A Beautiful Mind is the topic I'll be talking about today. This movie was one we've been watching in class for the last couple of days. Having just finished it today, it was a super interesting movie. Being able to get inside the mind of someone who suffers from a mental illness is an experience in itself. During class we discussed what normal is and what abnormal is. I new most thought those with a mental illness were considered abnormal, but I didn't know what it would be like to have one. While watching the movie, I was able to get the full insight of someone with a mental illness. This person happened to be John Nash. Nash allowed me to realize what people go through just to live a normal life. He also taught me to be more open minded when it comes to those with an illness or even people in general. You never know who suffers from an illness and who doesn't, they may hide it better than you think.
After realizing all of this, I decided to talk about one of the illness that was mentioned in class, but not focused on as much. Hypochondriasis is the disorder in which a person believes that signs (real or not) of certain matters are symptoms of a serious illness. Most patients have a hard time being social with others because they believe they're prone to getting a disease from others or from surroundings around them. These patients are preoccupied by their physical health.
Causes could be:
 Major trauma that was experienced in life
Not being able to express their feelings easily
Someone close to them has a disorder
Treatment for this disorder is unknown. It's more psychological than something they're able to fix with medication. Therapy is recommended.
The whole point of this isn't to list different things about the disorder but to realize how fortunate we are to be healthy. The easiest thing to do when dealing with someone who has a mental disorder is to judge that person and say they're unstable or not as normal as us. But the important thing is to know that everyone is different and why should we be able to judge who's normal or not? Watching this movie and looking further into a disorder makes me realize that people with mental illnesses suffer and struggle every day just to get through life. I have a better outlook on those who suffer because of this movie.

Conditioning...

There are two types of condition one being operant and one being classical. Classical conditioning sticks out more in my mind just because its something that you see everyday. Knowing I had to write this wonderful blog, I decided to look around today to see if I could find an example classical conditioning. I tried a mini experiment on alana today.In german class, we weren't doing anything fun so I thought of all the homework I had. When remembering again that I had this amazing blog to write, I pulled a little trick on her using classical conditioning.
I began by starting with a sound of boop. Every time I said boop, I would lightly poke her with a pencil. After about 4 times of this, I was able to condition her to the point that every time I said boop, she knew I would poke her. Her reaction when I said boop was able to revolve from doing nothing into her covering the area I poked.

poke ---> pain
noise + poke ---> pain
noise ---> pain

This chart explains how I conditioned her. This made me notice that classical conditioning can be used in many ways and in everyday life. I really liked this unit and it was fun being able to relate to it while being hands on in creating our own experiments.

Letter

I'm doing good in class. Psychology is super interesting and one of my favorite classes. I would say that I'm excelling in class and don't have many struggles. When I first entered the class, I was nervous for what it would entail, but have been surprised at how easily I've adapted and learned to love the lessons we've been doing. I thought psychology would be much more complicated than it has been so far. I find it interesting when learning the different parts that psychology can branch out to.
The discussions we have keep me interested even more. It's much easier to pay attention when you relate your own life or even our lives to different topics. Even about you watching little boys play at target in your lawn chair. I know you may be embarrassed you mentioned that, but its okay we do our best to understand. :). But anyway I have learned a lot in your class and am glad that I am apart of it. Outside of class I am struggling with college decisions along with the boring scholarships, but I'm finding a way to manage it all. Life is good. Nothing to exciting going on.
Oh, Criss Angel. In my honest opinion I could really careless about him or his tricks. Yes, I think it's neat that he can preform all his tricks and "walk on water" but I think he's spent a lot of time tricking people into believing that the tricks he does can happen. I don't believe what he does is truly real, I think it's more out of hope and faith that people believe those things can happen. He even puts up videos that reveal how he does some of his tricks.

Points of views

The significance of the candle represents light to me. Light to me represents warmth which can represent mant different things such as: love, happiness, laughter and so on. Responding to the blog Mr. Dreier posted isn't just about what the candle means to everyone, but is about what each individual sees. This focuses on different points of views and how every individual is unique. Not only is everyone unique in their own way, they think about things in a different way as well. I decided to focus on how everyone things in their own way and why they develop the way they do.
This week we learned about how small children develop and the ways they learn. The example from the movie clip that was shown was based on how children view things. In the clip the children that were younger didn't realize that the shape of the glass doesn't have an effect on how much liquid is there. The younger children said that the taller, skinny glass had more liquid than the smaller, rounder glass. When the older children were tested with the same experiment, they succeeded in believe that both glasses had the exact same. This whole processes is represented to show the development of children and the ability to judge number and volume.
When thinking about how to relate to this I came up with my own story out of experience. I thought back to when I was a little girl on that special christmas morning. When I was little I always believed that the biggest present was going to be the best. I would take the biggest present and open it first and believe nothing would compare to it. Little did I know, the smallest present under the tree was the best one. This is a prime example of how children judge volume and size.

Cerebral Palsy

This week was an interesting week. We spent most of our time learning and teaching many different types of brain disorders. There were a couple that caught my attention the most. Wanting to know more about disorders, I took the liberty to research one on my own.

Cerebral Palsy is a disorder thats dear to my heart. I've always had a dream to help child who are impaired but still have the spirit and hope. Cerebral Palsy is a disorder that is diagnosed as a small child. Cerebral Palsy involves the impairment of the both control in the body along with the brain. "The term cerebral means two halves, or hemispheres within the brain." Not only does this disorder effect young child, but there isn't any treatment to cure it. Most doctors diagnose children within a few years of childhood. These children have to go through many years of therapy to try and make it in the world, with the odds against them. To diagnose cerebral palsy is on a development

spectrum.

Although some scientists say it's mostly genetic, other causes are included such as:

Bleeding in the brain

Brain infections

Head injury

Infections in the mother during pregnancy

Severe jaundice

The point of this article is to show that there are many different brain disorders out there and many individuals suffer from them each day.

I myself found the presentations in class inspiring and intreging. I've learned alot about the different brain disorders that can occur and am interested in learning even more about others.

This week we learned about the right vs. left brain. When taking the quiz given in class I came up with a result of 5.2 meaning I tend to use my right brain more than my left. Other quizzes I have looked into state that I use my left. I became really interested in the way people think and even more interested in the way I think. Having a close number of 5.2 to me means that i tend to use both sides of my brain in different situations. After taking a couple quizzes it showed me how I think.

I found an article that talks about why the brain is the way it is. Most ask why we think with two different hemispheres but only have one brain. Because the cerebral cortex, is made up of two halves is why we think with different hemispheres.

 Each hemisphere (left and right) are used for different things. Although one may be gifted in a certain hemisphere versus the other, everyone uses both hemispheres. During class, we watched a video that showed us what it would be like when the cerebellum cortex was cut in half. Even though it was cut for a specific reason, it was unique to see the results. The man used his hemispheres in a different way than we do. Both hemispheres worked within his brain, but didn't combine as easily as a normal brain would. It took him longer to finish exercises than an average person. I found it really interesting to think about what it would be like to not be able to think the way you do now.

Think about having a deformed brain or even a different brain than you have now. Blog your ideas and reactions. (:

Jung, Adler and Horney

Carl Jung:

Came up with the idea or theory of having Collective Unconscious. Collective Unconscious in a short summary is the ideas from everyone in humanity mixed together. Meaning, different cultures go through experiences that most know about. This idea becomes apart of our unconscious thoughts because of things we hear or see in general. Collective Unconscious is the journey you take in life, but actually turned into repressed thoughts. It's the different memories, thoughts and ideas. You could even express the thoughts as urges from the past. Archetypes are models that were given in life. They're apart of collective unconscious. The models could be anything such as heroes in different cultures or even basic human behaviors. Archetypes is shaping and transforms your conscious from experiences you've been through in life or prehaps the ones you wish to seek.

Alfred Adler:
Alfred came up with the insight of the inferiority complex theory. The theory states that everyone is born being inferior. Not knowing what to do as a child or knowing the way to act makes children helpless. As the child starts realizing the feelings they have, they begin to strive to become like their parents or guardians. When surrounded by more powerful adults that are capable of being successful, the child begins to want the powers they have. Although Adler says every child has an inferior, not all children develop a inferiority complex.

Karen Horney:
Karen Horney had different views when it came to Sigmund Freud's theory. Within her theory, she denied that women married for the penis, but instead stated men had womb envy. Womb envy is where men need to have children to live on their legacy. Karen shows that men have womb envy in the matter of wanting to care and nurture for a descendant of their own.  She stated that Freud's views on penis envy was women's jealousy of men's power in the world.