"en psychology" via mard barani in Google Reader

Response 9

2009-11-09T17:05:56Z

1) You are taking a history class and the professor relies entirely on essay exams. When you arrive to the final exam, the room has been moved to a different building, because a leak developed in the ceiling. According to Godden & Baddeley’s study, will your recall of the material at the final exam in the new classroom be better, the same, or worse than if it had been in the usual room? Why?

A student is likely to do worse on the test because of a new environment. According to context-dependent memory, memory benefits from the spatial-temporal, mood, physiological, or cognitive context at retrieval matches that present at encoding, i.e., you’ll do better on a test if you take it in the same place that you’ve learned the material.

Because the test is in essay form, the student may really have some memory problems (especially if they did not know the questions beforehand). The student will probably bullshit the entire essay exam if they’ve having memory problems–this will show the professor that they really didn’t know the material at all.

2) What if the history professor used multiple-choice questions instead? Would the same effect be there? Why or why not?

The student will probably still have memory problems from the new environment, but will likely do better on the exam if it is multiple-choice, simply because the student can guess on any questions that are not remembered (or seeing the answer may also make them remember it!).

Response 8

2009-11-09T17:05:13Z

1) Is a tomato a fruit or a vegetable? Why?

A tomato is a fruit–I read this in a magazine 8 years ago, so you know it’s true. It’s a fruit because of something with the seeds, I think…maybe something about how they grow, too…?

2) What about a coconut? Is it a fruit, vegetable, or a nut?

Although “nut” is in the name, a coconut is a fruit.

3) What are the defining differences between fruits, vegetables, and nuts (legumes)? In other words, what are the rules that we use to define fruits, vegetables, and nuts, so that we can tell them apart? Anyone know a good botanist?

Fruits usually are sweet. They grow from trees (bananas, apples, oranges, lemons), vines (grapes), bushes (blackberries, raspberries). They have seeds. They usually taste best when eaten raw.

Vegetables are not as sweet as fruits, typically. They grow up from the ground (peppers, lettuce) or underground (carrots, radishes, potatoes). They have seeds, and taste good cooked or raw–though don’t try to eat raw potatoes–NOT GOOD!

Nuts and legumes have a “meaty” consistancy. They are high in protein.

We can tell all of these apart because we know what they are. When seeing a new type of fruit, vegetable, or nuts, it’s usually easy to tell the difference–although there’s not a definite list of characteristics. These are just a part of our schema for what we know to be fruit or vegetable or nut, and if they don’t fit the schema, then they are something different entirely.

Why do we see faces in everything?

2009-11-09T17:04:10Z

There’s a word for the human ability to see something meaningful in random forms. It’s

Newsom is History (Reflections)

2009-11-09T17:00:01Z

It had to happen and finally did. Newsom dropped out of the governor race. That must have been hard for him. He is such a great politician. How can he have only 1.2 million and his opponent 7.4 million? How can it be so hard to get the Southern California to back him? He is the twitter man. He is so good he knew nobody read the daily newspaper of San Francisco unless a dinasour already. He is Gavin Newsom. He did quit finally and the pressure did not stop. He lost his media bet about quitting and finally had to go out of town rather than face those pesky journalists. What is the future? Nobody cares. Governor Brown sounds much better and will do California some good also. This city will not change much however. San Francisco has been a tiny village grown into a city overnight. The mindset has not changed over a century and probably will not. The city politics will not change unless the architecture changes. The city was not built on the grid system and has lots of hills. What does that mean? The local politics has unusual structure for a big city. In simple terms, the place operates like a village. The villagers do not count and a few know what is best for them. And that is that. What about the city government? They exist for the sake of the village. There is no city government. There are a few people who know best and run everything. What was that I read? The Chinese invented civil service and in this country civil service laws meant to turn small village mindsets into bona fide city operations. That never happened in San Francisco and probably never will. San Francisco was itself before, during and after Newsom. A dirty old city pretending to be hip.

*This post belongs to this week’s edition of Writing by Cush blog and published early in World of Cush

Why Do Behavior Analysts Charge what they Charge?

2009-11-09T16:57:11Z

I really have to address this issue.

Some will say at times:
But I just paid $125 for an hour to the OT or I just paid $300 for an hour with a DAN Doctor and $500 for nutritional supplements or I just paid $100 for an hour session with a Speech Therapist etc etc

Others have said:
I just paid the plumber $325 for a part and 30 minutes labor or I just paid $225 to the mechanic for a tune up on my car etc etc

In order to become a Board Certified Behavior Analyst, it takes ALOT of WORK and ALOT of money. Hours upon hours of schooling, hours upon hours of studying, hours upon hours of work experience and supervision. Then lots of money to pay for our graduate level schooling and further education. Money is needed to obtain then maintain our certification.

Next, it takes hours upon hours to advertise to get clients, hours upon hours to develop and get contracts, hours upon hours to network, hours upon hours to coordinate services, hours upon hours reading new books and current research, hours upon hours in just planning through a behavior assessment, a program and/or behavior intervention/plan etc etc.

Psychologists, Psychiatrists. Speech Therapists, Physical Therapists, Occupational Therapists etc, including the Plumber and Auto Mechanic, they all charge their fees, they all have to make a living. Thus Behavior Analysts have to make a living too.

Marxism and Psychology Conference

2009-11-09T16:48:45Z

Marxism and Psychology

MARXISM AND PSYCHOLOGY CONFERENCE

Call For Papers

Marxism and Psychology Conference, The University of Prince Edward Island, August 5-7, 2010

Website: http://vre.upei.ca/mprg/

Contact: marfken@upei.ca

Submission Deadline: January 15, 2010

In the history of social thought, it is difficult to find a more divisive figure than Karl Marx. For many, the mere mention of his name conjures up images of totalitarian regimes dominating nearly every aspect of an individual’s existence. Yet for others, Marx’s critique of the capitalist mode of production draws attention to the fact that our beliefs, thoughts, and desires inevitably emerge against the background of specific cultural, historical, and social practices.

The purpose of this conference is to bring students, scholars, and activists together to discuss exciting issues at the intersection of Marxism and Psychology. While it is clear that a number of organizations are making important contributions to this area of study, we believe that the time is right to open up a space for students, scholars, and activists from a variety of disciplinary backgrounds to reflect on the role that Marxism can play in psychological theory, research, and practice.

In bringing together scholars at the forefront of research in Marxism and Psychology, we also hope to give new students and activists an opportunity to interact with individuals who have made significant contributions within this area. By organizing an impressive collection of plenary participants, we hope to foster an environment where students, activists, and scholars can identify potential graduate advisors, research assistants, and participatory investigators.

This year, confirmed plenary participants include: John Cromby, Raquel Guzzo, Lois Holzman, Gordana Jovanovic, Joel Kovel, Athanasios Marvakis, Morten Nissen, Ian Parker, Carl Ratner, Hans Skott-Myhre, Thomas Teo

Biographical information for the plenary participants can be found on the conference website.

We welcome submissions for individual papers and panel sessions. For individual papers, please submit an abstract (150-200 words) no later than January 15, 2010. For panel submissions, please include an abstract (150-200 words) for each paper as well as a brief description of the panel (150-200 words). Please submit all materials to marfken@upei.ca. Abstracts should either be in the body of the email or sent as an attachment (DOC or PDF format).

While the conference poster is available at the conference website, we also have color posters that need to be distributed widely. If you are interested in receiving some posters, please send us an email (marfken@upei.ca) with your mailing address.

For further information, please visit the conference website: http://vre.upei.ca/mprg/

Sincerely,

Michael Arfken, PhD. Director, Marxism & Psychology Research Group (MPRG), Department of Psychology, University of Prince Edward Island, marfken@upei.ca, http://sites.google.com/site/marfken/

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

Abandonment Issues

2009-11-09T16:42:22Z

Reading Science magazine on the commuter rail, I discover that the sun was probably not born an only child, as once believed, but rather one of a cluster of stars that has since dispersed. I pause to consider the universe and am caught by a sudden and overwhelming sadness, sitting helpless as I am while planets and galaxies fly from me at incomprehensible speeds. Because I have also read about climate change on this trip, and the DR Congo, I understand why the universe flees us. Still, I feel its departure is premature, like fans who leave the arena when a comeback is still possible.

Effects of immersion in nature on intrinsic aspirations and generosity (Weinstein et al., 2009)

2009-11-09T17:10:27Z

This is a non-video game study, but its implications could be significant to video games or media in general. For an unknown reason, this article showed up in my database alert, normally I would ignore it if it wasn’t for Andrew Przybylski as co-author. See university press release. Abstract Four studies examined the effects of nature on [...]

Do they need us or do we need them?

2009-11-09T16:23:35Z

I’m working my way through an interesting little book called Captured by Aliens by Joel Achenb

Firmcom.be

2009-11-09T16:18:33Z

New projects of Firmcom in Belgium

www.firmcom.be

Fear Not.

2009-11-09T15:56:25Z

Jesus tells us many times not to fear.

This is because he knows that we are really spiritual beings.

We are not our bodies.

We are not our emotions, or thoughts.

We are not our egos.

And our true selves, our spiritual selves cannot be hurt by anything in this material realm.

This is because everything is energy. And the spiritual realm vibrates at a higher rate than the denser material realm.

It is important to overcome fear because it :–

Can prevent you from taking back control of your own life.
Can paralyse you and stop you from making the decision to change.
Can cause you to do nothing, to procrastinate and put off making a decision.
Can cause you to avoid taking any decisive action.

To deal with your fear:–

you must begin by using your free will to make a decision to confront and overcome your fear.
then you need to learn and understand how fear is able to take hold of you.
Fear is caused by illusions, which are incorrect beliefs you have about yourself, God and the world in which you live.
Fears are caused by your acceptance of illusions, incorrect beliefs that you have acquired from the media, your family, friends, education and religious upbringing.
The basic illusion prevalent on this planet, is the illusion of separation—the incorrect belief that you are separated from God .
Because you feel separated from God, you do not realize who you really are, ie. a spiritual being who is currently living in a physical body. You chose to come here and you planned what lessons you wanted to learn and what family and people would be in your life.
Look at the list of common fears and identify which ones apply to you.
Identify the illusion, the incorrect belief , that has caused each fear.
Decide to dismiss each fear, and no longer allow it to control you by replacing each illusion with the corresponding reality and truth of Christ.