Read the narratives below that f

10 Paragraphs maximum!!!!




Read the narratives below that feature quotes from 16 fictional persons. The quote from each fictional person is related in some way to one or more concepts that are covered in PSY100/105.



Select 5 of the 16 quotes. Try to choose the five that you can do the best job of answering according to the criteria given below.



For each of the 5 quotes that you select, please write one or two paragraphs that accomplishes the following:

· Identify the psychological concept or concepts in the quote using correct terminology from the course. If the concept is closely associated with the writings of a particular theorist (such as Bandura, Erikson, Freud, Jung, Harlow, Kohlberg, Kubler-Ross, Lazarus, Maslow, Pavlov, Piaget, Rogers, Skinner, Spearman, etc.) then provide that information. Explain how the quote fits the concept.

· Identify the general perspective or approach to psychology that the concept falls under (such as behavioral, biological, cognitive, developmental, humanistic, psychodynamic, etc). If the concept doesn’t fit into one of those categories, then at least identify which part of psychology it deals with (such as learning, memory, states of consciousness, etc).

· Describe the concept, using your own words, in two or three sentences.



Format: This is not a research paper. Since it is not expected that you will need to cite any sources, it does not need to be written in APA format. Write it as if it were an essay on an exam.



Peter*



Peter’s quote describes how his Uncle Tex reacted to learning that he had a terminal illness. This relates to the stages of dying proposed by Elizabeth Kubler-Ross. When Tex first gets the news, he refuses to acknowledge the situation, which corresponds to Kubler-Ross’s stage of “Denial”. Later, Tex becomes very difficult, lashing out at his family, which corresponds to Kubler-Ross’s stage of “Anger”. Thus, Peter’s description of Tex’s experience goes along with the first two of Kubler-Ross’s stages of dying.



Kubler-Ross’s stages of dying theory falls under the general perspective of developmental approaches to psychology. Like several other developmental theories, it is a stage theory. Kubler-Ross proposes that there are five stages to the process of dying: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. This is a true stage theory which holds that persons go through this series of stages in this particular order. At first, the dying person tries to evade the reality of the diagnosis (denial). As the reality of the diagnosis sinks in, the dying person tends to lash out at family and caregivers (anger). Subsequently, the dying person develops the hope that death can be postponed or delayed, often by making promises to God (bargaining). Her last two stages are depression and acceptance.



*This is given for illustrative purposes only – to give an example of how to write the 1-2 paragraphs. Peter is not a choice amongst the narratives you have to choose from.







NARRATIVES



Zelda, 30 year old mother and part-time retail worker.



I took my daughter to the Virginia Science Museum last weekend. They had some cool exhibits there. The one that struck me as most interesting is a specially-built room. A person standing at one end of the room looks like a giant. Yet, if she stands on the other end, she looks tiny, like a miniature version of herself. The secret is in the way the room is shaped. Your brain thinks that every room is a normally-shaped room – it gauges your size by how you look compared to the room. When the room isn’t a normally-shaped room, such illusions can occur.



Alan, 30 year old engineer.



I used to think that it didn’t matter how you treated people, as long as you got the technical stuff right. Yet, as I worked with people on various projects at work, I’ve learned that I could get better technical results if I took their feelings into account. I’m not saying get all touchy-feely or anything like that. I’m just saying that it helps to pay attention to your own emotions and the messages that you are giving off, and to pay attention to how others are feeling. Sometimes, one of your workers may just need a little encouragement. So, I think that the technical stuff and the intelligence it takes to master that isn’t really the only intelligence that you need.



Becky, 21 year old single mother and part-time college student.



I recently got a job working at a credit card company. We are applying scientific principles to business problems. For instance, we developed two different versions of marketing materials, offering a 2.9 percent introductory rate to prospective customers. We randomly assigned half the people on the mailing list to get one version, while the rest of the people got the other. We then see which version gets the biggest response. This approach is a really big deal at the company. In fact, managers can get in trouble if they don’t use random tests like this. It is almost like being a scientist. We’re not discovering the secrets of consciousness and the universe, but we are discovering what best works with our customers.



Catherine., 65 year old retired teacher.



One of the best parts about being a grandparent is watching my grandchildren grow. I like seeing them pass the various milestones and rites of passage as they grow. It also intrigues me to see how they develop morally. At first, it is like “I shouldn’t steal because Daddy will spank me”. Later, they begin to have an appreciation that society works better if we all obey the rules. Of course, they eventually figure out that there are principles that are more important than obeying the rules. I have grandchildren in all of those phases now. I’m very proud of them, and I know that all of them are on their way to becoming the best persons that they can be.



Daniel, 25 year old full-time college student.



This past summer I worked in a warehouse at nights. We would load trucks from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. One fantastic thing about the job was that I learned to drive a forklift. It was very hard at first; there are a lot of things to control. Driving the forklift took all of my attention – I couldn’t do anything else at the same time -- not even smoke a cigarette. Then, as I got used to it, driving the forklift become second nature; it then took much less attention.



Working the night shift wasn’t too bad, though I didn’t sleep quite a well as I usually do. The worst part of it was when they called me in to work during the day on a couple of weekends. That was rough. Even though I wasn’t really sleepy, per se, I had some mental lapses that almost caused an accident.



Ellen, 45-year old sales associate.



One of the things that being a parent teaches you is that each of your children is different. When I was growing up the big theory of the day was that parents shape their children through a process of rewarding their behaviors. It’s hard for me to see how that could be true. Just look at my two boys Zack and John. They couldn’t be more different, but both were brought up in the same environment and my husband and I treated them the same way. What’s more is that they were different from the git-go. Even as babies, John was pleasant and agreeable, while Zack was disagreeable and prone to temper tantrums. Thank goodness that both of them are growing up to be outstanding young men, but I can see that they still have these same basic tendencies and I think they’ll always be that way.



Fred, 70 year-old retired business manager.



Retirement has been good to me. It was a big adjustment at first, but I really enjoy being able to spend my time the way I want to. Whenever possible I spend time with my grandchildren. I have five of them, ranging in age from 6 to 22 years of age. My three grown children are all in their mid to late 40’s. They are getting well-established in their careers. I’m very proud of them.



In my opinion, my kids are doing a pretty good job of raising my grandchildren. I’ve been there and done that, of course. It isn’t always easy, as I well know. I’m very pleased to see them passing on their knowledge and values to my grandkids, just as I passed on my knowledge and values to them.



George. 35 year-old building contractor.



When I was in the 9th and 10th grades my parents sent me to a private boarding school. It pretended to be a military academy, but I felt that it was a second-rate operation and I really hated it there. Fortunately, Mom and Dad ran out of money, so I got to finish high school in the public high schools. Even though I’ve long forgotten most of it, some of that experience has stayed with me. For instance, at the boarding school, we always ate meals in a mess hall. They always rang a bell before flinging open the mess hall door. To this day, my mouth waters whenever I hear a bell ringing! It’s just like one of Pavlov’s dogs.



The boarding school also had a chemistry lab that perpetually smelled like sulfuric acid and xylene. Any time I catch a whiff of either substance, it triggers a flood of memories from that miserable place. So, sometimes, if I catch a whiff of battery acid or if one of our subcontractors is using xylene as a solvent or paint thinner, it takes me back to the boarding school.



Harold, 35 year old professional.



Some psychology principles really work. Some years ago, I worked as an orderly at an inpatient facility for children with special needs. One of our clients wasn’t making any progress with her lessons because she was constantly babbling. We noticed that she liked to listen to the radio. Every time she would start babbling, we would turn off the radio for a few minutes. After a while her babbling was far less frequent. She then began to make progress with her lessons.



With some of the older patients, we would reward them with these poker chips whenever they completed their lessons on time. Later, they could cash in these tokens at the commissary for candy and other things. Before long, most of the patients were completing their lessons on time.



Ida, 39 year old manager.



I’m worried about my brother. The last time I saw him I asked him how he felt. He said “What kind of question is that? Who the heck cares how I feel? In fact, I’ve been feeling fine. Happy, yeah, that’s the ticket. I feel happy; darned happy, even. So don’t worry about me, Sis”. I think he was “protesting too much”. I think that he is very unhappy and that he is in denial about it.



He has been drinking more than usual and seems very grouchy and hostile. When I asked him about that, he angrily said “Me, hostile? You’re the one who’s being hostile! I’m sick and tired of your angry attitude!”. It was almost as if he was taking his hostility and attributing it to me.



June, 50-year old writer and author.



There are some folks who think that you have to have your basic needs met before you can become the best person you can be. They think that food and water and security needs have to settled before you can be your best. Then, they say, you need to focus on belong and what-not. I have trouble with that idea. My grandfather is a good example of how people can actualize their best talents and be the best person that they can be – even under adversity. Grandpa was a dirt-farmer in Oklahoma during the Dust Bowl years. He worked hard all the time – and in some years it was all for naught. Many nights he went to bed hungry, so that his kids could eat. Nonetheless, he was always motivated to be creative and to become the great person that he was, even in the worst adversity.



I believe that every person has their own kind of genius, but that they often don’t develop it. They get so caught up in listening to other people tell them what they should and shouldn’t do and how they “ought” to be that they forget to be true to themselves. So, what I tell my own kids – and what I still tell them – is learn to trust your own organism. Not everyone can be a rocket-scientist, but everyone can excel in their own area if they just learn to trust themselves and tap into their God-given genius.



Karla, 32 year old telecommunications worker.



Every summer, we spend at least a week at the cabin in the Adirondacks that has been in my family for three generations. We have modern amenities, now, but the windows are small and it isn’t well lit. When we walk in from a bright sunny day, it seems very dark inside the cabin. Within a few minutes, my eyes get adjusted to the lower level of light and it no longer seems dark.



Lane, 28 year old factory worker.



Some people think that dreams mean something. As for me, I don’t go for all that nonsense about what dreams say about your unconscious. However, I do think that you sometimes dream about things that are on your mind. For instance, if I’m having problems at work or in my relationship, I sometimes dream about that subject. So, I think you dream about things you are thinking about in your everyday life.



Mildred, 72 year old retired mail carrier.



My memory isn’t as good as it used to be. For instance, sometimes I have trouble remembering a phone number long enough to dial it. Yet, I’m not worried about it, because I don’t seem to have any trouble with other types of memory. I’m good at remembering concepts that I learned in school, like the capital of Colorado or the names of the countries in Central America. Moreover, I can remember happenings from the past with about the same facility as any other person of my age. Of course, some of the things I learned in my life, like swimming or riding a bicycle are things that you never lose.



Nathan, 55 year old sales professional.



My Uncle John drank heavily all his life. I guess his liver could take it. In the end, though, I think all that alcohol took a heavy toll on him. His liver could take it, but his brain couldn’t. He couldn’t remember things and became very disorganized. Near the end, he was basically incoherent. So don’t tell me that alcohol is harmless. In my opinion, it has caused as much human misery as any other drug.



Odie, 44 year old musician.



The way you think affects your life. That’s what I believe. If you think about gloomy things, you turn into a gloomy person. So, I always try to think positive. That’s the way it works with most of us. However, some people have a chemical imbalance in their brain. Look at Mom. After Dad died, she got very gloomy. I was really worried about her. She got some Prozac or something from her doctor and that helped bring her back to normal. So, I’m not saying that pills are the answer for everything. Pills are not the answer for all ailments. All I’m saying is that some people need more than positive thinking, they need help to cure a chemical imbalance.