Blog Post #3

The article titled "What? Me Biased?" from the New York Times was about how people may say they're not biased about things such as Obama being president but actually are. In most cases though their bias is not done consciously. The article says that most people subconsciously thought that Barack Obama was less American than some other white candidates. I learned that, that it is probably very true that people have bias even when they don't think they do. It's relevant to me because I'm sure I'm the same way. I don't think I'm racist or think that Obama is less American than anyone else but my subconscious may say something different. I took the test that they used in finding their information. It said that I moderately favored European Americans over African Americans. Which probably is true even though I don't think I'm racist what so ever. Although I don't see how this study could actually prove how people think of African Americans as less American. Because the things they ask you to do don't really give the idea that some people are more foreign than others, at least I don't see how it could. Honestly I think of African Americans just as American as any white person I'd be more likely to say that someone of a different race could possibly be less American, But not African Americans and I'm not saying that I have anything against other races either but now that I've read this I'm thinking a little more critically of my own thoughts. But then again who knows what my subconscious really thinks. This article really made me think, I really enjoyed writing this reaction.

I learned that if you want to remember a dream all you have to do is get up and stay awake for a few minutes. I can't even remember how times I've had a dream that I wanted to tell someone and then I couldn't remember. Now when I have great dream or even a crazy one that I have to share I'll know exactly how to keep myself from forgetting it.

The thing that surprised me most was that our five senses take in about 11,000,000 pieces of information per second. But we only consciously process about 40 of those pieces of information. Wow! Its the perfect example of my conscious mind and my unconscious mind and how much that goes on around me that I don't even realize is happening. It just makes me think how can that much actually be going on around me and me not even realize it.

I agree that dreams may serve as many different functions. Mainly because sometimes my dreams make sense and I know why I dreamt about the things I did. And sometimes they are completely random which may be the activation synthesis theory.

I know they say that if you really accept hypnosis it can really happen to you. But I have a hard time believing it's true. I think that people are just really relaxed and because they are open to it and because they want to be hypnotized they think they are. I've seen a few shows before where people I know are the ones hypnotized. And honestly I think they are playing it up a bit. Although after reading the section on pain I'm Beginning to think a little differently only because it's pain. You can only take so much pain and if something should hurt and it doesn't than maybe you really are hypnotized. Maybe you really are in a different state.

Blog Post #3

The two activities I did were "Seeing more than your eye does" and Contrast/Color "Illusions". In the first one I learned that your eyes have blind spots so your brain may "make things up" that you aren't really "seeing" and in the second one I learned that your brain makes "informal guesses" about what you see rather than what is actually there. Like with the colored squares that look one color but are actually another color. I learned that the brain does so much without you even knowing it. I probably would have been surprised about the colored squares if I hadn't seen things like that before. Now I will think more critically and not take everyday things for face value.

Well first of all I had no idea how much went into the brain. I knew it was complex but I didn't realize there were this many parts to it. I mean just in the neurons alone it's insane. I learned about the side of the brain that actually applies what it sees (opposite side of brain applies what it sees, the left visual Field is seen by the right side of the brain). So if you have a split brain it makes things a lot different. I also learned what all the functions are of each part of the brain. All of the functions of the brain have an impact on how we perceive information. What ever our brains tell us is how we see or feel something. Like if you would stimulate a certain part of the brain it would effect a certain part of your body. Each sense has its own sensory cortex. I sort of knew that our bodies did what ever our brains told us to I just didn't realize the complexity of it all.

I thought the video on the split brain was very cool. I didn't know for one it was possible to split the brain and two how what you see is actually seen by the opposite side of the brain. The whole thing is very interesting and I did actually try drawing the circle and a square and I couldn't do it:)

Blog Post #2

Research is important because we can use it to find out facts and information about tons of different things. If we didn’t use research we would be no where and wouldn’t fully understand the things we need to or want to. Psychology of emotions is relevant to my life because as far as I know everyone around me has emotions including myself. I think it’s important to understand how and why emotions work as they do. This was found in the article titled "Journey Through the Psychology of Emotions. Besides that I just think it’s a very interesting concept. One thing I learned from this chapter was the three different ways to describe behavior, case studies, surveys, and naturalistic observations. I think they’re important because they give you different types of descriptions to choose from to let you decide how specific you want to get into your research. Another thing I learned was what correlations were. Those are important because they help you to see possible cause and effects and the relationships that are shared. The last thing I learned was the different research methods, descriptive, correlational, and experimental. These methods allow having different levels of involvement. You can just describe, observe, or actually experiment in your research

Thinking Critically with Psychological Science

I thought psychology was about the study of the mind and people's behaviors. But that is such a vague way of saying it. There are so many parts to it. There are little details that have such an impact on everyday things. There's also so many areas of psychology that you wouldn't think were different but they really are.

Psychology is all around you. It's part of you, even if you don't realize it, your friends, your family and even strangers. Which means you're constantly affected by it. The way you interact with all those people and the way they interact with you is all part of psychology. Your reactions to each other in both actions and thoughts are involved in the world of psychology.

I think what I learned was that people rely on their intuition way more than they should. I always thought the "gut" feeling was a safe bet but now I know that people are over-confident and are often wrong. Now I know to think twice about my gut feelings. I also learned what you need to have to embrace a scientific attitude. I thought this was interesting because I never even thought about the type of mind set you needed to have to understand psychology.

Hey! I'm Cheyenne Gray, I'm 18 years old, and I attend Gilmanton High School. I think my family has shaped me into the person I am today because they are the ones who have instilled in me all of my values and beliefs. They've given me the option to be my own person and to achieve what I feel is important. Studying psychology is important because understanding how people work can be helpful in many different ways. Psychology is understanding how people work, why they do the things they do and just how people become who they are. I think it's very interesting how it all works.