Psycho Talks

How to reduce your screentime.

2024-11-07T00:34:00.006+05:30

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Internet Era!

As we are globally shifting from 4G to 5G, the society we are living in is also developing at an erratic speed. From newspaper to news application, from letters to WhatsApp Messenger apps, from telephone to live video calls, our society is shifting and developing on the path of modernity. With the rapid growth of social media, users are spending significant amount of time on various social networking sites to connect with friends, to share information, for educational purpose and for entertainment and common interests.

In 2018, around 36% of households had a Smartphone and it increased to 74.8% in 2022. As we know that the content consumed by population include favorable as well as unfavorable on internet. Usually it provide information related to "virtual learning" mode and educational purpose, shopping, gaming short clip videos for entertainment purpose, digital literacy social media apps and so on.

Psychotalks24

Since it is obvious that excessive use of any of the online content on smart phones may harm at certain degree and researchers had also studied that digital distraction seems to create a non ideal environment for the refinement of higher cognitive function in critical period of child and adolescents brain development. The developing prefrontal cortex of the teenage brain is still mastering tasks such as impulse control, emotional regulation and the assessment of consequences and risks.

Impact on Human Brain

Day by day the span of attention, patience and concentration level of adolescents decreasing and reduction of social interaction, loneliness and intolerance of other’s opinion may affect their cognitive functions, academic performance and various aspects of their life and it will bring down their quality of life as well.

The more time spent on internet is associated with higher self-reported depression scores and also negatively affects subjective well-being.

In most of the studies it was mentioned that our behavior and attitude was extremely affected by excessive use of social media and socio-digital engagement, some people feels high anxiety and bodily dissatisfaction if they don't spend time on social media and it will occur because of isolation in their real life so they spend excess time on social networking sites for social approval and connectedness. As we are not aware but it will affect our mental, social as well as physical health also after looking on overall aspects we can conclude that online content and Digital technology have the potential to impact human life many ways so we need some application based solutions in our daily life to improve the quality of life so let's learn some strategies of how to integrate and habituate healthy "digital practices" in our routine life.

Some Useful Techniques(How to Reduce Screen time)

- First of all we can practice "digital detox" one day in every week that means we need to spend less time on digital gadgets and it is obvious that it will so hard for many of us so we need to start with a small goal. Like in first week we need to make a target of using less than 5 hours in next week less than 4:30 hours and so on and one more thing is that you can also navigate your performance in your own phones by specific settings and continue to improve yourself.

- In the life full of Hassel we need to adapt a good habit which is "meditation”, by performing meditation you will definitely notice so many changes in your life, as your concentration capability will increase as well as focused and instant attention and mental performance will also increase.

- In next step you can make a habit to take a short 5 minutes break after every 45 minutes of using gadgets, it will give you some rest while work and enhance your working capabilities.

- You can also do more calculative work on your own without using calculator on daily basis for mental exercise, it will enhance your grasping ability, quick decision and speed too.

- Some people have bad habits of playing online games for long time, so they need to replace this habit by playing outdoor games instead of online games.

- While in mean time you can also improve your cognitive functions by solving puzzles and quizzes.

- Read novels, comics, books and try to maintain your childhood hobbies like arts and crafts too.

Conclusion

So here we have discussed so many strategies that will definitely help you to improve your mental as well as social health, so try to adapt these techniques in your daily life and improve it on your own self.

How To Find A Right Therapist

2023-12-11T02:41:00.001+05:30

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What's Wrong!

One thing we all have to accept that nowadays maladjustment in daily routine, stressful life events, anxiety, dysfunction in social conditions, general anxieties are occurring more frequently in our country

As per factual information provided by reliable sources throughout recent years number of cases of mental illness is increasing in our country. But we can notice that number of recognized trained therapists are still the same.

Mental Health is no Joke

Mainly when we try to focus on small town areas in our country, we can see that there are few number of therapists are available and in opposite to that the number of cases of such persons are increasing who are not able to deal or manage their personal, social and occupation life efficiency.

Here increasing number of cases of patients but few people to treat them, That's how it became one of the biggest reason that client are not receiving proper counselling sessions and treatment by their therapists. We can see that there are soo many clients go to the single therapist for long time period which is only available in their locality and as expected they may not able to provide a quality time and efficient treatment to each and every client.

What's Wrong with Therapists!

Point to be mentioned that due to lack of time, therapist don't focus on step by step therapeutic procedures and application of various types of therapies to deal with their client due to shortage of time they starts providing medicines from day one sometimes to save their time and make money too.

It is important for us to understand that not all patients need medication, some of them who are initially suffering from mild to moderate malfunctioning or inconvenience in their life by which they show symptoms of general anxiety, stress, PTSD, depression. They need someone who can hear their problems, talk and boost their confidence that they are capable to deal with their problems by own, overall if the symptoms are mild they need to consult with a psychotherapist(or a RCI licensed clinical psychologist) who can provide a suitable therapy session for them which works effectively.

Because we know that everyone must face discomfort or difficult situation in their life once in a while.

"And therapy isn't just about talking, it's about providing a safe space too - a containing environment."

Incase if these symptoms are prolonged and patient is not showing any improvement then they need certain medicines.

Cautions

(it is important to understand that medicines will act quickly but it is not good for our immune system, once you start medicines you will depend on it for the rest of your life and it will suppress your immunity as well).

So while diagnosing a patient, therapist must provide proper time so that they truly understand which patient needs medicines and which one needs therapies only.

How Our Brain Works

2023-07-20T19:02:00.000+05:30

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To minds in one

Psychotalks24-Two minds In One

Have you ever think about how our brain works? Do we have two minds in one that think differently? Do some of us depend on one side of the brain more than the other? These questions are too complex but Sometimes, such questions arise in our mind.

So we'll take a closer look at the issues involved in these generalizations about cerebral specialization.
By using soo many complex methods, scientists have compiled too many data on the specialized abilities of the right and left hemispheres. It shows us how the right and left brains might be related to cognitive processes. Here we have some cool and fascinating facts about our brain and its complex works and how it is specialized in some abilities.

Research findings have been interpreted that :The two hemispheres are specialized to process different types of cognitive tasks.

Left hemisphere handles verbal tasks, analytic, abstract, rational, linear, language, speech, writing, math and logic.
While the right hemisphere handles nonverbal tasks, spatial problems, music, art, fantasy and creativity, synthetic, concrete, non rational, intuitive and holistic.

Different people rely on different hemispheres: some people are left brained, their greater dependence on their left hemisphere and it makes them analytic, rational and logical. Some people are right brained, due to their greater use of their right hemisphere they become intuitive, holistic and irrational.

As per research, being right brained or left brained is thought to explain many personal characteristics, such as whether an individual like to read or write, is good with maps or enjoys music etc.

However the research on cerebral specialization is complex but there are so many evidences that the right and left hemispheres are specialized to handle different types of cognitive tasks but only to a degree.

People differ in their patterns of cerebral specialization. Some people display little specialization, their hemispheres seem to have equal abilities on various types of tasks.
Also many studies proved that each hemisphere has its own mode of working, thinking and organizational style, although we know that it is difficult to generalize because it is difficult to define and measure and also we cannot deny subjective experience of human being.

There is misconception that some people are left-brained or right-brained and this may can predict their cognitive abilities and interests but there is no scientific proof for this notion and till now we didn't found any proof about this idea through brain- imaging or other techniques also, because our whole brain work simultaneously and if any area of our brain stop working properly the surrounded areas will adopt those functions as well.

In the end notes, we can understand it like our brain consist very complex structure and functions as well, so we cannot claim on the basis of few experiments and studies that any one area is only perform only a single function, because it is a thread like structure which is interrelated with each other and function simultaneously, so we need some more scientific studies and experiments to gain more knowledge and particular function of our brain.

How to Improve Self Control.

2022-09-11T14:59:00.000+05:30

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Achieving self-control through behaviour modification

Sometimes there is such a moment in our lives when we struggled with the challenge of self control.

Here are some principles and techniques that we can use in behaviour modification to improve self control.

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It is assumed that behaviour is mainly a product of learning, conditioning and environmental control.
That "what is learned can be unlearned". Thus, people can recondition to produce more desirable and effective patterns of behaviour. The technology of behaviour modification has been applied in schools, businesses, hospitals, factories, childcare facilities,prisons, and mental health centers.

Here are four steps in the process of self- modification ;-

1) Specifying your target behaviour :-

The first step is to specify the target behaviour that you want to change. Behaviour modification can only be applied to a clearly defined, overt response etc.
To identify target responses, you need to ponder past behaviour and pay careful attention to behaviour over the next week so you can list specific examples of responses that lead to the trait description.

2) Gathering baseline data :-

In this you need to systematically observe your target behaviour for a period of time (usually a week or two week) before you workout the details of your program. In gathering baseline data,you need to monitor three things.

First, you need to determine the initial response level of your target behaviour.
otherwise You can't tell whether your program is working effectively unless you have a baseline for comparison. You can simply keep track of how often the target response occurs in a certain time interval. It is crucial to gather accurate data. you should keep permanent written records.

Second, you need to monitor the antecedents of your target behaviour. Antecedents are events that typically precede the target response. Often these events play a major role in evoking this behaviour.

Third, you need to monitor the typical consequences of your target behaviour. Try to identify the reinforcers that are maintaining an undesirable target behaviour or the unfavorable outcomes that are suppressing a desirable target behaviour.

3) Designing your program:-

It's time to plan your intervention program . As per to increase or decrease the frequency of a target response.

• Increasing response strength:- Efforts to increase the frequency of a target response depends largely on the use of postive reinforcement. you reward yourself for behaving properly.

• Selecting a reinforcer:-
To use positive reinforcement, you need to find a reward that will be effective for you. Everybody has different thresholds, like what is reinforcing for one person may not be reinforcing for another. To determine your personal reinforcers, you need to ask yourself questions such as.. what do I like to do most ? What makes me feel good? What would I hate to lose? Etc
You don't have to come up with new reinforcer that you have never experienced before, you can use reinforcers that you are already getting.
And you have to restructure the contingencies so that you get them only if you behave appropriately.

• Arranging the contingencies:- Contingencies will describe the exact behavioural goals that must be met and the reinforcement that may then be awarded.
Try to set behavioural goals that are both challenging and realistic.
Setting unrealistically high goals - a common mistake in self modification and often leads to unnecessary discouragement.

• Decreasing response strength:- Reinforcement can be used in an indirect way to decrease the frequency of a response. You can reinforce yourself for not emitting a response, or for emitting it less, and thereby decrease a response through reinforcement.
Other strategy for decreasing the occurrence of an undesirable response can be to identify it's antecedents and avoid exposure to them.
Punishment is also used for decreasing unwanted behaviour ..and people tend to overuse it. First , do not use punishment alone. Second, use a relatively mild punishment so that you will actually be able to administer it to yourself.

4) Executing your program:-

Once you have designed your program, the next step is to put it to work by enforcing the contingencies that you have carefully planned.
During this period, you need to continue to accurately record the frequency of your target behaviour so you can evaluate your progress. The success of your program is dependent on your not cheating.
Generally, when you design your program, you should spell out the condition under which you will bring it to an end. Doing so involves setting terminal goals, such as reaching a certain weight, going without cigrettes etc
Often it is a good idea to phase out your program by planning a gradual reduction in the frequency or potency of your reinforcement for appropriate behaviour.

What is Memory?

2022-05-29T17:25:00.000+05:30

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MEMORY :- Memory is an active system which receives information from the sense organs, puts that information into usable form, organize that information as it stores it away and then, retrieve the information from storage.

Memory-psychotalks

There are soo many kinds of memory, few of them are described below;-

Types of memory

Intentional memory :- Individuals deliberately tries to learn and memorize the material.

Incidental memory:- No deliberate attempt is made by the individual to learn the task. The material gets memorized by chance.

Retrospective memory:- It refers to the memory for the past events.

Prospective memory:- It describes our ability to plan and remember the future tasks.

Explicit memory:- Refer to the conscious recollection of previous events.

Example:- recall or recognise words, facts etc.

Implicit memory:- The process in which we use information from memory but are not consciously aware that we are doing so.

Example:- unconsciously remembering the cycling.

State dependent memory:- It is defined as any external or internal condition of a person's body and mind. Retrieval of the memory is better when biological or psychological state of the person during encoding of the information matches with the state of the person at the time of retrieval.

Example:- normal state , alcohol state etc.

Drug dependent memory:- when items learnt under a specific drug condition.

Person is able to recall those events when again in the same drug condition.

Mood dependent memory:- It is learnt under specific mood condition (happy/sad) will be better when mood of the person is same at the time of retrieval.

Schema driven memory:- Mental representation of the event, objects or the person's incidents, situations acquire through experience.

It deals with the information of schemas.

Also deal with how new information is integrated with our previous knowledge.

Help in deciding how the information should be encoded/ stored/ retained and which information should get attention.

Categories of schemas:

Person schema - Refer to the general knowledge and beliefs about other people's traits and characteristics.

Self schemas - General knowledge about our own personality traits, goals, attitude etc.

Script schemas - General knowledge which the people have about common and frequently occurring events.

Eyewitness testimony memory:- It deals with the memory for events which have been witnessed by the people. Sometimes people do not give accurate information, resulting in misleading effects.

It is suspicious.

Cultural memory:- Regarding the cultures especially the customs, traditions and rituals of a culture.

Meta memory:- Person's general knowledge and awareness of his own memory process.

According to flavell and Wellman (1977), younger child possess very poor meta memory and it improves with age.

Autobiographical memory:- Memory for information related to a person's own history.

It is constructive in nature.

Some periods in our lives produce more memories than others, so it is not equally distributed evenly throughout our lives.

Rapidly increase in the frequency of memories is seen after the early adulthood than childhood.

Flashbulb memory:- Memories of events which are very arousing or surprising.

For example:- war, deaths earthquake etc

It was highly detailed, clear and vivid.

Surprising and mostly negative.

It has an emotional effect on the individual.

Memory traces is important to the individual.

Eidetic memory:- Ability to recall an object for a short period of time after it is no longer present.

It stays for a second or less than it.

Photographical / exceptional memory: Ability to recall an image ( text, number etc) in great detail for a longer period of time.

This kind of memory is rare.

Haptic/ tactile memory:- A type of sensory memory related to sense of touch like - gripping or touching. It provides a very brief memory of touch, approx 2 seconds.

What is ASPD

2022-03-27T15:00:00.000+05:30

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ANTISOCIAL PERSONALITY

Also known as sociopaths or psychopathic problems.

"It is characterized by impulsive, irresponsible actions satisfying only immediate and narcissistic interests without concern for obvious and implicit social consequences."

Clinical pictures:-

Individuals who are basically unsocialized and whose behaviour pattern brings them repeatedly into conflict with society.
They are grossly selfish, callous, irresponsible, impulsive and unable to feel guilt.
Superficial charm and intelligence, talks well and gives good impression and sense of humour.
Interest lies in immediate pleasure and has no absolute purpose or long range goals.
Lack of control, unstable, ego-centric, impulsive and irresponsible behaviour.
Lack of anxiety,shame and guilt.
Self-centered, no love, attachment and care for other relationships, defective superego, insincerity, selfish nature make them lead on uncontroventional and unrestrained sex life.
Suffer sexual maladjustment and abnormalities.sometimes alcohol and drug addict.
Aggressive and hostile towards authority and social regulations.
Frustration tolerance is low.
Quick bored when no immediate result or pleasure found.
Use of RATIONALIZATION and PROJECTION mechanism for defend their unjustified behaviour and lies to blame others.
No goals in life, their life is disorganised and unplanned.
Show symptoms in age of 15 to 18.
Occur in 3% in males and 1% for females in population.

TWO dimensions of psychopathy:-

An affective- interpersonal set of traits:- lack of remorse and guilt, callousness, lack of empathy, glibness, superficial, charm, grandiose sense of self- worth and pathological lying.
Second dimension reflects behaviour:- antisocial or impulsive acts, social deviance, poor behaviour controls, irresponsibility and a parasitic lifestyle.

Etiology/causes of ASPD:-

Heredity and biological factors:- Rarely defective genes, physique and body constitution, defective intelligence, mental deficiency, brain disorders are responsible sometimes.

But there is no roles played by genes and chromosomes and no evidence of heredity being responsible for ASPD.

Environmental and socio-psychological factors:-

parents and family:- unhealthy relationships prevailing between the parents and child.

Lack of emotional and social security, poverty.
Denial of the facilities for the satisfaction of essential primary and secondary needs.
Child learn and imitates the role of parents as a model(observational learning) and conditioned to behave antisocially.
If in family,- domestic violence, street brawls, alcohol- drug addiction, promiscuity and other behaviour happens, child learn the behaviour of adults who reject social norms.
Broken homes :- death of one parent, separation, desertion, divorce or prolonged parental absence and when the child placed in foster home, hostel or orphanage, as a result child emotional and social needs may be frustrated. Here child may adopt antisocial lifestyle.
emotionally disturbance in home:- parents different opinion about the rearing, education and career of child, quarrel, careless, over indulgent, over bearing with child. Then child turns to antisocial elements.
Consequences of defective family environment are perpetuated and nourished in environment outside the home. Neighbours, peers, and antisocial climate is one's child comes to learn undesirable or what is denied at home.

Treatment:- people with ASPD is difficult to treat because they rarely see any need to change in ownself and tend to blame others for their problems.

Individuals seem to decline after older age (40+) even without treatment, because of weaker biological drives, they referred as "burned-out psychopaths".

Drugs like - lithium, anti- convulsant or anti-depressants, phenothiazines, phenobarbitone, dilantine, carbamazepine, chlordiazepoxide may help in reducing aggresive/ impulsive violent behaviour.

but biological treatment is not so effective because it also occur side effects and may be individual did not take medicines at time, because they do not believe that they need treatment.

Cognitive behavioral treatments:- it increase self control, self critical thinking and social perspective taking.

increasing victim awareness, teaching anger management, changing antisocial attitude, and curing drug addiction.

this therapy required controlled situation ( prison or forensic setting) in which therapist administor reinforcement and the individual cannot leave treatment.

Psychotherapy is not effective in ASPD.

Stress Management Techniques

2022-02-09T23:04:00.003+05:30

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What is Stress Management?

Developing effective emotion regulation skills to enjoy a balanced and happy life.

Stress Management

How can we help ourselves stay healthy in the face of stress?

Most stress management programs train people to use more effective Coping strategies.

Coping- The process by which people try to manage the perceived discrepancy between the demand and resources.

So, Here are some approaches can be also helpful in Stress Management.

Emotional disclosure:- "Opening up" and writing expressively about life problems in a systematic way does seem to be an effective therapy for many people with illnesses.
Writing or talking about life's difficulties can be valuable in dealing with stress.
In research, it was found that people who had written about their emotions had significantly less physical dysfunction than those assigned to a control condition.
In studies, patients often experience initial increases in emotional distress during the writing phase but then show improvement in their medical status over follow-up.
In this, patients are given an opportunity for emotional catharsis,or "blowing off steam". And writing gives people an opportunity to rethink about their problems.
Emotional disclosure is associated with better immune functioning. So, if you can find a good listener, you may be able to discharge problematic emotions by letting your fears, misgivings, and frustrations spill out in a candid conversation.

Biofeedback :- Getting feedback about one's own bodily processes.A procedure aim to make patients more aware of such things as their heart rate, level of muscle tension or blood pressure.This is done by connecting the patient to monitoring equipment and providing a cue to the patient when he or she is successful at making a desired response.

It is a technique in which an electromechanical device monitors the status of a person's physiological processes and immediately reports that information back to the individual.
Over time, patients become more conscious aware of their internal responses and person gain voluntary control over the processes and able to modify them when necessary.

Music therapy:- Therapists always use of music as an intervention in counseling.

Sometimes therapist work with the client to actively create the music. Eg:- composing a song, engaging in music etc. And sometimes the therapist offers music listening experience such as using music to facilitate na client or group's relaxation.

Breathing Exercises :- Method of regulated breathing.

Conscious effort through the nose, one has to inhale to the full capacity, and the exhale through the mouth.
It should be done for a number of times each day.
It produces deep relaxation and also reduces muscular tension.

Pranayama:- More than 50 difference techniques of pranayama have been described in old scriptures.

Some of them are:-

Anuloma pranayama - The technique involving alternate nostril breathing.
Bhastrika pranayama- long and deep breathing, as if feeling the movement of the diaphragm.
Kumbhaka pranayama - Retention of breath for a while.
Sheetali pranayama - The process of cooling the breath by doing respiration with mouth open and tongue extended out is known.
This treatment seemed to address issues related to the patients' well-being, anxiety and depression

Progressive Muscle Relaxation:- In 1938, by Edmund Jacobson.

Refers to focusing attention on specific muscle groups while alternately tightening and relaxing these muscles.

Alternate relaxing and tensing of the muscles.
Increases consciousness of and awareness about how they are functioning.
It is a technique in which the body responds to anxiety provoking thoughts and situation accompanying muscle tension with muscle relaxation.
It can help patients with essential hypertension, headache etc.

Guided imagery:- Using one's imagination to recreate and enjoy a situation that is very relaxing and soothing.

Imagery is a potent method of stress reduction, particularly when combined with physical relaxation methods such as deep breathing.

One is encouraged to visualise or mentally recreate the situation in which he felt extremely happy and peaceful.

It could be some place in the lap of nature,or it could be the company of some loved one.

The more intense patients imagines the situation, the more relaxing experience tends to be.

Transcendental meditation:- a new technique of meditation developed by - "Maharishi Mahesh Yogi"

Sitting in a particular yogic posture with closed eyes and chanting of certain mantras along with it.

Transcendental meditation for 20 minutes twice a day reduced their diastolic blood pressure and may be helpful in deep relaxation and peacefulness in the individual.

Forgiving:- forgiving someone involves counteracting these natural tendencies and releasing the person from further liability for his or her transgression.

Forgiving is associated with better adjustment and well-being as well as reduced anger and physical symptoms.

Sleeping schedule:- good sleep habits can also help in the effort to minimize physiological vulnerability to stress.

Sleep loss can undermine immune system responding and fuel inflammatory responses. Poor sleep quality is associated with poor health and that sleep loss can elevate the risk of mortality. Research suggest that people need to get a sufficient amount of sleep and should strive for consistency in their patterns of sleeping.

Excercise:- The potential benefits of regular exercise are substantial, including increased longevity.

Research shown that moderate amount of excercise reduces your risk of disease.

So, excercise regularly without overdoing it, and reinforce yourself for your efforts.

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Definition of Stress

Criminal Behaviour in Psychology

2022-01-09T15:49:00.002+05:30

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Criminal behaviour- Delinquency and Crime

One of the most troublesome and widespread problems in childhood and adolescence is delinquent behaviour, especially that involving juvenile violence.

Criminal Behaviour in Psychology

What is Delinquent Behaviour?

This behaviour includes such acts as destruction of property, violence against other people, gambling, cheating, pick-pocketing, murder, robbery, dacoity, assault, intoxication, vagrancy, begging, kidnapping, abduction, sexual offences and various behaviour contrary to the needs and rights of others and in violation of society's laws.

Juvenile delinquency

The term juvenile delinquency is a legal one that refers to illegal acts committed by individuals between the ages of 8 and 18 .

(It is not recognised in the DSM as a disorder).

About one in five adolescents entering the juvenile justice system suffers from a mental health condition.
A significant research literature shows that adolescents detained in adult correctional facilities have a high rate of suicide or are likely to commit more crimes when they are released.
Although most juvenile crime is committed by males, the rate has also risen for females. Female delinquents are commonly apprehended for drug use, sex offences, running away from home.

Causes of delinquency

Learned and acquired in social and economic conditions:-

Broken home- Incomplete family due to death, desertion, separation or divorce. Delinquency appears to be much more common among youths from homes in which parents have separated or divorced than among those from homes in which a parent has died, shows that parental conflict may be a key element in causing delinquency.
Parental rejection and faulty discipline- in many cases, one or both parents reject a child. When father is the rejecting parent, it is difficult for a boy to identify with him and use him as a model for his own development.
Unusual jealousy and rivalry for other members.
Economic difficulties and poverty of the family.
Dull, monotonous and uninteresting home environment.
The delinquent and criminal behaviour of the parents or other members.
Maltreatment and injustice, and lack of proper physical and emotional security.
Denial of reasonable freedom and independence to the youngsters.
Child's basic needs and emotional problems like inferiority, insecurity, jealous make him maladjusted and turn him into a hostile, antisocial and delinquent personality.
Acts of peer group, neighbours, mass-media, newspaper, books, magazines and cinema that acquaint children with immortal and antisocial acts.
Maladjustment in school- defective curriculum, improper teaching methods, lack of cocurricular activities, slackness in administration and organization, antisocial/ undesirable behaviour of teachers, maltreatment and injustice done to the child.
Failure or backwardness.

Genetic determinants:-

Although the research on genetic determinants of antisocial behaviour is far from conclusive, some evidence suggests possible hereditary contributions to criminality.
Brain damage and learning disability- brain pathalogy results in lowered inhibitory controls and a tendency towards episodes of violent behaviour. Such adolescents are often hyperactive, impulsive, emotionally unstable and unable to inhibit themselves when strongly stimulated.

Psychological disorders:-

Some delinquent acts appear to be directly associated with behaviour disorders such as hyperactivity. One study reported that over half of Delinquents show evidence of mental disorders and 14 % are judged to have mental disorder with substantial impairment that requires a highly restrictive environment.

Antisocial traits:- Many habitual delinquents appear to share the traits typical of antisocial personalities like - impulsive, resentful, defiant, devoid of feelings of remorse or guilt, incapable of establishing and maintaining close interpersonal ties and seemingly unable to profit from experience.
Drug abuse:- Many delinquent acts- particularly theft, prostitution and assault- are directly associated with alcohol or drug use. Most adolescents who abuse hard drugs such as heroin are forced to steal to maintain their habit.

How to deal with it

Parental education,and good parenting methods can applied on child and can treat and handle child's basic needs and urges.
Attempts to save the child from bad company.
If juvenile institutions have adequate facilities and personnel, they can be of great help to youth who need to be removed from aversive environments. These institutions can give adolescents a chance to learn about themselves and their world, to further their education and develop needed skills for self expression, recreation, manual work and learning of useful crafts, and to find purpose and meaning in their lives and learn moral and social values.
In such settings, young people may also have the opportunity to receive psychological counseling and group therapy.
Establishment of special schools, remand homes and special juvenile courts with trained magistrate.
Taking help from clinical psychologist and psychiatrists.
Behaviour therapy techniques:- mostly used based on the assumption that delinquent behaviour is learned, maintained and changed according to the some principles as other learned behaviour have shown promise in the rehabilitation of juvenile offenders who require institutionalisation.
Counselling with parents and related environmental changes are generally of vital importance in a total rehabilitation program, but it is often difficult to get parents involved with incarcerated delinquents.
Provision to satisfy basic needs and help in their social and emotional readjustment.

How to Improve Memory

2021-11-30T10:52:00.000+05:30

Memory

Memory refers to retaining & recalling information over a period of time, depending upon the nature of cognitive task you are required to perform.

Memory works on past experience & use all those information in the present.

Without memory of past we cannot operate in the present or think about the future . Without memory we could not learn anything.

Improving Everyday Memory

Mnemonics devices are strategies for enhancing memory. In fact, they have a long and honorable history. Actually mnemonics devices were even more crucial in ancient times than they are today.

Mnemonics can be helpful in some situations but they are not a cure-all. They can be hard to use and hard to apply to many every day situations.

Here less exotic strategies- such as increasing rehearsal, engaging in deeper processing, and organizing material - are more crucial to everyday memory, now we will discuss some popular mnemonics :-

Engage in adequate rehearsal :- practice makes perfect, or so you've heard. In reality practice is not likely to guarantee perfection. However, it usually leads to improved retention.( Retention refers to the proportion of material retained/ remember)

Retention improves with increased rehearsal. This improvement presumably occurs because rehearsal helps transfer information into long term memory LTM.

Research suggests that testing actually enhance retention,a phenomenon dubbed the testing effect or test enhanced learning. Taking a test on material increases performance on a subsequent test even more than studying or rereading for an equal amount of time does.

The testing effect is not limited to rote learning, it can enhance in-depth meaningful learning, as well.

Why is testing so beneficial? The reason behind that testing forces students to engage in effortful retrieval of information, even unsuccessful retrieval efforts can enhance retention.

Schedule distributed practice and minimize interference :-

Retention tends to be greater after distributed practice than after massed practice. Studied showed that the longer the retention interval between studying and testing, the bigger the advantage for distributed practice. The longer the retention interval, the longer the optimal break between practice trials.

Example:- let's assume that you need to study 9 hours for an exam. Should you cram all your studying into continuous 9 hours period (massed practice) or it is better to distribute your study among, 3 hours periods on successive days ( distributed practice).

Interference is a major cause of forgetting. This issue is especially important for students because memorizing information for one course can interfere with the retention of information for another course. Thus, the day before an exam in a course, you should study for that course only.

Engage in deep processing and organizing information :- if you expect to remember what you read, you have to fully comprehend it's meaning. Benefit if you spent less time on rote memorization and more on paying attention to and analysing the meaning of their reading assignments. Try to relate information to your own life and experience.

It is also important to understand that retention tends to be greater when information is well organized. Hierarchical organization is particularly helpful when it is applicable.

Enrich encoding with mnemonic devices:- Although it's often helpful to make information personally meaningful, it's not always easy to do so. Thus, many mnemonic devices such as - acrostic, acronyms and narrative methods are designed to make abstract material more meaningful. Other mnemonic devices depends on visual imagery.

Acrostics and acronyms:- acrostics are phrases (poems) in which the first letter of each word functions as a cue to help you recall information to be remembered.

Acronyms, a word formed out of the first letters of a series of words.

Example:- the order of colors in the spectrum often store the name "Roy G Biv" to remember red, orange, yellow, green, Blue, indigo, violet.

It can be effective memory tools.

Link method :- The link method involves forming a mental image of items to be remembered in a way that links them together.

Notice that the more bizarre you make your image, the more helpful it is likely to be.

Method of loci :- The method of loci involves taking an imaginary walk along a familiar path where images of items to be remembered are associated with certain locations.

The first step is to commit to memory a series of loci, or places, along a path. Usually these loci are specific locations in your home or neighborhood. Then envision each thing you want to remember in one of these locations. When you need to remember the items, imagine yourself walking along the path. The various loci on your path should serve as cues for the retrieval of the images that you formed.

Research suggests that the method of loci can be effective in increasing retention. This method ensures that items are remembered in their correct order.

Famous Scientists on Memory

Memory is the means by which we draw on our past experience in order to use this information in the present. (Sternbery , 1999)

Memory is the process of maintaining information over time .(Martin , 2005)

Emotional Intelligence

2021-11-06T20:48:00.002+05:30

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What is Emotional intelligence?

Emotional-Intelligence-Psychotalks

Emotional intelligence as a theory, developed by Peter Salovey and John Mayer.

Emotion word comes from Latin word "Emovere" it means stimulate.

It is the ability to process emotional information accurately and efficiently.

Ability to monitor one's own and other's emotions, to discriminate among them, and to use the information to guide one's thinking and actions. (Salovey and Mayer)

Able to understand oneself and feeling of others.
Able to express the emotions.
Use to motivate self.
Use to control, manage and arrange emotions.
Use to identify interrelationships and intrarelationships.
Identifying, understanding and managing one's own emotions and emotions of others is known as emotional intelligence.

Some facts/History of emotional intelligence:-

1. In 1985, Wayne Payne,- introduce the term emotional intelligence.

2. In 1987, Beasley used the term "emotional quotient".

3. In 1989, Greenspan gave emotional intelligence model.

4. In 1990, Mayer and salovey offered first formulation of a concept emotional intelligence.

5. In 1995, Emotional intelligence become popular after Daniel Goleman book "why it can Matter more than IQ.?"

Implications of emotional intelligence :-

1. Competencies :- To promote creativity, resilience and connection.

2. Value :- To develop good values and integrated self (personality) .

3. Outcomes :- Improvements in quality of life, relations and performance.

Types of emotional intelligence:-

1. Experiential intelligence:- It can learnt by experience and intellectual wisdom.

2. Interpersonal intelligence:- It is about the relationship between two or more peoples, so resolving conflicts, meeting with certain problems, organize oneself, control of desire, knowledge of rules.

3. Emotional competence:- it is about, how do you express yourself when you are in situation which involve social interaction, how do you respond in that scenarios, explain self-efficacy in emotions eliciting social interaction.

4. Emotional regulation:- To cope/deal with stressful situations by changing cognitive and behavioral efforts.

Approaches of emotional intelligence:-

Salovey and Mayer ability model:- In 1990, the information from the perceived understanding of emotions and managing emotions is used to facilitate thinking and guide our decision making.

Perceiving Emotion:- Able to identify emotions in the facial and postural expressions of others.ability to identify emotions in physical and psychological base.

Using emotion:- Ability to use emotions to facilitate various cognitive abilities and judgment.
Understanding emotion:- Ability to understand relation among various emotions, to perceive cause and consequences, to recognize and describe complex feelings and discriminate between them.
Managing emotion:- Ability to manage emotions in oneself and in others, ability to engage, prolong and detach from emotional state at particular time, manage emotion in pleasant and unpleasant both conditions for own self as well as for others.

Goleman's framework of Emotional intelligence:-

In 1995, Daniel Goleman gave this model in his book,"Emotional intelligence,why it can Matter more than IQ.?" It is also known as mixed model.
Goleman said, if person got success in their life, 20% due to IQ. and 80% due to emotional intelligence.
Intelligence is a cluster (group of abilities) of skills and competencies, which are Focused on four capabilities (self awareness, self management, social awareness and relationship management).
He focused on emotional intelligence as a wide array of competencies and skills that drive leadership performance.

This approach includes non-E. I. qualities that studies relevant, emotion specific abilities and also motives, social styles, self-related qualities.

According to Goleman,-

Personal competence includes:- self-awareness, self-management, self-motivation.
Social competence includes;- social awareness, social skills, relationship management.

Five key components/features of emotional quotient by Goleman:-

Self-awareness:- Having a deep understanding of one's emotions, strengths, weaknesses, needs and drives. It includes,- self confidence, self assessment, emotional awareness (recognize own emotions and their effects),self-worth and capabilities.

self-regulation:- Conversation people have with themselves, which frees them from being prisoners of their own feelings.

Involves,-

self control:- manage disruptive impulses and feelings.
Trustworthiness:- Able to maintain honesty and integrity.
Conscientiousness:- Take responsibility of our own performance.
Adaptability:- able to adopt the feeling and handle the changes with flexibility.
Innovation:- Be open to new ideas.

Motivation:- it requires clear goals and a positive attitude.

Initiative, optimistic, Achievement drive or strive to improvement, commitment or aligning with the goals.

Empathy:- Reacting to anther's feelings with an emotional response that is similar to the other's feelings.

A skill to treat people according to their emotional reactions.

Understand feeling of others, empathetic person excels at- service orientation, developing others, political awareness etc.

Social skills:- Development of good interpersonal skills is tantamount to success in your life and career.

Includes:-

Influences, leadership, communication, building bonds, conflict management, team capabilities, managing relationships, change catalyst, collaboration and cooperation.

Criticism of emotional intelligence:-

Management is very difficult
Behavior in nature,
It is dynamic in nature,
Biasness, prejudice and manipulation occur anytime,
It is time and cost intensive affair.
Emotional intelligence without 'moral compass' is useless.

Definition of Stress

2021-10-15T10:23:00.003+05:30

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What is Stress?

Our response to events that disrupt or threaten to disrupt our physical or psychological functioning.

Stress is good sometimes, A little bit stress can motivate us to do our work.

Symptoms like;- trouble sleeping, feeling overwhelmed, problems with memory and concentrating, frustration, changes in eating habits, nervousness, deficiency of consistency in personal and professional life.

It used to describe the physical, emotional, cognitive and behavioral responses to events that are appraised as threatening or challenging.

Causes Of Stress

Stressors:- Events that cause a stress reaction.

Hassles:- The daily annoyances of everyday life.

Catastrophe:- An unpredictable, large scale event that creates a tremendous need to adapt and adjust as well as overwhelming feelings of threat.

Distress;- The effect of unpleasant and undesirable stressors. Example:- death of close one, failure etc.

Eustress;- Effect of positive events/ optimal amount of stress that people need to promote health and well being. Example:- wedding, special day, interview, outing etc.

Stress is a hormonal response from the body, hypothalamus sends signals throughout our nervous system to kidney and it release stress hormones (cortisol)

Effects of stress:-

Body:- headache, frequent infection, taunt muscles, muscular twitch, fatigue, breathlessness.
Brain:- Worrying thinking, nightmares, negativity and indecisions.
Emotions:- Loss of confidence, more fussy, depression and irritability.
Behaviour:- Loss of appetite, loss of sex drive, restlessness, drinking and smoking more.

Characteristics of stress:- The severity of the Stressor, it’s Chronicity (how long it lasts), it’s timing, how closely it affects our own lives, how expected it is, how controllable it is.

Events that are unpredictable and unanticipated (for which no previous coping strategies developed) place a person under severe stress.

What are Emotions in Psychology 2?

2021-08-01T21:27:00.004+05:30

Theories of Emotion:-

Emotions-psychotalks24

James- Lange theory of emotion:- William James and Carl Lange together share a common view of emotion. These two physiologists say that emotions arise from physiological arousal. ‘bodily changes directly follow the perception of an emotional situation and our awareness of the bodily changes give the experience of emotion’.

According to the James-Lange theory of emotion, we would only experience a feeling of fear after this physiological arousal had taken place.

So, this theory was developed by American psychologist William James and Danish physiologist Carl Lange in the mid-1880s. According to them, our physiological ( bodily) reaction occurs first, followed by an emotional reaction. Both believed that when an event occurs, our body reacts, and then we feel emotion after the brain interprets that physiological changes. Rather than being the cause of physiological events, such as muscular tension, increase heart rate, perspiration, dry mouth, and running, created by ANS ( autonomic nervous system).

For example- an emotion-evoking stimulus (snake) triggers a pattern of physiological response (increase heart rate, faster breathing, etc) which is interpreted as a particular emotion (fear).

STIMULI -> PHYSIOLOGICAL CHANGES -> EMOTION

The James- Lange theory of emotion suggests that emotions are a result of physiological responses large and not their cause.

When stimuli that can induce emotions are received and comprehended by the cortex of the brain the visceral organs and the skeletal muscles are triggered by the A.N.S. (autonomic nervous system) and S.N.S.(somatic nervous system). The autonomic and somatic systems will then stimulate the brain, which will be interpreted as an experience of emotion.

Example:- when someone sees an angry bull.

Common sense view; perception of angry bull > feeling of fear > physiological reactions.

James-Lange view; perception of angry bull >physiological reactions > feeling of fear.

After seeing a stimulus, receptors get activated and an afferent nerve impulse is generated which is conveyed to the cerebral cortex through afferent fibers. This gives the perception of the emotional situation and efferent impulses are conveyed to visceral organs, muscles, and glands resulting in activation of these organs. Again afferent impulses about activation of responding organizers are conveyed to the cerebral cortex and thus the organism has the experience of the emotion.

So,

PRESENCE OF STIMULI > PERCEPTION OF STIMULI > EMOTIONAL ACTIVITY > CONSCIOUS EXPERIENCE OF EMOTION.

Thus, the theory assumed that the conscious experience of emotion is preceded by Emotional behavior.

Criticism:-

This theory suffers from certain serious pitfalls which are:-

William Wundt based on his studies on conscious experience refuses the contention of James-Lange. Wundt cites certain instances in which he found that in Experimental situations if the experience of emotion is withheld temporarily, Emotional behavior too ceases. Thus, awareness of Emotional behavior cannot be assumed to be the basis for Emotional experience.

Most often, sometimes we experience an emotion even without displaying Emotional behavior.

The major objection to the theory came from canon. He pointed out that;-

(a) Physiological changes of one Emotional state do not differ from another Emotional state, that would be essential to discriminate one emotion from another based only on our bodily reactions.

(b) Internal organs are relatively intensitive structures and also slow in action in comparison to conscious experience. Hence, bodily changes cannot be thought of as a source of Emotional experience.

(c) When a person is artificially induced to bodily changes (by injecting adrenalin) it doesn’t produce an experience of true emotions.

They assume a kind of reflex action between the perception of an emotional situation and accompanying emotional behavior. But Worcester argues this is not always true that when we see a tiger in the jungle we run away, but if we see a tiger in a zoo, we tend to approach. We don’t experience Emotional fear.

Cannon-Bard theory of emotion:- The cannon-Bard Theory of Emotion, also known as the “Thalamic theory of emotion”.

Walter Bradford cannon a physiologist at Harvard University and his graduate student Phillip Bard developed a theory in late 1920 which was named as cannon-Bard theory. They emphasized the role of the brain in producing physiological responses and feelings through his experiments. In his experiments, cannon discovered that it was still possible to experience emotion even if the brain was excised from the signals of bodily responses. It was not reliable to depend on bodily responses to know the type of emotions, a person experiences as different emotions may be formed by the same bodily responses.

For example:- if a person with a racing heart could either mean that the person is angry or excited. They conclude that the experience of emotion doesn’t depend on bodily inputs and how the body responding to stimuli. Both of these the experience of an emotion and experience physiological arousal, work at the same time. People recognize the emotions and simultaneously undergo physiological responses such as perspiring, trembling, and tension of muscles.

Experience of emotions involves two separate processes in the nervous system – ANS as being responsible for the arousal and the Cortex as being responsible for the production of the subjective sensation of the emotion.

In this theory, emotions result when the thalamus sends a message to the brain in response to stimuli, resulting in a physiological change and reaction.

According to this theory, the lower brain area ( thalamus, hypothalamus) plays a central role in emotion. Emotional stimuli are received by the receptor organs, then sensory impulses send to the Cortex, it passes through lower brain areas, signals are associated and organized, then the upper level of the brain similarly cerebral cortex discharged neurons through effector impulses also must pass through the thalamus and determine the emotions that we express.

For example:- I see a snake.., I’m afraid and I begin to tremble.

TO READ FIRST OF PART WHAT ARE EMOTIONS

Criticism:-

Some issues raised also in this theory, are:-

This theory lays too much emphasis on the hypothalamus whereas the fact is that involvement of some other parts of the nervous system has also been found. This has been substantiated by experimental studies in which the hypothalamus was artificially stimulated by exposing the subjects to some Emotional situations and their Emotional reactions were compared to the control group of such subjects who were exposed to Emotional situations naturally. Some of the noted differences were “ artificially aroused Emotional behaviors were relatively short-lived, more stereotyped, less adaptive, more restricted and fewer situations orientated.

In a natural Emotional state and the hypothalamus, other parts of the nervous system also get involved. Therefore, the researchers such as Lashley, Lindsley, Arnold, etc opine that the Experimental studies do not lend much support to assume the hypothalamus as the seat of emotion.

· The researchers further noted that the hypothalamus is also incapable of maintaining the tension arising out of emotion for some longer duration.

Thus, this theory is also not able to explain the entire fact of emotion and therefore, cannot be regarded as a preferable theory of emotion.

Schachter- singer Theory of emotion:- This theory maintains that the emotion we feel is due to our interpretation of an aroused, or “stirred up,” bodily state.

Schachter and Singer (1962) argued that the bodily state of emotional arousal is much the same for most of the emotions we feel and that even if there are physiological differences in the body’s patterns of responses, People cannot perceive them. Since the bodily changes are ambiguous, the theory says that any emotions can be felt from a stirred-up bodily condition.

In other words, given a state of arousal, we experience the emotion that seems appropriate to the situation in which we find ourselves.

The sequence of events in the production of emotional feeling, According to this theory, is:-

(1) perception of a potential emotion-producing situation,

(2) an aroused bodily state which results from this perception and which is ambiguous, and

(3) interpretation and labeling of the bodily state so that it fits the perceived situation

· It is also known as the Two-factor theory and cognitive labeling theory of emotion

· We experience the emotion that seems appropriate to the situation in which we find ourselves.

· When the physiological arousal occurs, the individual must identify the reason for this arousal to experience and label it as emotion.

According to two-factors theory, EMOTION is the result of the interaction between two factors:- physiological arousal and cognition.

Physiological arousal is cognitively interpreted within the context of each situation,(how a person labels and understands what they are experiencing- based on a person’s experience) which ultimately produces the Emotional experiences.

For example:- if we see a snake (stimulus) it would elicit sympathetic nervous system activation (physiological arousal) that would be cognitively labeled as fear (cognition) based on the experience would be the feeling of fear.

Like James-Lange’s theory, Schachter’s and singer’s Theory also interprets emotions based on physiological reactions.

And Schachter-singer’s theory also followed cannon-bard theory and suggests that similar physiological responses can produce varying emotions.

For example:- heart rate becomes faster when we are trembling and also when we are fighting with someone.

Lazarus cognitive appraisal theory:- ( 1970,1984) according to Richard Lazarus, thinking must occur first before experiencing emotion.

The emotion we feel results from appraisals or evaluations, of information coming from the environmental situation and from within the body. And memories of past Encounters with similar situations, dispositions to respond in certain ways.

Appraisal involves:- cognition, processing of information from the environment, the body, and memory.

According to this theory, the sequence of events first involves a stimulus, followed by the thought, which then leads to the simultaneous experience of emotion and physiological responses.

EVENTS > APPRAISAL > EMOTION > PHYSIOLOGICAL RESPONSES

For example:- if we encounter a tiger in the jungle, we immediately think that we are in danger, which leads to an emotional experience of fear and the physical reaction.

Lazarus also distinguished between primary and secondary appraisal:-

Primary appraisal:- meaning of the event,

Secondary appraisal:- assess the ability to cope up with the consequences of the event.

The all-over process of primary and secondary appraisal is unique and different to each person.

How To Study Brain Functions ?

2021-06-24T23:30:00.000+05:30

Methods Employed in Studying Brain functions.

Study of Brain is known as Anencephaly.

Brain-psychotalks

The Anatomical method:- It is used by anatomists and those who pursuing medical education.

In this method, in the post death phase of the organisms, its tissues are treated in such a way that nerve tracks can be viewed with the help of a microscope. Anatomists learn as to what sense organs sends fibers where and what parts of brain sends of motor fibers to the spinal cord.

The Method of extirpation or ablation (remove):- Extirpation means cutting out or destroyed, it take help of neurosurgeons and get removed some portions of brain tissue or destructive electric current applied through electrodes and resultant behavioural changes are observed. This kind of injuries whether experimental or accidental are termed as “lesions”.

Action potential method:- Researchers have some sensitive electrical recording devices. The neurons while conducting, produce electrical currents and the potential underlying them can be recorded. Some of these are tiny changes in electrical waves some other monitors of brain can detect differences in the amount of work going on in different sections of the brain, moment by moment.

The method of stimulation:- The area of brain Associated with sensation, can be mapped by stimulating patients brain, during surgical operation and obtained introspective report, and also observe as to which muscular part of the body make movement during stimulating of the brain.

In recent times, technique of stimulation has been developed with the help of electrodes fixed in the area of desired stimulation, a stiff wire positioned by a rack and pinion device is clamped to the head.

Chemical method:- some measured amount of drug or hormones are injected into test animals and resultant reactions are observed.(drug or hormones are independent variables while the resultant physical or behavioural changes are dependent variables)

Selective breeding:- Experimenter raises a number of generations of plants and animals and systematically sort out each generation member and observe the changes occurred.

Theories of brain function:-

Localisation theory of functions:- Each part of the cerebrum perform definite functions which it can perform alone.

Localisation of function is the idea that certain functions (like,- language memory etc)have certain locations or areas within the brain. It could perform a definite function such as sensory, motor and Association function.

· Sensory function:- Johannes miller brought forth the doctrine of specific nerve energies. According to this, a sensory nerve produces certain type of experience even though it is stimulated. Example:- if back portion (occipital) of head of individual is struck , person “sees stars” because occipital lobe is related to vision.

· Motor function:- This area is narrower than sensory area. The structure of neurons of motor area is pyramidal tract. Three areas in the brain have been found to perform motor functions.

1) Primary area:- It concentrated in front of the fissure of Rolando which extends both- forward and backward. Long axons lead down from this area through spinal cord to the motor neurons, supplying motor nerve impulses. On stimulation of this area, some voluntary muscle-group have been found to respond. Conversely, when areas in this region are destroyed, impairment of movements occur.

2) Secondary area :- located near the fissure of Sylvius. But little is known about the functions of this area.

3) Supplementary motor area:- located in the longitudinal fissure near the middle line of the brain, involved in control of movement and with postural control and muscle tone.

Secondary and supplementary motor areas sends small axons to the nuclei in the interior of the cerebral hemisphere. Another small axon go to the nuclei in the brain stem and then make a chain of such neurons lead to spinal cord.

The short neuron system play a major role in the control of movement. If uncontrolled, disorderly movements happened such as trembling, jerks etc are caused as some part of it are damaged and can be cured.

· Association function:- Many large areas of the cerebral cortex which are unconnected with sensory motor processes are called association area. These areas perform integrative functions of the input coming from more than one sensory channel and perform higher order functions such as learning, memory and thinking, reasoning, emotionally charged activities, motivational behaviour etc.

Damage or injuries cause loss of connected functions. Disorders in association areas related to language are called “aphasias”. Some people fails to organise elementary sensory elements into Normal perception called “ agnosias” (inability to know).

The agnosias and aphasias on the basis of nature of the functions are of three types:-

Astereognosis:- loss of ability to recognise solid objects through the sense of touch.

Alexia:- “ word blindness” inability to recognise printed words.

Sensory aphasia:- “ word deafness” inability to recognise spoken words.

Mass action theory or “ Equipotential theory” :- it is the theory that the brain has the capacity ( in the case of injury) to transfer functional memory from the damaged portion of the brain to other undamaged portion of the brain. This hypothesis put forward by ‘karl Spence lashley’.

Memory can’t be localised to a single cortical area but is instead distributed throughout the cortex.

Different areas or part of the brain are more or less interchangeable functionally. The propounders of this view are franz, lashley, goltz, monakow etc.

It has been observed that impairment on injury in a particular area, though causes disturbance or almost complete loss of function connected with the area, but this is not a permanent loss of function. Gradually, owing to practice, the lost functions reoccur. It so happens because the adjoining area of the injured part takes over to discharge the function of the injured part such evidences go to prove that each area in the brain is equally potential to perform similar functions.

Hence, it is also called Equipotential theory.

What are Emotions in Psychology?

2021-04-15T21:22:00.004+05:30

Emotion

Emotions-psychotalks24

Emotion is defined as a complex state of feeling that results in physical and psychological changes that influence thought and behaviour.

· It is any conscious experience characterized by intense mental activity.

· It is cognitive process, subjective experience and expressive behaviour.

· Emotion is an conscious experience.

· It is a sudden reaction to a stimuli.

· It is affective state of the individual.

· Emotion derived from the word “ emovere” which refers to the stirred up state.

· It works on reflex action.

· Our Psychological appraisal of a situation is informed by our experiences, background, culture and gender ; and different people may have different emotional experiences of similar situation (individual differences)

· The field of Psychology examines emotions from a scientific perspective by looking at their mental, physiological and behavioral components.

· The experience of emotion follows a complex biological process that include the limbic system, ANS( autonomic nervous system) and RAS (reticular activating system).

· Emotion word comes from Latin word "mote" which means to move, it is a state of being moved.

Basic emotions:- such as gloom, delight, love, fear, anger, jealousy, disgust, shame, pride, worry, anxiety, joy, sorrow, zeal, awe, contempt, patriotism etc.

Anger:- frustration leads to anger and then to aggression. Any kind of interference in the goal directed activity makes one red with anger.

The sympathetic nervous system discharge of the hormones when people afraid and those who were angry at themselves had higher amount of “epinephrine hormones” (adrenaline) those who were angry at the experimenter, secreted “ norepinephrine hormones” (noradrenaline).

In the liver epinephrine helps mobilize glucose (blood sugar) into the blood and thus makes energy available to the brain and muscles. Both of these hormones tend to increase heart rate and blood pressure.

Sometimes anger doesn’t attack or hitting the source of anger, it express it on some other substitute, that is called ‘displaced anger’.

Child express their anger in the form of – temper tantrum, surliness, bad temper, bullying and fighting.

Teenagers express anger in form of sarcasm, abuses, bossiness, verbal threats, gossiping and even plotting.

Adults seldom express anger, because by adulthood superego is activated, which makes them mature. However milder form of anger expressed sometimes in verbal remarks and avoid.

Fear:- fear is a learned emotion. In infancy or childhood, fear is usually caused by sudden loud noise, unexpected strange situation.

When child grows younger fear shift in imaginary creatures, loneliness, darkness and all those objects which are potential to body harm.

In adulthood, fear occurs , social fear- being left alone, of being ridiculed, criticism etc. For adult, such things which pose a threat of failure, loss of money or property, status, feeling of insecure, separation from dear one or family, bad health etc.

Some fears are unlearnt – such as fear of loud noise, sudden loss of support, pain etc.

As we know, fear can be developed through conditioning procedures. This experiment is done by Watson and Rayner (1920) on an infant 11 month baby – named Albert. In beginning, boy didn’t display fear of animals, he plays with rabbit instead of getting away. In experiment, a white furry rat shown to him and almost simultaneously followed by a sudden loud burst of sound. The boy shrink back to get away from it. It was a natural response to natural stimulus. The repeated procedures developed fear of white furry rat in the boy but also to any white furry object.

We also learn through discrimination, learning provides us with information as to what object is dangerous or what is delightful.

Besides socialization, cultural values, social norms etc also makes learn to fear.

Love and affection:- Both are so tied together. In fact the two terms are used interchangeably to cover entire empathetic aspect of affective feelings associated with pleasure. Everyone have their own choice like- someone may love a toy, a pet, a novel , any objects and persons.

Physiological or covert emotion:-

· Heart rate and blood pressure:- emotions like anger, fear, makes change in the rate of heart beat ( increase) this is caused by hyper functioning of the sympathetic nervous system because of this blood pressure also brings changes either hyper or hypo i.e. ( high or low).

· Change in breathing:- in emotion, change in breathing also. Such as rate of breathing may either speed up or slow down.

· Change in skin temperature:- it is assumed that experience of emotional security results in rise of skin temperature while emotional stress results in drop of skin temperature.

· Some other inter physiological changes:- changes occurring in secretory functions of the salivary glands are observed in the state of fear in the form of dryness of mouth, disruption in digestive functions, sweating or dryness of skin, hyper excretion tension of skeletal muscles resulting in tremor etc.

· Changes in glandular responses:- Adrenal glands ( located at the top of each kidney, it produce hormones that helps the body control blood sugar, burn protein and fat, react to stressors and regulate B.P., two most important adrenal hormones are cortisol and aldosterone).

In the state of strong emotion such as anger, adrenal glands get excited and pours excessive amount of ' adrenaline' as well as ' non- adrenaline' hormones into the blood.

Under the influence of adrenaline, the liver releases stored sugar into the blood, this cause chemical changes in blood resulting in quick clotting of blood, rise in B.P., rapidity of pulse rate, enlarging lungs to admit more air, enlargement of eyes pupils to admit more lights, rise in skin temperature and excessive sweating particularly on the palms of hand.

Non- adrenaline hormones brings about constriction of blood vessels at the body surface.

Glandular responses help the emotionally charged individuals to cope physically with the emergency situation during emotion. However, if the emotion provoking situation is not met by direct action, the hyper glandular functioning prove harmful to the individual.

· The galvanic skin responses ( GSR):- (a) tissues generate electro motive force

(b) the electrical resistance of the skin is charged. This changes are measured by a very sensitive electrical apparatus called ‘GSR’. It is also called psycho galvanic responses (PGR).

· Pupillometrics :- during emotion, certain changes in pupils of the eye take place (increase/ decrease). Dr. Eckhward hess discovered a new device in the year 1960, it is known as pupillometrics.

External changes or overt expression in emotion:-

· Facial expressions:- language of face is stronger communicator than verbal words. Face is a borometer of communicating one’s feelings and emotions. Thompson (1941) studied blind childs and found that different emotions can be differentiated , such childrens never seen the pattern of changing in different type of emotions even then different emotions could be found on their faces.

Engen(1957-1958) have shown that three dimensions of emotion:-

(a) Pleasant- unpleasant:- faces are judged in these degree.

(b) Attention- rejection:- in attention, wide open eyes, flored nostrils, openness of mouth etc. In rejection, all reverse. Eyes, nostrils, lips are highly shut as if keeping the object out of stimulation.

(c) Sleep- tension:- relaxation of sleep, i.e. emotions are at the lowest. Tension is the expression of extreme emotional arousal.

· Vocal expression (para language):- emotions judged by listening to the sound also. Cues like – loudness, pitch, tremor or break in voice, screaming sounds, express the emotions like- anger, fear, enjoyment, sorrow etc.

· Postures and gestures:- every posture associated with an emotions. If someone is in fear, he flees in anger, make aggressive gestures. In sorrow, turns head downwards, while in joy- hold the head high and chest out.

Role of CNS and ANS in function of emotion:-

CNS (hypothalamus) :- impulses from receptors travels into the CNS(central nervous system). Some go up to the spinal cord While other enter the brain directly. The nervous system integrates the sensory information of the emotion provoking situation sensation received from emotional response mechanism interpret them and experience the emotion. Hence, CNS play a vital role in emotion.

Impulses from receptors to upper level of brain pass through lower brain centre known as thalamus. Beneath it are situated a group of nerve centres called ' hypothalamus'.

Hypothalamus play three important function in emotion:-

(a) Impulses from receptors to cerebral cortex pass through it. Impulses from viscera and muscles also pass through it.

(b) Impulses also come into hypothalamus from cerebral cortex viz. When we remember or think of an emotion provoking situation, impulses are initiated and pass through it.

Hypothalamus is the seat of emotion because it also exert control over voluntary muscles in emotion. It has been observed that diseases or lesion or tumour in the Hypothalamic region causes emotional apathy, sleepness and even narcolepsy ( an epileptic disease characterized by extreme sleepness).

Role of ANS( autonomic nervous system):- physiological changes in emotions:- such as sweating, rapid heartbeat, rise in blood pressure and so on, are controlled by ANS. It has purely motor functions. It is divided into two parts :- sympathetic and parasympathetic. Function of two divisions are antagonistic to each other.

For example:- hyper functioning of sympathetic nervous system brings acceleration in the activities of internal organs:- heart, digestive organs, glandular activities etc. This results in rise of heart rate, blood pressure, excessive secretion of endocrine glands etc. While parasympathetic nervous system hyper functioning lower down the activities of internal organs.

One division of ANS accelerates the visceral activities, another inhibits it and thus results in effective coping with the emotional situation. Antagonistic functions of the ANS is useful in the sense that through it, very effective control of visceral organ is possible and thus play a significant role in adjustive behaviour during emotions.

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Read what are emotions part 2

Cause of ID

2021-03-17T20:17:00.004+05:30

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Causes of Intellectual Disability:-

causes of mental retardation

· Genetic factors: - About 30% of cases of ID are caused by hereditary factors.

It may be established by genetic factors in two ways.-

1) Through transmission of some defective genes in the chromosomes of one or both parents. It is often the results of pairing of two defective genes. When defective recessive genes are paired, as in PKU (phenylketonuria), the production of an enzyme, necessary for an hour important metabolic process, is usually disturbed. It affect on the embryo and causes I.D.

2) On account of chromosomal aberration. - Down’s syndrome or mongolism is one such disorder which is said to be caused by chromosomal aberration. The most prevalent genetic condition includes Down’s syndrome, klinefelter syndrome, fragile x syndrome, PKU, William syndrome, prader-willi syndrome, neurofibromatosis, congenital hypothyroidism.

· Infection: - it can also be the result of many infectious diseases like syphilis, rubella, toxoplasmosis and encephalitis which can damage brain tissue and the nervous system. If the mother suffers from any one of these diseases, she may transmit infection to the developing fetus.

· Problem during pregnancy: - a pregnant person who drinks alcohol or drug use, malnutrition, certain infections like rubella or preeclampsia may also have a baby with intellectual disability. According to a survey, 3000 child affected because of fetal alcohol syndrome, due to using alcohol by mother.

· Problem during childbirth: - if baby born extremely premature, or has problems during labor such as not getting enough oxygen, he or she may have developmental disability due to brain damage.

· Intoxication: - A number of toxic agents like carbon monoxide, mercury, lead and various immunological agents like anti- tetanus serum or the use of small pox, rabies and typhoid vaccine may result in brain damage during development after birth.

Similarly, region of the pregnant mother.

· Socio-psychological factor:- children’s who are denied the satisfaction of their Psychological and social needs become over- sensitive to Psychological stress, or lack of adequate mothering and parental care results in retarded.

In socio-cultural environment, the children are deprived of the basic necessities of life for their proper physical, intellectual, emotional and social development. A poverty ridden, deprived, crowded and uncongenial family environment provides sufficient as well as necessary grounds for the germination and perpetuation of mental sub- normality.

- Ignored or neglected infants who are not provided with the mental and physical stimulation required for normal development may suffer irreversible learning impairment.

- Children who live in poverty and suffer from malnutrition, unhealthy living conditions, abuse and improper or inadequate medical care are at a high risk.

Clinical types of mental retardation;-

· Cretinism: - This intellectual disability ranging from moderate to severe retardation results from ' thyroid deficiency'.

- Severity of this disorder depends the age at which it occurs.

- Physical shape- dwarf-like, thick-set body, coarse and thick skin, short and stubby extremities, abundant hair of wiry consistency and thick eyelids that gives a sleepy appearance.

- Broad flat nose, large and flabby ears a protruding abdomen and failure to mature sexually.

· Microcephaly: - Associated with ‘failure of cranium' to attain normal size on account of the impaired development of the brain.

- They has an unusual small head which rarely exceed a circumference of seventeen inches, (normal child have 22 inches approx.)

- They are short statured with the usual cone shaped skull and receding chin and forehead.

- Fall into the profound, severe or moderate categories.

- Both genetic and non-genetic factors cause brain.

- No proper medical treatment.

· Hydrocephaly: - Results from the accumulation of an unusual ‘large amount of cerebrospinal fluid within the cranium'.

- Causing damage to the brain and enlargement of the skull.

- Gradually increase in the size of skull.

- Causing seems to be genetic and non-genetic.

· Phenylketonuria (PKU):- it has a genetic base transmitted through a recessive gene carrying metabolic disturbance.

- At birth, lacks an enzyme needed to breakdown phenylalanine, an amino acid found in protein food. Thus, the accumulation of phenylalanine in the blood causing damage to brain tissue.

- Symptoms such as vomiting, a peculiar musty odor, infantile eczema and seizures, motor incoordination, signs of mental retardation.

· Amaurotic idiocy: - Rare hereditary disorder of fat metabolism transmitted. It has two different forms- infantile and juvenile.

- Major symptoms include- muscular weakness, inability to maintain normal posture, loss in the ability to grasp objects, visual difficulties progressive to blindness.

- Its infantile form, also known as ' tay-sachs’ diseases.

- Common among infants, appears at about 6 months of age, and death occurs between the ages of 2-3 years.

- Juvenile amaurotic idiocy occurs at 5-6 years of age and patient may live up to thirteen years.

· Mongolism: - (down ‘syndrome) the facial characteristics match to members of the Mongolian race.

- The retardation in them ranges from moderate to severe (IQ approx. 20-50)

- Look short in stature with small round heads, short neck, thumbs and fingers with almond shaped eyes, short flat nose, small mouth, fissured and dry lips and lounge. Hands and feet’s are broad and clumsy.

- They have a deep voice.

- Motor coordination is awkward.

- Some of them can learn self-help skills, acceptable social behavior.

- Causes are faulty hereditary, metabolic factors (glandular imbalance often involving pituitary glands).

- There is no effective treatment or prevention.

Treatment:-

v Genetic counseling and voluntary birth control: - chromosomal aberrations as well as pairing of defective recessive genes prove it for normal brain development cause. Test may help to identify the problems and should control the birth.

v Proper care of mother and child:- in fetal alcohol syndrome, pregnant women shouldn’t drink alcohol, getting proper care, taking prenatal vitamins and getting vaccinated against certain infectious diseases can also lower the risk of I.D. child.

v Providing normal and stimulating environment after birth: - Great need for educating the parents and others, and then they give the children normal as well as stimulating environment for the proper growth and development. Illiteracy and poverty of the parents and poor environment shouldn’t come in the satisfaction of basic needs.

v Provision of special education and training to subnormal’s:- intervention programs that assess children. In such training schools, help them in basic skills as bathing, feeding, extracurricular activities and social programs also needed.

Why some people can't remember things easily

2021-03-09T22:09:00.003+05:30

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Mental Retardation/Intellectual disability

Mental retardation is condition or state of mind.

It is not a diseases or illness of the mind; it is a developmental disability that appears in children between the ages of 0-18. They are having trouble in daily activities, lack of skills necessary for day to day living.

Mental retardation term used in DSM 4 but now replaced by” intellectual disability” in DSM 5.

Some important definitions

American association on mental deficiency: - Mental retardation refers to significantly sub-average intellectual functioning existing concurrently with deficits in adaptive behaviour and manifested during the developmental period.

British mental deficiency act: - Mental retardation is a condition of incomplete development of mind existing before the age of 18 years wheather arising from inherent causes or induced by diseases or injury.

According to James page: - it is a condition of subnormal mental development, present at birth or early childhood which is characterized by limited intelligence and social inadequacy.

Child with intellectual disability has limitations in two areas:-

· Intellectual functioning: - Also known as IQ, this refers to a person’s ability to learn, reason, make decisions and solve problems.

· Adaptive behaviour: - These are skills necessary for day to day life, such as being able to communicate effectively, interact with others, and take care of oneself.

Keypoints:-

· People with intellectual disabilities can and do learn new things or skills but they learn them more slowly in comparison to normal child.

· It is related to the subnormal development of the mind or brain.

· It is also related to one’s inadequate adjustment with the environment.

· The deficiency may be observed at birth or early childhood.

· Both, inherent and external factors may cause mental retardation.

· If individual has an intellectual functioning level below 70-75, are intellectual disabled.

· Intellectual disability is thought to affect about 1% of the population.

According to WHO (world health organization), subnormal’s IQ characterized between:-

Mild (IQ 55 to approx 70)

Moderate (IQ 35-40 to approx 50-55)

Severe (IQ 20-25 to approx 35-40)

Profound (IQ below 20-25)

1) Mild mental retardation: - Approximately 85% of the mentally retarded population is in the mildly retarded category.

- Their IQ range scores from (50-70) approx.

- They can acquire academic skills up to about the sixth grade level.

- They show sign of delayed development early in life and learn to walk, talk, feed and toilet themselves a year later than the average.

- Speech disturbance and slow learners in school.

- They exibit immature behaviour and lack of judgement.

- They can expect to reach a reasonable degree of educational and to make adequate social and economic adjustment with community.

2) Moderate mental retardation: - About 10% of the mentally retarded population is considered moderately regarded.

- Their IQ scores ranging from 35-55.

- They attain intellectual level similar to six years old child.

- Physically they appear clumsy, suffer from Motor incoordination

- They show sign of retardation in almost all areas of development.

- They manage to speak, their rate of learning is too slow, only acquired the basic skills of reading and writing.

- They require constant supervision and support and need institutionalization depending on their general level of adaptive behaviour.

- They are able to live with the community in such supervised environments as group homes.

3) Severe mental retardation; - About 3-4% of mentally retarded population included in this section.

- They have IQ scores of 20-40.

- They attain only average of ‘four year old child' intellectual level.

- They show severe motor and speech incoordination, sensory defects also.

- They need care and supervision of others also in necessary skills and functions like feeding and dressing.

-great need for institutionalization.

- Proper care, timely treatment and specialized training and managing their physical well being needed.

4) Profound mental retardation: - only 1-2% of mentally retarded population is classified in this.

- IQ scores below 20-25.

- They attain an intellectual level of average ‘two year’ old child.

- The symptoms associated with them are retarded growth, physical deformities, pathalogy of the central nervous system, mutism.

- Severe speech disturbances, motor incoordination, deafness.

- They are unable to protect themselves against common dangers.

-such individuals are completely dependent on others and need the care and supervision.

- Essentially, they need to be institutionalized.

Sign and symptoms of I.D.

Signs may appear during infancy or until a child reaches school age.

· Delayed speech.

· Slowness in developmental achievements such as rolling over, sitting up, crawling, and walking late.

· Difficulties transitioning from normal stages of development such as potty training or feeding and dressing ownself.

· Difficulty in remembering things.

· Difficulty with problem solving or logical thinking.

· Difficulty adapting to new situations.

· Inadequate memory.

· Behaviour problems such as explosive tantrums.

· Difficulty in social adjustment, language and motor skills.

· In severe cases, child may also have concurring physical and psychological problems such as hearing or vision problems, seizures or mental disorders.

Cause of Mental Retardation in part 2

What is Attitude : Definition in Psychology

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Attitude

Attitude is a mental state because it exist in a person’s mind.it is a basic aspect of social cognition, influence our thoughts and affect our behaviour.

It is as a mental set or preparedness that could significantly influence physical reaction time.

Attitude may be positive or negative. It affect our thoughts, behaviour and influence behaviour.it can be learned through one’s own experiences and through interaction with others.

Definitions :-

An attitude is defined as an individual’s tendency or predisposition to evaluate an object or a symbol of that object in a certain way. –Katz and Stotland.

Attitude refer to certain regularities of an individual’s feeling, thought, and predisposition to act towards some aspect of his environment. – Secord and Backman.

Attitude as the keystone in edifice of the field of social psychology. – G Allport.

Person’s mind would tend to fall into a set pattern or attitude that would colour his perception of the situation. – H.Spencer and Alexander Bain.

So, attitude is defined as an enduring system of three components centring about a single object,- cognitive, feeling and action.

Tripartite model or ABC model of attitude :-

So, any attitude has these three components:-

· Affective component - it is the way a person feel toward objects, events or other person.

· Behavioural component – it is the action that the person takes with respect to object, person or situation.

· Cognitive component – it refers to the way the person think about another person, object or situation.

Function of attitude:-

· Instrumental or heuristic function :- individual develop positive favourable attitude toward objects that are rewarded and unfavourable attitude toward objects that punish. It is also known as adjustive or Unitarian function.

· Knowledge or schematic function :- it concern with how a person organises and processes information about his social world. It allows us to see the social world as a more familiar, predictable and less uncertain place.

· Self-esteem function :- a person obtain satisfaction by expressing himself in terms of attitude that are appropriate to his personal values and self concept. It enhance self-worth.It is also known as value- expressive or social identity function.

· Ego- defensive function :- attitude can serve to protect people from themselves and other people. People protect himself from being criticized of unpleasant truth or harsh realities of himself by holding a particular attitude.

· Impression motivation function :- our attitudes can shift in order to create positive view or desired impression on others, to make our good impression on others. It is also known as management Function.

Formation of attitude :-

· Genetic factors:- it plays some role in the formation of attitudes.

Research shows that attitude of identical twins correlated more highly than non-identical twins towards many social issues.

· Learning based on association- classical conditioning :- our process of social learning is classical conditioning, based on Association of stimulus and responses plays an important role in the formation of attitude.

Example :- if a child in the classroom frequently finds that the teacher call his class fellow as lazy, stupid etc, indicating an unfavorable attitude of the teacher, so the child also develops similar negative attitude towards that fellow.

· Learning based on consequences- instrumental conditioning :- in this, learning is based upon direct experience with the attitude object.

If a person experience reward to attitude object, he develops a favourable attitude,and if he experience punishment after interacting with attitude object, he may develop a negative or unfavorable attitude towards the attitude object.

Religious, social and caste issues are found similar to their parents, so parents play an important role in shaping the attitude of child.

· Learning based on illustration- observational learning :- attitude are learnt through observing the behaviour of significant others. Many child develop attitudes by what they observe their parents or others. Also observe mass media, television, films, magazines, newspaper and so on.

· Social comparison :- people’s compare ourselves with another person or group of people and develop attitude as we think it to be proper.

So, attitude developed as a result of social comparison/ information, with our desire to be similar to the people whom we like.

· Miscellaneous factor :- 1) Group membership :- in group, pressure to show conformity and they shape our attitudes and our behaviour. (group or culture norms)

2) Child rearing:- in this, parental values, beliefs and practices affect attitude of the children.

3) Chance conditioning:- learning takes place by chance or by mere coincidence.

4) Direct instruction:- given by parents, teachers or others.

5) Interaction with others:- attitude developed when the person is surrounded by other people with that kind of attitude.

Attitude change:-

Attitude change occurs anytime an attitude is modified, change occurs when a person goes –

- From being positive to negative (incongruent)

- From slightly positive to very positive ( congruent)

- From having no attitude to having one.

Sometimes, the same influences that lead to attitude formation can also create attitude change.

· Learning theories of attitude change :- classical, operant conditioning and observational learning can be used to bring about attitude change.

· Elaboration likelihood theory of attitude change :- this theory of persuasion, says that people alter their attitude in two ways- first, they can be motivated to listen and think about the message, thus attitude shift. Second, they influence by the characteristics of the speaker, leading to a temporary or surface shift in attitude.

· Self perception theory :- when we have no ( or a very weak) prior existing attitude on a particular issue we can infer our attitudes from observing our own behaviour.

· Cognitive dissonance theory :- people can also change their attitudes when they have conflicting beliefs about a topic, in order to reduce the tension created by these incompatible beliefs people often shift their attitude.

· Balance :- attitude change if there is a state of Imbalance between the P-O attitude, O-X attitude and P-X attitude. (P- person whose attitude is being studied, O- another person/object, X- topic towards which the attitude is being studied)

Imbalance found when all three sides of P-O-X are negative or two are positive and one is negative.

Balance is found, when all three sides are positive or two sides are negative and one is positive.

For more psychology notes click here

Humanistic Psychology

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Introduction

Started taking shape in 1960s from the work of Abraham
Maslow and Carl Rogers

Milestones:

In 1951, Car Rogers published ‘client centered therapy’ and

in 1954, Maslow published ‘Motivation and Personality’

Reckoned as third force in psychology

It was a reaction to both Psychoanalytic theory and

Behaviourism

Humanistic psychology took a more positive view of human

nature

Antecedent Influences

Roots of ideas of the humanistic psychology can be found

in the works of earlier psychologists

Franz Brentano who had earlier opposed Wundt’s ideas of

studying structure of consciousness. Brentano was of view

that consciousness should be studied as a molar quality

rather than a molecular content

Kulpe was of view that conscious experience cant be

explained in terms of mere responses to stimuli. They are

more than that.

William James emphasized that psychology should focus on

functions of consciousness and the whole individual rather a

mechanist view of a person. He also was concerned with

problems and needs of human being. In his book Principles of

Psychology, he included a chapter on self which acted as

precursor for other self theorists.

Gestalt psychologists in their views that our experiences are

more than simple sensations. They emphasized upon

wholeness of experience.

Psychoanalysts like Adler and Horney who opposed the

deterministic views of Freud that personality is shaped by

unconscious forces. They believed in human being’s strength to

overcome their past.

Emphasis on uniqueness of individuals.
Optimistic view of human personality
Human beings should be studied as whole
Human beings have innate tendency to reach to their maximum potential.
Studies should be person centric rather group centric

Studies on Animal wouldn’t help in understanding of human beings.

Focus on free will and creative power of human beings
Person centered therapy

Strengths

Weaknesses

Where do it stand today? in part 2

What is an Interview : Definition Types and Techniques

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Definition of Interview

Interview refers to a one-on-one conversation with a specified purpose, where one person acts as interviewer and other person is in the role of interviewee.

 According to Kerlinger - “The interview is face to face interpersonal role situation in which one person, the interviewer, asks a person being interviewed, the respondent questions designed to obtain answers pertinent to research
problem.”

 According to Dezen: “An interview is any face-to face conversational exchange where on

 According to Good and hatt: “Interview is a process of social interaction between interviewer and interviewee.”

 According to APA(American Psychological Association):

Interview is a directed conversation in which a researcher, therapist, clinician, employer, or the like (the interviewer) intends to elicit specific information from an individual (the interviewee) for purposes of research, diagnosis, treatment, or employment. Conducted face to face, by telephone, or online, interviews may be either standardized, including set questions, or open ended, varying with material introduced in responses by the interviewee.

Characteristics of Interview

 A widely used research technique.

 Interviews involve social interaction

 It is a directed conversation with specific purpose.

 Provides in-depth knowledge about the issue being
investigated.

 Different types of data are generated from interview
depending upon different type of questions a researcher
asks.

 Interview is a type of verbal communication.

 There is considerable flexibility in the process of interview.

Types of Interview:

Structured and Unstructured

Structured Interview

 According to APA(American Psychological Association):

“ Structured Interview is a method for gathering information,

used particularly in surveys and personnel selection, in which

questions, their wordings, and their order of administration are

determined in advance. The choice of answers tends to be

fixed and determined in advance as well. With structured

interviews, answers can be aggregated and comparisons can

be made across different samples or interview periods;

interviewees can be assessed consistently (e.g., using a

common rating scale); and order effects are minimized. Also

called standardized interview.

 It is a quantitative research method.

 Predetermined set of closed-ended questions are used.

Interviewer asks same questions in the same order from

every interviewee.

 Also known as formal interview.

 Easy to replicate, this means it is easy to test for

reliability.

 Structured interviews are less time consuming, so large

sample can be obtained with this method. This considerably enhances representativeness of sample.

Unstructured Interview

 According to APA: “ Unstructured interview is an interview

that is highly flexible in terms of the questions asked, the

kinds of responses sought, and the ways in which the

answers are evaluated across interviewers or across

interviewees. For example, a human resource staff member

conducting an unstructured interview with a candidate for

employment may ask open-ended questions so as to allow

the spontaneity of the discussion to reveal more of the

applicant’s traits, interests, priorities, and interpersonal and

verbal skills than a standard predetermined question set

would. Also called nondirective interview.”

 In such type of interviews, set questions are not used.

 Interviewer asks open-ended questions based on a specific

topic and tries to give whole process, a natural flow.

 Interviewer remains free to modify his questions based on

respondent’s answers at any moment if he considers it

necessary.

 Often called informal interview.

 Generates qualitative data. Interviewer is able to get dipper

understanding of person’s situation. This improves validity of

this method.

Merits of Interview method

 In-depth investigation is possible.

 Interview is a great tool to discover how individuals think

and feel about a topic and why they hold certain

opinions.

 Useful to obtain detailed information about personal

feelings, perceptions and opinions.

 Produces high response rate.

 Respondent’s own words are recorded and if there is

any ambiguity, follow up questions are asked to clear it.

 In one on one conversation, interviewee feels less self

conscious.

Limitations

 Time consuming and costly.

 Different interviewers elicit different response from same

respondent.

 Interviewer can be biased.

 Interviewee can sometimes hide correct information.

what is a dream and how does it work

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DREAM

Image by Stefan Keller from Pixabay

“It is an altered state of consciousness based on our emotions, fantasies or conscious experience.”

A dream is a succession of images, ideas, emotions and sensations that usually occur involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep.

Early Stages

In early age, the philosophers and experts believed that the nature of dream is supernatural. So, at the time of dreaming, the soul travels away from the body. At this stage, whatever the soul sees or listen, there is a dream.

This is the reason that philosophers and experts think that the sleeping person should not take up suddenly or else the soul will not be able to enter the body, so that the person may die.

After Stages

After that it was believed by some religious scholars that dream was a reward of divine force, it is an supernatural event effected by the god, if they are happy on human being then he/she sees a happy dream and if god is rage, person see unpleasant dream.

Philosopher Aristotle, Thomas Hobbes and physiologist Galen believed that during sleep, organic changes causes in our body by external stimuli.

Some facts about dream:-

· The scientific study of dreams is known as “oneirology”.

· Dream mainly occur in R.E.M.(Rapid eye movement) stage.

· Cicero’s statement - Nature of dream is meaningless.

· Dream is a mental process, which is constant.

Characteristics of dream:-

· Dreams are meaningful.

· Dreams are symbolic.

· It is hallucinatory in nature.

· Dream are subjective and ego- centric.

· It also hint towards future.

· Dream express the repressed wishes of unconscious.

Types of Dreams

Mainly divided into two types :- simple and complex dreams.

But modern psychologist divided it into seven types according to that event or content see in dreams.

· Wish- fulfilment dream.(person may see that their wishes comes true about which he/she thought in real life)

· Anxiety dream ( person feel fear, sweating and sometimes crying in their dreams due to fear)

· Punishment dream.(if somebody has done any fault and feel guilt about that then he/ she sees himself punished by someone)

· Prophetic dream (person may see future hints)

· Protest dream (person seeing himself to break social norms which he/she can’t did in reality)

· Resolution dream ( people sometimes found solution of mental conflicts in dreams)

· Kinesthetic dream (person who have strong imaginative power seeing himself doing extraordinary things. Like, flying, having super power and fighting with enemies e.t.c)

Freud’s theory of dream:-

According to Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) dreams are indirect, disguised and symbolical expressions of the repressed and unconscious sex wishes. The sex wishes are often banned by the society and not allowed adequate fulfilment in waking life. Therefore, they are represssed and become unconscious.

In the waking condition these unsocial sex wishes are not allowed by the censor or super ego to enter into the field of consciousness. So during sleep , the censor or superego relaxes but alert, so the repressed sex wishes put on a disguise form and appear as dreams.

According to Freud:-

· “Dreams are the royal road to the unconscious”.

· Dreams were the “guardians” of sleep.

· Dreams are symbolical expressions of libidinous desires.

· Freud give his dream theory in his book-“ The interpretation of dream(1900)”

Dreams are of two types:- 1) Manifest content and 2) latent content.

1) Manifest content:- it is that content in which the basic dreams include as it appears to the dreamer.

2) Latent content:- it consist the actual meaning of dream which comes into disguised or symbolic form in dreams. All those unacceptable thoughts and desires repressed in unconscious and then those desires comes into symbolic or disguised form in dreams.

The process by which the latent content of dream is transformed into manifest content, known as “dream work”, or “dream mechanism”.

The latent content of sex wishes into manifest content is affected by means of ‘ condensation, omission, displacement, dramatization and secondary elaboration'.

· Condensation:- it means that the dream may represent many needs and impulses simultaneously.

· Omission:- it means that an event that expresses an unacceptable desire directly is admitted to give the dream an innocent appearance.

· Displacement:- of affect means the transference of feeling or emotion from an important element to an unimportant element of the dream.

· Dramatization:- means visualization and projection.

· Secondary elaboration:- means the attempt of the dreamer to make the manifest content coherent and intelligible.

Criticism:-

· Dreams are not only motivated by sex- desire.

· Not only direct or indirect fulfillment of repressed desires.

· Wishes are not only by unconscious.

· Freud only studied and analysed on abnormal person and formulate theory.

Jung theory of dream:-

According to Jung (1875-1960), dreams are a way of communicating and acquainting ownself with the unconscious.

I. Dreams are window to unconscious.

II. Dreams are the direct natural expression of the current condition of the dreamer’s mental world.

III. Dreams interpretation was built on,” collective unconscious”.

IV. Jung said, dreams are not sees the unconscious as animalistic, instinctual or sexual. He sees it as more spiritual. Eventually, jung split with Freud due to their different view on dreams.

V. Dreams work on present situation.

VI. Symbols are different from person to person.

VII. Collective unconscious- it means transfer from one generation to another.

VIII. He believed, nature of dreams is to present a spontaneous self portrayed, in symbolic form of the actual situation in the unconscious.

IX. Dreams Speak in a distinctive language of symbols, images and metaphors, a language that is the unconscious mind’s natural means of expression.

X. According to jung, dream express not just personal content, but also collective or universal content- that is archetype dreams.

XI. In archetype dreams- the symbols have some meaning universally.

· The persona

· The shadow

· The anima/ animus

· The wise old man

· Divine child

· The great mother

· The trickster

Jung believed that the world’s religious and mythological traditions contain s wealth of archetypal images.

Alfred Adler viewpoint on dream:-

According to Adler, when we dreaming, our unconscious is creating a way for you to deal with a problem without having to face upset emotions and thoughts in waking life.

· Dreams are problem solving device.

· Meaning of symbols of dream depends completely on the individual separately.

· Dreams have future content.

Sleeping Process

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What does the Brain do when we sleep ?

We all know from experience that sleep varies from drowsiness to sound sleep from which it is very difficult to wake. its an important part of our daily routine—we spend about one-third of our time doing it and it is essential for survival.

Sleep is important to a number of brain functions, including how nerve cells (neurons) communicate with each other. In fact, our brain and body stay active while we sleep. Recent researches suggest that sleep plays a important role that removes toxins in your brain that build up while you are awake. According to Sigmund Freud; our all unfulfilled desires, unsocial wishes , unacceptable thoughts etc which are not allowed adequate fulfilment in waking life. Therefore they are represssed during sleep and become unconscious.

Everyone needs sleep, but its biological purpose remains a mystery. Sleep affects almost every type of tissue and system in the body – from the brain, heart, and lungs to metabolism, immune function, mood, and disease resistance. Recently , However, experimenters studying sleep have learned that the Electroencephalogram (EEG) a tracing of the electrical activity of the brain ( or “brain waves”), provides a good index of the depth of sleep. since the tracing can be made without disturbing the sleeper, the EEG has become a standard measure of sleep depth. The tracings have also made it possible for investigators to know when someone is dreaming during sleep.

Variations in the activity of the ARAS( Ascending reticular activating system) play a large role in the control of the levels of sleep and the EEG pattern which accompany them. The ARAS also has an important influence on the brain activity that occurs during dreaming.

In general, as a person falls into deeper and deeper sleep during the night, the “brain waves” becomes progressively slower and higher in voltage. Starting with the Alpha rhythm (10 Hz) of the drowsy waking state, the brain waves slow until they may have a frequency of only 1 to 3 Hz.

Based on EEG patterns, investigators have divided sleep into 4 stages. In stage 1, a relatively- large proportion of the “brain wave” activity is fairly fast; in stage 2 and 3, the proportion of slower activity increases; and stage 4 is characterized by a large proportion of very slow ( 1 to 3 Hz) activity.

Sleep Stages

There are two basic types of sleep: Non-REM sleep (which has three different stages) and REM sleep- rapid eye moment (the 4^th stage) Each is linked to specific brain waves and neuronal activity.

Stage 1 non-REM sleep is the changeover from wakefulness to sleep. During this short period (lasting several minutes) of relatively light sleep, your heartbeat, breathing, and eye movements slow, and your muscles relax with occasional twitches. Your brain waves begin to slow from their daytime wakefulness patterns. Relatively- large proportion of the “brain wave” activity is fairly fast.

Stage 2 non-REM sleep is a period of light sleep before you enter deeper sleep. Your heartbeat and breathing slow, and muscles relax even further. Your body temperature drops and eye movements stop. Brain wave activity slows but is marked by brief bursts of electrical activity, in stage 2, the proportion of slower electrical activity increases in brain.

Stage 3 non-REM sleep is the period of deep sleep that you need to feel refreshed in the morning. It occurs in longer periods during the first half of the night. Your heartbeat and breathing slow to their lowest levels during sleep. Your muscles are relaxed and it may be difficult to awaken you. Brain waves become even slower than stage 2.

MRI of Brain

REM sleep first occurs about 90 minutes after falling asleep. Mixed frequency brain wave activity becomes closer to that seen in wakefulness.it is characterized by a large proportion of very slow ( 1 to 3 Hz) electrical activity. Your breathing becomes faster and irregular, and your heart rate and blood pressure increase to near waking levels. Most of your dreaming occurs during REM sleep, although some can also occur in non-REM sleep. Your arm and leg muscles become temporarily paralyzed, which prevents you from acting out your dreams. Memory consolidation most likely requires both non-REM and REM sleep. New born baby spend 50% of sleep in their REM stage and adult 20-25%.

One of the striking facts about the sleep pattern through the night is its cyclical nature, it moves from stage 1 to stage 4 and back again several times.

The EEG(electroencephalogram) is a record of the slowly changing electrical activity of millions of nerve cells, all functioning at the same time in the brain, with suitable amplification of the electrical activity, the EEG can be recorded by attaching electrodes to the scalp. These brain waves are really very small voltage changes, in the range of millionths of a volt. The number of alternations of voltage per second, or the frequency of the electrical changes, varies from 1 or 2 in deep sleep to 50 or more in highly aroused states. The range of frequencies of the EEG is from about 1 to 50 Hz.

How Lie Detector Works

2021-02-17T21:01:00.000+05:30

Lie detectors

Lie Detector Machine

Lie detector are also called polygraphs, the word polygraph means “many writer”; these devices have this name because they make simultaneous records of several bodily reactions thought to be indicative of emotional arousal.

Physiological changes during lie detection procedures:-

Most polygraphs measure changes in blood pressure, heart rate, breathing rate and depth, and the resistance of the skin to the flow of a small electric current (the galvanic skin response, or GSR).

Aim of the test:-

The aim of the test is to help the suspects establish their truthfulness, and describes the polygraph as a scientific instrument for the measurement of various bodily responses.

Process or pattern of lie detection:-

The examiner obtains biographical information from each suspect and goes over the dozen or so yes/ no questions that will be asked about the suspect.

The examiner may use any one of several questioning techniques. A common one is the control- question technique. In this technique, neutral questions, general questions designed to evoke an emotional response from almost everyone, and specific questions designed to evoke responses only from those with guilty knowledge are used.

The rationale of the control- question technique is that an innocent person who knows nothing of the details of the crime should give a larger response to the control questions than to the specific questions, while the suspect with guilty knowledge should, while also responding to the general questions, give a large response to the specific questions. Thus it is the pattern of polygraph responses on the control and specific questions that is supposed to give a clue to lying or truthfulness.

Example:- in case of stolen, a general question might be “did you ever steal anything before you were 18?” since most of us have, a polygraph response would be expected. A specific question might be “ what happened to the money in the red envelope?” while the difference between the responses to the general and specific questions can be quantified, interpretation of the polygraph record remains somewhat of an art, requiring intuition and judgement on the part of the examiner.

Uses of lie detection machines:-

These machines are use in trying to discover guilt or innocence, lie detectors are sometimes used for other purposes :- The police may sometimes use them in an attempt to force confessions from suspects, business and government agencies use lie detector tests to screen applicants for employment.

How good is the polygraph at detecting liars:-

Psychologists who are skeptical about the accuracy, or validity, of lie detector tests and those whose business it is to give such tests. A number of studies indicate that properly administered tests correctly identify some 70-90 percent of deceivers. However , a very important problem is the large number of false positives ( truthful people who are judged by the polygraph to be lying).

Benjamin Kleinmuntz and julian szucko estimate that false- positive judgements “may label more than 50% of the innocent subjects as guilty”.

Benjamin Kleinmuntz

The examiner may have a difficult time with this. Furthermore, it is possible to “beat the machine”. If a suspect engages in some silent on going mental activity- such as counting backward by 3s- while being examined, responses can be blunted.

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Experimental Psychology

2021-02-07T20:28:00.000+05:30

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Founded by William Wundt

Experimental method in psychology :-

It is another scientific method of psychology founded by William wundt at Leipzig laboratory, Germany, this is an observation done under controlled conditions.

In an experiment,the experimenter does three main functions lies on control method :-

· He changes or varies some event which are hypothesized to have an effect.

· Keeps other conditions constant.

· Looks for an effect of the change or variation upon the behaviour choosen for observation.

Thus,the method is simple enough. But it is highly technical and follows a pre-planned systematic order of observation, pre-planning involves :-

· Careful definition and analysis of the problem.

· Formulation of hypothesis

· Classification of variables.

· Techniques of controlling extraneous or relevant variables.

· Detailing of systematic procedures of observation.

Hence, an experiment is also termed as ‘ systematic’ or ‘ pre-planned’ observation.

Variable :- As stated above, experiment involve variables. A variable is that which varies, variables are those attributes of objects, events, things, and being which can be varied and measured.

Viz breathing or sudden noise is a fact or event. These events are not static, rather they vary or change in quality or quantity. A noise may vary in its intensity of loudness. It may be rapid or slow , deep or shallow. In the similar way, all events, facts, things attributes etc which vary are variables.

Types of variables :-

· Independent variable :- Independent variables are those whose effects are studied in an experiment.

· Dependent variables :- Dependent variable is an experiment is a factor about which the experimenter makes a prediction regarding the possible changes due to manipulation of the independent variable in a certain way. Example :- Suppose a medical scientist plans an experiment to study the effect of vit.’x’ on maze learning activity of rats. Here, vit.’x’ is an independent variable because the experimenter is likely to vary this variable in certain ways ( i.e. giving vit.’x’ to some rats and not to others or giving more to some than others). The resultant effects or changes on learning ability of rats will be dependent variable in this experiment.

So, in course of planning an experiment, the experimenter also identifies some more independent variable which may influence the dependent variable. But, since the effects of these independent variables are beyond the preview of study in the experiment, these are called extraneous variables which are kept under control (kept constant) . This is done with a view to ensure greatest possible accuracy and clarity of result.

Thus, the purpose of an experiment is to establish an invariable relationship between any two or more than two variables. This relationship explains the “ cause and effect relations” of behaviour events. This purpose is achieved by manipulating the independent variable ( cause) and observing its resultant effects ( result) in a systematic order.

Merits of experimental method :-

· Most objective and impartial; one of the objectives of psychology is objective collection of facts about behaviour events. The experimenter notes what the subject does in a particular condition and not what he feels or thinks.

· Control; control is another important characteristics because extraneous variables remain controlled, therefore, obtained facts are more reliable, valid and accurate.

· Replication; we can report an experiment again and again and be sure of the observation. This makes the observation reliable.

· Quantitative analysis; Through experiment, data are obtained in quantitative form. Therefore, statistical analysis is possible which makes the analysis precised and solid.

· Wider applicability; experimental method has wider applicability. It can be applied on all living beings of all the ages.

· Standardization; experiments are performed under standard conditions. Therefore, it is one of the standardized methods of study.

Limitations :-

· Experiment cannot be always used. In psychological experiments, the experimenter works with livings – peoples or animals. These subjects are not docile. Therefore, they are not always willing to cooperate.

Example :- it is hardly possible to experiment with what makes a happy marriage.

· Experiment is artificially arranged. Hence, the observed facts under artificial conditions are also likely to be artificial. Under the circumstances, the responses of the subjects may not mean the same as it really means.

· Experiment is high technical, it requires well trained experimenter who has obtained knowledge of its technical implications.

· Most of the experiment require sophisticated apparatus and well developed laboratory conditions. This involve huge finance.

· Most of the variables are beyond control of the experimenter. Hence, absolute accuracy of observation is not possible.

मनोविज्ञान पहला खंड

2021-02-05T20:48:00.001+05:30

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इस पोस्ट को english में पढने के लिए यहा क्लिक करे

नैदानिक मनोविज्ञान का परिचय।

यह मनोविज्ञान से संबंधित एक शाखा है जिसमें

लोगों का मानसिक स्वास्थ्य शामिल हैं

मूल्यांकन और निदान, हस्तक्षेप या

उपचार होता है

नैदानिक मनोविज्ञान

मानसिक स्वास्थ्य।

डब्ल्यूएचओ के अनुसार यह केवल अनुपस्थिति नहीं

मानसिक बिमारी है । यह अच्छी तरह से अवस्था के रूप में परिभाषित किया गया है

जिसमें हर व्यक्ति को अपने होने का एहसास होता है

उसकी क्षमता, सामान्य तनावों का सामना कर सकती है

जीवन का, उत्पादक और फलदायी रूप से काम कर सकता है

और अपने या में योगदान करने में सक्षम है

उसका समुदाय

मानसिक स्वास्थ्य संज्ञानात्मक, व्यवहार संबंधी है,

और भावनात्मक भलाई।

अन्य संबंधित क्षेत्र से क्लिनिकल मनोविज्ञान का भेद।

 असामान्य मनोविज्ञान

Al मनोविश्लेषण

Ry मनोरोग

 परामर्श मनोविज्ञान

 स्कूल मनोवैज्ञानिक

 मनोरोग सामाजिक कार्यकर्ता

Habilitation पुनर्वास मनोवैज्ञानिक

N मनोरोग नर्स

नैदानिक मनोविज्ञान की गतिविधि।

Inter थेरेपी / हस्तक्षेप

 निदान / मूल्यांकन

 शिक्षण

 शोध

 परामर्श

Ical क्लिनिकल पर्यवेक्षण

 प्रशासन

नैदानिक साइकोलॉजी की परिभाषा।

अमेरिकन साइकोलॉजिकल एसोसिएशन

क्लिनिकल साइकोलॉजी का क्षेत्र विज्ञान को एकीकृत करता है,

सिद्धांत, समझने और कम करने के लिए अभ्यास

कुरूपता, विकलांगता और असुविधा के साथ-साथ

मानव अनुकूलन, समायोजन और व्यक्तिगत को बढ़ावा देना

विकास। नैदानिक मनोविज्ञान पर केंद्रित है

बौद्धिक, भावनात्मक, जैविक, मनोवैज्ञानिक, सामाजिक,

और मानव कामकाज के व्यवहार संबंधी पहलू

जीवन अवधि, अलग-अलग संस्कृतियों में, और सभी सामाजिक आर्थिक पर

स्तर।

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Psychology Gyan 3 (मनोविज्ञान)

2021-02-05T20:17:00.001+05:30

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STRUCTURALISM

STRUCTURAL psychology was established at Cornell University( America) in 1898 by British psychologist Edward Bradford Titchener.

Cornell University America

He was student of wundt,he done his ph.d under wundt in 1890-1892 At Leipzig University.

Read about Wundt theory

Titchener established structural psychology in his paper- “The postulates of a structural psychology”.

Edward Bradford Tichener

#Basic features of structural psychology :-

1.subject- matter of psychology:- Titchener psychology was the study of conscious experience dependent upon the experiencing person.He didn’t accept wundt’s idea that psychology studies only immediate experience.

Titchener distinct between mind and consciousness that mind was sum total of person’s experiences summed from birth to death, and consciousness was sum total of person’s experience at any given time.

Titchener stated three basic problems of psychology –

· What – analysis of mental experience into its simplest form.

· How – discovering how these components are combined.

· Why – is the way mental events correlate with their physiological conditions,(brain and nervous system).

Titchener analyzed the three basic elements of consciousness – sensations, images and affections. Titchener had rejected wundt’s” tridimensional Theory of feeling “ (pleasant- unpleasant, strained- relaxed, and excited- calm). He accepted only the first one and later, even rejected that also.

Titchener gives 4 basic attributes of elements of consciousness- quality, intensity, duration, clarity(clarity only in sensation and image, not available in affection), later he added extensity in this list of basic attributes.

Titchener rejected wurzberg’s point – “ imageless thought”,he said that it is because of faulty or incomplete introspection because people always start imagining during any thinking process or conversation.

2.Methodology of psychology :- like wundt, titchener also considered introspection and experimentation to be the primary methods of investigation in psychology.For him, experiment is an observation that could be repeated, isolated and varied.

In introspection, he encountered a problem that is “ stimulus error”, it means to see things or object rather than the conscious experiences, generated by the concerned object or thing. Example:- To see a table and call it table – ‘stimulus error'.

3.principles of selection:- Titchener use the concept of attention. In this, concious elements are arranged and thus, it becomes the focus of consciousness. He outlined three stages of attention :-

· Native or involuntary or primary attention (basic factors like quality or intensity of sensory experience required).

· Voluntary or secondary attention- (purposeful focusing on elements in consciousness).

· Derived or habitual attention- (arise due to repetition of similar learnt factors in past).

He regarded that these stages are continuous, not separate ones.

4.principle of connection:- For Titchener, “law of contiguity” was his main law of connection or association.

“Law of contiguity”- any sensory or imaginal contents occurs in our present experience ,who are likely to appear in past.

Meaning of sensation or image was the result of connection between past Associations and images – (Titchener, in context theory of meaning, 1915).

5.Emotion:- For Titchener, emotions are intensified feelings arising from sensations within the body. For him, 2 methods to study emotions –

· Method of impression- (used when comparison of different affective characteristics).

· Method of expression – (study on the basis of bodily changes).

6. Thinking:- Titchener criticise the wurzberg’s point that- the process of thought was imageless. According to Titchener, the result of wurzberg’s wese caused by the faulty or incomplete introspection.

He also rejected the”will” element – fundamental by wundt.

He accepted determining tendency of ach and the thought maybe unconscious – viewpoint of wurzberg’s.

7.Mind-body problem :- As wundt believed, Titchener also accepted that mind and body are different from each other. No interaction and neither cause between them called ' psychophysical parallelism'.

CRITICISM of STRUCTURALISM

· It was too ‘self-contained’ and it was limited to the analytical framework of conscious experience.

· No interest in practical applications of psychology.

· No interest in applied branches of psychology, he excluded child, Animal, social and abnormal psychology.

· He ignored Watson behavioural studies, that they were not psychology.

· Introspection changed into retrospection because it take some time to report about the conscious content, some of them are forgotten.

· Act of introspection might change the experience itself. Example – inspecting the experience of anger, the state of anger disintegrate and finally disappear.

· This method in different laboratories were getting different results.

· Some data( unconscious) couldn’t obtained by this method of introspection and it doesn’t work on animals.

· Gestalt psychology studied psychology phenomena as a whole and this is not whole. It studies only on elements.

Similarity in wundt and Titchener :-

· Subject-matter of psychology was conscious for both.

· Introspection , experimentation and observation are primary methods of psychology.

· Both believed in psychophysical parallelism.

Dissimilarity in wundt and Titchener :-

· For wundt, - two elements of conscious experience ( sensation and affection),but for Titchener- three elements of conscious experience (sensation, image and affection).

· For wundt- Two primary attributes of concious experience (quality and intensity), but for Titchener- four primary attributes of conscious experience (quality, intensity, duration, cleanness and later he added one more that is extensity)

· Wundt gave- tridimensional theory of feeling but later Titchener rejected this theory.

· Titchener rejected applied and practical aspects of psychology, wundt had some inclination towards practical psychology.