing I learned about in this chapter. It is a group of severe diorders characterized by diorganized and delusional thinking, disturbed perceptions, and inappropriate emotions and actions, and it means split mind. It is interesting because it affects many people and is a cluster of disorders. Delusions, or false beliefs; hallucinations; and inappropriate emotions and actions are common symptoms. The emotions of schizophrenia are often inappropriate and split off from reality. Schizophrenia typically strikes as young people are maturing into adulthood. It affects both genders, but males are often times struck earlier and more severely. It is a scary disorder because it knows no boundaries and people with schizophrenia often end up in lower socioeconomic levels, or even homeless.