Introductory College Psychology Essay

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psychological concepts. In some questions, specific scenarios were also given and we had to analyse them with reference to psychological concepts. Over all, this assignment broadened our knowledge of psychology and improved our thinking skills.

To answer this question, first we have to understand the meaning of gender. While sex refers to the biological differences between males and females, gender refers to the sociological differences between males and females. Gender however can be influenced by biological differences but it basically is a social phenomena. Gender differences can vary in different cultures and societies. For e.g. most of the females work in the U.S. But many women in Asian countries do not go to work. So if women and men were classified on basis of going to work, then women in U.S. would be very different from women in the Asian countries.

Let us now talk about gender roles. Gender roles are defined according to culture and the society. Gender roles define what is expected from women and men in different societies. Competition exists a lot between the two sexes from the past decade. This is greatly because of the fact that women have grown to become more independent and that they have the liberty to work. Earlier, women were beings that took care of household activities and brought up the children. They would stay at home while the men would go out and hunt. However, now the women are equal to men in most of the spheres of practical lives and are in competition with males on every battlefield. Culture again influences how we see gender and gender roles. Like I mentioned earlier, the culture of many eastern countries does not allow women to work and earn while the culture of western countries allows women to work freely. So gender roles rely on culture greatly.

Gender typing occurs with boys and girls when they are young. They are taught things like boys play with fire trucks while girls play with Barbie dolls. This creates an image of what the society wants from girls and from boys. Therefore, boys and girls start to act accordingly. If boys and girls were taught things like it is okay for boys to cry but not okay for females to weak then males and females would behave in very different manners today. This would be due to the fact that there gender typing would change.

Concepts of individualism and collectivism also vary due to gender. Individualistic people are usually from Western Europe while collectivist people are from Asian countries like India. This is because of many factors including culture and religion. Culture in western countries is of nuclear families while in India extended families are preferred. This is also due to religion. Therefore these different family arrangements can cause males and females to act in very different ways with each other. Western countries would be abundant with individualistic people while the eastern countries would be abundant with collectivist people as from the beginning they have been brought up in different family structures. They have also different traditions and teachings.

Trust vs. mistrust. Childs develop trust when mothers feed them.Answer 2:

Initiative vs. guilt. A child is happy when she does something.

Autonomy vs. shame and doubt. A child is reassured after he misuses autonomy

Generativity vs. stagnation

. Adults form family and teach their offspring.

Intimacy vs. isolation. Both of them finding love.

Identity vs. role confusion. Both of them trying to develop identities

Industry vs. inferiority. A child does work

Integrity vs. despair.

Old people look back on their life and cherish memories

Cognitive perspective focuses on how we code, manipulate, stack and retrieve information. Let us talk about the first stage. The cognitive psychologist can ask that how does the child store information about trust? The child reasons that a mother who takes him into his lap is trustworthy therefore he takes the milk from hands only. Another explanation is that the child stores previous information about the same situation.

The second picture makes the psychologist make the question that how does the child solve the problem of misusing authority? One explanation is that the child is learning and makes mistake while practicing authority when working. The other explanation is that the reasons that If he does not do a task he will shame others.

The third picture gives birth to the question that does the child feel guilty if he doesn't do anything? One explanation is that the information he has tells him that if he doesn't do anything he will be treated as guilty by his parents.

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Another explanation is that this child is trying to paint her hands to show that she took initiative to do something.

The fourth picture raises the question that why is this young child cleaning? One explanation is that she knows through experience that if she doesn't do chores, she would be made to feel inferior. The other explanation tells us that the child solves the problem of inferiority by doing chores.

The fifth picture raises the questions that what information makes teenagers try to develop good relationships? The explanation proposed can be that the teenagers know through experience that they will belong to a group if they have girlfriend or boyfriends. The other explanation is that they are applying the things they learnt to develop healthy relationships with each other.

The sixth picture raises the question that what experiences lead adults to form strong relationships? Explanation is that young adults through information know that they want someone to depend on and love throughout their lives.

The seventh picture raises the question that why might people feel a lack of purpose? The explanation is that now they are in a stage where they can share their knowledge and they can be proud of it.

The eighth picture raises the question that why do old people feel depressed when they can't share their knowledge with some one? The explanation is that they know they are about to die and they want to share and expand what they learnt in their lives.

Answer 3:

The autonomic nervous system is the systems that stimulates our body for action in times of stress and calm our body down in times of peace and calm. Therefore, it controls the physiological aspect of our arousal; through sympathetic and parasympathetic divisions. For e.g. ANS could is affected when we are attacked by a lion. Our pupils dilate as we are under stress so that is a physiological change. However, our emotions are also vague and fearful as we fear the lion.

Drug use can lead to a physiological change in the sense that dopamine changes the way the brain functions. It changes the reward system. Psychological change can be that a person feels joyful and he wanders off into a different world.

The nervous system is monitored and controlled by the electrical mechanism of nerve firing. Abnormal nerve firing can lead to seizures. On the other hand, psychological change refers to the fact that a person enters a state of mixed emotions and hyperactivity as is the case with epileptic people.

The physiological change occurs with our color vision when the light rays strike our retina and manufacture an image of the color in our brain. The image of the color is sent to the brain by using the three types of color receptors for red, blue and green. The psychological aspect comes in when emotions are affected by our color vision. For example the color blue is supposed to be a hunger-reducer while colors like orange and red enhance the appetite of an individual.

Answer 4:

Operant conditioning basically talks about the association of a response with a result and thus we redo acts with good results and don't do acts that follow unfavorable results.

In her first class Beth sat with 25 students who knew each other well. So she must have tried to make friends with people in the class who didn't know her well therefore they did not make friends with her easily. Chances are that Beth would get rejected first. So the response (trying to be friend) would lead to the consequence (rejection). Therefore, Beth tries to become friends with the class again. If she fails to make friends then she would get rejected again therefore she would stop making friends this activity of her lead to the concept of punishment. Hence, Beth would try to make friends less often as she cannot face the punishment of rejection.

This is the case when Beth will be hindered by operant conditioning. However, if she makes a little amount of friends in her first class then she will try to make friends again in her next class. This is because the making of friends is a positive reinforcement to Beth. Beth knows that if she tries to make friends (action) will lead to making friends (consequence/positive reinforcement)

Therefore she tries to make friends in each and every….....

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