Feminist Perspectives on the Family

ReviseSociology: Feminist Perspectives on the Family

A “blasphemy killing” at a university shocks Pakistan

Economist: A “blasphemy killing” at a university shocks Pakistan

Dissociative Disorders

Dissociative States
In psychology, the term dissociation describes a wide array of experiences from mild detachment from immediate surroundings to more severe detachment from physical and emotional experience. Dissociation occurs on a continuum—at the nonpathological end of the continuum, dissociation describes common events such as daydreaming while driving a vehicle. Further along the continuum are non- pathological altered states of consciousness. More pathological dissociation involves dissociative disorders.

Most individuals have experienced a dissociative state at some point in their lives. Consider if you are talking to a friend and suddenly you realize that you blanked out and missed half the conversation; or consider if you’ve been driving somewhere familiar, and you realize halfway through the drive that you weren’t fully paying attention but were instead on “auto-pilot.” These are both examples of dissociation. Dissociation of this sort is fairly normal from time to time; however, there are five types of dissociative disorders which are considered psychopathological: dissociative identity disorder, disociative amnesia, depersonalization/derealization disorder, other specified dissociative disorder, and unspecified dissociative disorder.

-Dissociative Identity Disorder
Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is a rare mental disorder characterized by at least two distinct and relatively enduring identities or dissociated personality states that recurrently control a person’s behavior; it is accompanied by memory impairment for important information not explained by ordinary forgetfulness. Amnesia in DID is understood to mean amnesia between two or more of the distinct identities; the host alter will experience “losing time” in the present another alter takes the place of the one the host alter. Rarely is the host alter aware of their time loss. Each of the distinct identities or personalities has its own way of perceiving, thinking about, and relating to itself and the environment.

Previously known as multiple personality disorder, DID became popularized in 1974 with the publication of the highly influential book (and later miniseries) Sybil. Describing what Robert Rieber called “the third most famous of multiple personality cases”, it presented a detailed discussion of the problems of treatment of “Sybil”, a pseudonym for Shirley Ardell Mason. Though the book and subsequent films helped popularize the diagnosis and trigger an epidemic of the diagnosis, later analysis of the case argue that Sybil may not have actually had DID.

-Dissociative Amnesia
Amnesia refers to the partial or total forgetting of some experience or event. An individual with dissociative amnesia is unable to recall important personal information, usually following an extremely stressful or traumatic experience such as combat, natural disasters, or being the victim of violence. Some individuals with dissociative amnesia will also experience dissociative fugue (from the word “to flee” in French), whereby they suddenly wander away from their home, experience confusion about their identity, and sometimes even adopt a new identity (Cardeña & Gleaves, 2006). Most fugue episodes last only a few hours or days, but some can last longer.

-Depersonalization/Derealization Disorder
Depersonalization is defined as feelings of “unreality or detachment from, or unfamiliarity with, one’s whole self or from aspects of the self” (APA, 2013, p. 302). Individuals who experience depersonalization might believe their thoughts and feelings are not their own; they may feel robotic, as though they lack control over their movements and speech; they may experience a distorted sense of time; and, in extreme cases, they may sense an “out-of-body” experience in which they see themselves from the vantage point of another person. Derealization is conceptualized as a sense of “unreality or detachment from, or unfamiliarity with, the world, be it individuals, inanimate objects, or all surroundings” (APA, 2013, p. 303). A person who experiences derealization might feel as though they are in a fog or a dream or that the surrounding world is somehow artificial and unreal. An episode of depersonalization/derealization disorder can be as brief as a few seconds or continue for several years.

-Other Specified Dissociative Disorder and Unspecified Dissociative Disorder
The old category of dissociative disorder not otherwise specified is now split into two according to the DSM-5 (2013): other specified dissociative disorder and unspecified dissociative disorder. These categories are used for forms of pathological dissociation that do not fully meet the criteria of the other dissociative disorders, or if the correct category has not been determined. Other specified dissociative disorder covers a variety of different presentation, including some symptoms similar to DID but not matching the distinct criteria. Unspecified dissociative disorder is often used in an emergency room setting where there is insufficient information to make a diagnosis.

Boundless Psychology: Dissociative Disorders

Free Will versus the Programmed Brain

Scientific American: Free Will versus the Programmed Brain


"On the other hand, the results fit with what some philosophers had predicted. The Western conception idea of free will seems bound up with our sense of moral responsibility, guilt for misdeeds and pride in accomplishment. We hold ourselves responsible precisely when we think that our actions come from free will. In this light, it’s not surprising that people behave less morally as they become skeptical of free will. Further, the Vohs and Schooler result fits with the idea that people will behave less responsibly if they regard their actions as beyond their control. If I think that there’s no point in trying to be good, then I’m less likely to try."

Stossel: Left's War on Science

Clearly there are those on both the right and the left who have ideological beliefs which can be anti-science, but as this video points out, the general narrative is that the left is pro-science.

Christie Blatchford: Unlike Canada, U.K. has learned sex assault 'victims' aren't always victims

Christie Blatchford: Unlike Canada, U.K. has learned sex assault 'victims' aren't always victims

Jerry Seinfeld - Awards are Stupid

Cognitive Psychology: Introduction

Cognitive psychology is the study of mental processes such as "attention, language use, memory, perception, problem solving, creativity, and thinking".(1) Fundamentally, cognitive psychology studies how people acquire and apply knowledge or information. It is closely related to the highly interdisciplinary cognitive science and influenced by artificial intelligence, computer science, philosophy, anthropology, linguistics, biology, physics, and neuroscience.(2)

Cognitive psychology is based on two assumptions: 1) Human cognition can at least in principle be fully revealed by the scientific method, that is, individual components of mental processes can be identified and understood, and 2) Internal mental processes can be described in terms of rules or algorithms in information processing models. There has been much recent debate on these assumptions.(2)

Information Processing Approach

The information processing approach, unlike the stimulus-response model of behaviorism, looks at how input is transformed into output. In other words, what happens between sensation and behavior is a more important question for cognitive psychologists than just which sensation produced which behavior. Cognitive Psychology treats the sensation as bits of information which are subjected to various processes in the mind and ultimately behavior may or may not result from this.(3)

Though the cognitive approach began in the late 1950's it was the arrival of the computer that gave cognitive psychology the terminology and metaphor it needed to investigate the human mind. The start of the use of computers allowed psychologists to try to understand the complexities of human cognition by comparing it with something simpler and better understood, i.e., an artificial system such as a computer. The use of the computer as a tool for thinking how the human mind handles information is known as the computer analogy. Essentially, a computer codes (i.e., changes) information, stores information, uses information, and produces an output (retrieves info). The idea of information processing was adopted by cognitive psychologists as a model of how human thought works.(4)

The information processing approach is based on a number of assumptions, including:

1. Information made available from the environment is processed by a series of processing systems (e.g., attention, perception, short-term memory);
2. These processing systems transform, or alter the information in systematic ways;
3. The aim of research is to specify the processes and structures that underlie cognitive performance;
4. Information processing in humans resembles that in computers.(4)

Mediational Processes
The behaviorists approach only studies external observable (stimulus and response) behavior which can be objectively measured. They believe that internal behavior cannot be studied because we cannot see what happens in a person’s mind (and therefore cannot objectively measure it).

In comparison, the cognitive approach believes that internal mental behavior can be scientifically studied using experiments. Cognitive psychology assumes that a mediational process occurs between stimulus/input and response/output.(4)

The mediational (i.e., mental) event could be memory, perception, attention or problem solving, etc. These are known as mediational processes because they mediate (i.e., go-between) between the stimulus and the response. They come after the stimulus and before the response.
History of Cognitive Psychology

• Norbert Wiener (1948) published Cybernetics: or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine, introducing terms such as input and output.
• Tolman (1948) work on cognitive maps – training rats in mazes, showed that animals had an internal representation of behavior.
• Birth of Cognitive Psychology often dated back to George Miller’s (1956) “The Magical Number 7 Plus or Minus 2.”
• Newell and Simon’s (1972) development of the General Problem Solver.
• In 1960, Miller founded the Center for Cognitive Studies at Harvard with famous cognitivist developmentalist, Jerome Bruner.
• Ulric Neisser (1967) publishes "Cognitive Psychology", which marks the official beginning of the cognitive approach.
• Process models of memory Atkinson & Shiffrin’s (1968) Multi Store Model.

(1) American Psychological Association: Glossary of Psychological Terms
(2) Scholarpedia: Cognitive psychology
(3) Zeepedia: Cognitive Psychology (2nd Link)
(4) Simplepsychology: Cognitive Psychology
(5) Wikibooks: Cognitive Psychology and Cognitive Neuroscience

https://mechanism.ucsd.edu/teaching/w07/philpsych/smith.cogpsychhistory.pdf

Fruits and vegetables, before and after cultivation

Washington Post: Fruits and vegetables used to look so different you might not even recognize them

Derren Brown & Michael Shermer

Notes:
@27:38 Brown summarizes a major aspect of stoicism stating
"one of the big the big building blocks of stoicism is this familiar idea now of you know, it's not things in the world that cause our problems but it's those stories we tell ourselves about those things"

@38:41 When talking about happiness vs pleasure Brown says
"because that's the difference isn't it between a pleasurable thing in the moment you know if you have the choice between going on a roller coaster, I think Daniel Kahneman used this example, going on a roller coaster with your friends versus looking after a sick relative, you probably have more pleasure on a roller coaster but afterwards when you think about what you've done with your day you might be happy with the fact that you chose to look after the sick relative because the story that you're telling yourself about who you are and the choice that you made are more conducive to happiness"