Topical Blog due Thursday 4/12 @ midnight

Subliminal messaging involves presenting a stimulus for a very short time and an individual whom is unaware of its presence. The point is to get their unconscious mind to register it, while their conscious mind is unable to detect it, which Freudian unconscious, adaptive unconscious and implicit motivation theorists all agree works. The major source of subliminal messages today is in advertising. However, researchers have found that although the unconscious mind may recognize the stimulus, it does not act on it. Therefore, the book is suggesting that subliminal messages do not influence one’s behavior.

Subliminal messages were first known to have been used in whisper therapy, which consisted of suggestions made in which the patient didn’t consciously register, so it would enter the unconscious mind. Later research indicated variability amongst peoples’ limits between the conscious and unconscious mind. This threshold was demonstrated by "subliminal electrical stimulation," in which impulses were conducted at different intensities to change the brain activity. When a stimulus goes into the unconscious mind, there are no reasoning skills to evaluate it, and thus is assumed to be true. Currently, subliminal message use is illegal in the U.S. by regulation of the FCC, but is also difficult to spot. The most common way to sneak a message into an advertisement unknowingly is by flashing an image onto a screen in frames (1/3000th of a second every 5 seconds). Other ways include words hidden in images, images hidden in images, and words hidden in background music. With new information, the question remains, just how influential are subliminal messages?

In 1994, researchers Kirk Smith and Martha Rogers studied the effects of subliminal messaging to answer some of the questions it raised. They wanted to be able to detect whether or not participants could consciously recognize the subliminal message, to compare effects of recognized and unrecognized messages, see if unrecognized messages had effects on informed participants, and finally to indicate the successfulness of subliminal messages on viewers.
The researchers found that subliminal messages which go consciously unrecognized by viewers are only slightly more (if at all) successful than recognized messages for both informed and uninformed participants. In fact, they indicated regular advertising to be more successful in viewer influence than subliminal advertising. Furthermore, they found the subliminal effects on memory to be very low, which concludes that subliminal messages have little effect on influencing viewers.

Through ongoing research, the subliminal information pool increased with news that there may be some other effects to it. A study was done with participants with electrodes to measure brain activity, in which they viewed threatening and non-threatening words subliminally as well as normally. The results indicated that threatening words elicited activity in the amygdala (negative emotion) compared to non-threatening words. Although consciously recognized words elicited a stronger response, subliminal words still enacted a response. These results indicate that by stimulating emotions, subliminal messages may influence our motivations. However, it still is not clear if they have stimulations strong enough to do so.

http://library.thinkquest.org/28162/legal.html
http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/apl/79/6/866.html
http://www.world-science.net/othernews/050516_sublimfrm.htm

The topic that I chose to research about a little more would be Freud’s Id and Ego. I think these are both interesting because it relates to our lives so much, and also I thought it was interesting about the section in the book that was talking about if they really did exist. While searching the web there were multiple websites that really helped explain the topic better and made me think of things in different ways.
The first website was from simplypsychology, which is actually a website that was extremely helpful. It seems like it is exactly what is says, simple, yet it does a good job in explaining things, and of course I am a visual learner, and this website used pictures to show the differences and what id and ego really mean. This site also explained superego, which was not really discussed in this particular chapter, but it was something that was nice to look over and review. If you look at the site, you can see that the pictures are childish, but sometimes that is nice because you want the average person to really understand, and sometimes things can be too confusing for the average person and then they will just give up on the topic. This is one reason I really enjoyed this site. This website also related to chapter 14 because the eros and thanatos were also explained when it comes to the Id, which were actually two names that I am not sure if I had heard of before reading the chapter. It explained that the Id is inherited or biological stuff, while the ego is something that relates to how we are influenced. It explained how the ego can sometimes be defined as weak compared to the Id, since that is something that is usually predetermined.
The second website that I looked at was Wikipedia. I know something Wiki does not get good reviews and people believe it is not accurate information, but I compared the information from this website to the book and other sites I looked at and the information seemed to be very good quality. It explained exactly what Id and Ego were, the correct definition and how we can relate it to the real world. This website also really explained the structural model and how all of the psyches relate. Even though the superego was not really explained in the book, it was explained in this website, but it definitely explained how all three are different.
The third article I looked at was definitely very interesting because it was talking about a topic that many people, especially psychologist had talked about. It was called Freud or Fraud? And It explained the id, ego and superego and how some people believe Freud was just a little full of it! It explained the question of if the id and ego are both on an unconscious level. It kind of put some things in a different perspective for me. If explained that if the id is at an unconscious level, and the ego is at a conscious level then how can one thing (id) can fight against something that is conscious when it is unconscious. Also, it then explained that some people believe that they are both unconscious; but then you have to think how we ever make our own choices if we are unconscious. So who makes our choices? Or id? Ego? Or something else. I think it was nice to see things in a different perspective. Yet during the article it does explain things correctly which relates to the text.

http://www.simplypsychology.org/psyche.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Id,_ego_and_super-ego

http://animosityreborn.hubpages.com/hub/Freud-or-Fraud

For this assignment I chose look delve deeper into Freud’s idea unconscious dream analysis. Freud believed that while a person was unconscious and dreaming their dreams could be interpreted through symbols. The id will release at these times information that normally is held back by the ego. The id from day one of life reacts to biological desires. The ego has to allow for desires from the id to be met, but also pay attention to the situation in which the individual is. At age five the superego is developed which handles the moral dilemmas. This website describes the inability to remember dreams as work of the superego. As the moral protector, the superego protects the individual from remembering the id’s desires that could at times be harmful. During the analysis of these dreams, Freud would use free association. This would entail expressing to the subject a dream symbol then the subject would in turn say the first thing that came to their mind. Freud believed that once he started the free association that it would lead to the subject let more of their unconsciously thoughts and feeling flow freely. An example of this was if the word was bird it may lead to the subject reflect on their childhood when they had many birds as pets.

After he analyzed the free association along with the dreams he would group the dreams to interpret them into five processes. They are displacement, projection, symbolization, condensation, and rationalization. Displacement is described when the desire for an object is symbolized by something different. Projection is when the subjects desires are placed upon another person. Symbolization requires the subjects repressed urges and desires symbolically. Condensation makes the dreams objective less obvious by the subject hiding their feelings. Finally, rationalization is the final stage of the dream. This is when the mind creates the dream in an organized fashion.

Freud also listed his dreams under three categories. These three categories were the satisfaction dream, the impatient dream, and the comfort dream. One website described what Freud came up with as commonalities between dreams of many different individuals. From those similarities he found that a house in many turns related to a human. If the house had a balcony or awning, the person was normally a woman. Kings and queens were many times used as symbols for the individuals parents. He also found traveling and journeys as the person describing dying. The final items I found interesting, and so did Freud (obsessively) was his many examples that his subjects would come up with as symbols for the male and female sex organs as well as many symbols for intercourse. The male sex organs were converted into symbols that displayed objects that could penetrate, objects from which water flows, objects that defy gravity and animals. Female sex organs were objects that could hold other objects, objects that represent breasts and others such as bushes, and shrubs. Freud was a twisted man.

http://www.dreammoods.com/dreaminformation/dreamtheory/freud3.htm
http://www.dreaminterpretation-dictionary.com/freud-dream-interpretation.html
http://www-usr.rider.edu/~suler/dreamman.html#freud

The topic I chose to search was Ego Defense. Anxiety and overwhelming feelings create a need to defend. When anxiety occurs the mind responds in two ways. First, problem solving skills are amplified. Second, the ego-defense mechanisms come into play. These mechanisms can operate unconsciously and can alter, change, or falsify reality. When reality is perceived in a different way anxiety decreases and the psychological tension of an individual is reduced. Forces that allow us to keep painful thoughts away are known as defense mechanisms. These mechanisms are involuntary and out of our control. They are natural, normal, and occur in every being. Repression is a type of defense mechanism that can prevent unpleasant thoughts from becoming conscious, and can prevent unwanted memories from resurfacing. Being cut off from these feelings is known as alexithymia. People who repress can begin to feel anxiety and stress build up. They are conflict avoidant and are unwilling to work things out with others. They remember very few negative events to the extreme where they believe they had a happy childhood when in reality they did not. Projection involves attributing ones owns thoughts and feelings to another person. People who project are often caught up in blaming others. They often harbor shame that interferes with social information processing. These people miss opportunities for growth by not seeing the negative in themselves. Without realizing unwanted behaviors they cannot change. Denial involves a person’s unwillingness to handle a situation; blocking out external events from their awareness. The defense mechanisms I just discussed were among a list of many immature tactics. Mature defense mechanisms include sublimation, humor, anticipation, and suppression. Defense can be termed as “self-protection.” Defense mechanisms help us deal with stress however; they can keep people from showing their true selves.

http://homepages.rpi.edu/~verwyc/defmech.htm

http://www.simplypsychology.org/defense-mechanisms.html

http://www.byregion.net/articles-healers/Defense_Mechanisms.html

The topic I chose to look into more was part of the Freudian unconscious mind. I realize that this whole chapter was about unconscious motivation but I enjoy learning about how our id, ego and superego's are developed.

The first article I found starts off with Freud's saying that we are all born with the id factor. The id section is a very selfish part of the unconscious mind. Although, as a baby you obviously do not know that. The id is only worried about it's needs. When the child wants something it tries it's best to get it, whatever it takes. Next, in line is the ego factor within three years of the id. The job of the ego is to make sure that the id's needs are met but also realizing that other people have needs as well. This is when you realize you're not the only person with needs and wants. The superego becomes present around the age of five or six. The caregivers of the superego help shape the superego into what it becomes. The superego is developed from our morals and values. This website said that the ego is the strongest in a healthy person because it doesn't want to upset the superego but has to meet the needs of the id.

http://allpsych.com/psychology101/ego.html

According to my second website everyone's personality is shaped by their id, ego and superego. Those three behaviors shaped who we all are. Since we are all born with our id's then Freud thinks that it's the most important and main component to personality. The id is known as the pleasure principle and if not catered to soon enough than tension and anxiety might become present. This article states that immediately satisfying our needs may not always be possible right away. The ego is known as the part that deals with reality and is the most realistic. I would consider the ego the more responsible unconscious thought. Freud said that the ego develops from the id and manages the id so that it's acceptable in the real world. Like the id, the ego is known as the reality principle keeping everything put together. The last part of the personality developed would be the superego. The superego is known for it's morals that were learned from our parents and society. The superego is present in every state, such as; conscious, preconscious and unconscious.

http://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/a/personalityelem.htm

My third website that I found starts out stating that the three parts of the unconscious are all systems, and in no way physical. The id is consisted of our biological components of personality. The id system responds to it's instincts, so when a child is hungry they are going to cry until they get fed. When the child is fed they experience pleasure and are somewhat satisfied for the moment. The ego is developed next. The ego is developed so it keeps the unrealistic and the real world on the same page. The ego knows right from wrong and tries to keep the id in line. Next is the superego. The superego is developed during the phallic stage. The superego strives for more moralistic goals and also strives for perfection. Guilt can arise when the superego falls short of an ideal state.

http://www.simplypsychology.org/psyche.html

Although I learned a lot from chapter 14 I also learned more information from these three websites. I'm glad I did some extra research because even now I have a better understanding of the id, ego and superego systems and how they are developed.

People’s Choice

The concept I found most intriguing in chapter fourteen was that of suppression. Suppression when defined in the book was the act of stopping a thought and trying not to think about it. The book then went on to say that the more you tried to not think about this thought the more you actually did. In class, however, suppression was defined as actively trying to forget a situation or event. This effort can actually be successful. For example if something bad happened on a family vacation and the family choose to never talk about it and never wanted it brought up, over time the event itself can become foggy and hard to remember.

The in-class definition was what came up most when I went looking under suppression. The first site I went to said that depression was a defense mechanism and said it was also a form of denial. It is used when people are faced with a reality that they cannot handle. This website claimed that denial was a function used to protect the ego from things that the individual was unable to cope with. Therefore saving that individual from higher degrees of anxiety and pain.

The second site I looked at explained a study in which scientists tried to figure out how the human mind could suppress a memory. The article then went on to describe a two-step process in which people could accomplish actively suppressing a memory they wished to forget. The first thing they researchers discovered was that when someone is actively trying to forget something the prefrontal cortex activates. This is the part of the brain that is involved in cognitive functions that control our thoughts. When watching the prefrontal cortex they discovered that two regions of this area were working together to forget the memory. First, the sensory aspects of the memory were blocked and then the emotions associated with that memory were blocked. With this two-step process accomplished by the brain the memory itself could then be suppressed.

The last website I looked at went over the positives and negatives of suppression. The positive was that suppression allows us to avoid material our ego is not ready to handle on a day to day basis. The negative aspects included things like distorted memories, having the complete information no longer available to our consciousness, and not being able to handle certain things in a constructive manner because suppression is a form of denial.

http://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/ss/defensemech_3.htm

http://www.livescience.com/1684-suppress-bad-memories.html

http://www.trans4mind.com/jamesharveystout/repress.htm

After our discussion in class about the Id and Ego I decided to research it more to see how valid some others think it is.

The first place I found information about the id and ego explained that our personalities are a result of the power struggle going on within up between the id, ego, and super ego. The id is the initial urge or impulse that a person feels when we want something; this is the start of a drive or motivation. They described the id at the little devil that sits on our shoulder whispering temptations into our ears. Even though it’s compared to the devil don’t think it’s a bad thing because it’s what helps us have desires and we wouldn’t be at to do anything without desires. The ego works as the mediator between the id and the pressures of the world around us. They describe the ego as a sports agent because the ego works with the id to get what it wants without costing it too much in the long run. The id needs the ego to make good rational decisions. We should thank the ego for that!
http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/understanding-the-id-ego-and-superego-in-psycholog.html

There is a lot of talk if the id and ego actually exist. The next place I looked described the ego. The two points they gave are this: our actual true nature in the immediacy of now, which is awareness, consciousness; there is no separate entity or sense of ‘me’ in that. And the set of concepts that are the self image which is the ego, the ‘me’, our human sense of self, based on a cherry picked version of the past. They explain that the ego can’t stand alone. They discuss a lot how can you get something if you can’t see it. They argue that the ego doesn’t exist because we can’t see it. They feel that it can’t be scientifically proven and therefore we shouldn’t take it seriously. They give the analogy of asking someone to go to the ocean and get a bucket of blue water, we know it’s blue but in the bucket it won’t be blue, therefore how can we be sure we want to trust the ego.
http://www.theendofseeking.net/EG%20-%20DoesTheEgoExist.html

With all this talk of the ego I decided I wanted to learn a little more about the ego development. The ego starts with an infant being born. At that time the infant is a being. The being does not have knowledge or consciousness. But over time, through experiences of pleasure and pain, memory traces are made and then self-representations form. The ego then becomes stable after learning through experiences. It is very important for a being to go through different stages of ego development because then it can form to how it is desired. They say that the self stays mostly stable throughout most of one’s life. When it is not constant is when we can discover mental disorders.
http://www.ahalmaas.com/Glossary/e/ego_development.htm

Terms: id, ego, super ego, drive, motivation, conscious, ego development

Many people experience the stages of mourning and death. It is nearly impossible to escape the loss of a loved one whether it be a relative or a favorite pet. There are five stages of normal grief. They were first proposed by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross in her 1969 book “On Death and Dying.”Sources will vary on whether there are five or seven stages of grief, but I will talk about those that are. Stages that Reeves listed in the book that also showed up on the websites are the common denial, anger/projection, bargaining/rationalizing, sublimation/acceptance. Almost everybody uses one or more of these stages of grief no matter how prolonged or slight they are still felt and define our reactions.
To start I will talk about the most common defense mechanism, denial. Life is full of surprises and they aren’t all good, like death. When most people hear the news they are in a state of shock and they can’t believe it. Death is so tough to face that many people say it didn’t happen and they deny, deny, deny until they come to the realization that it really happened. Even though this is usually a temporary thing many people turn to this strategy first because, just like water, they want to easiest way out while facing no struggle.
After denial there is an onset of anger and projection. We start to blame others for the loss. Because the person knows they didn’t cause this it must be somebody’s fault so they can be angry and release the pent of energy. People begin to blame their god first because many believe they was divine intervention that played a role. After that people will typically become short-tempered and snap at people even when they mean no threat. This is because are defenses tell us to shut down to the world and that it will be the best way to cope. Some people will even blame to deceased for their pain because if they were still alive than the pain would be gone. Logical, but ultimately short lived and useless.
Many people try to rationalize or bargain to make the death seem easier or less painful. This stems from a high level of vulnerability. Some common rationalizations are . . .
If only we had sought medical attention sooner…
If only we got a second opinion from another doctor…
If only we had tried to be a better person toward them…
Secretly, we may make a deal with God or our higher power in an attempt to postpone the inevitable. This is a weaker line of defense to protect us from the painful reality.
Not everybody reaches the last stage of grief which is acceptance or sublimation. Reaching this stage can provide a huge sense of unburdened relief. Of course this is not to say that the person is happy to be rid of the deceased, but rather they know that it may have been for the best or maybe good things can stem from the death. This is when people take the hurt and pain and take it to a new level of rejuvenation, growth, and development of a deeper appreciation for life.
No matter the defense there will always be death and it will get to people on a very deep level and many will see the stages for short or long periods of time. The truth is many people will get through them no matter how hard it turns out to be.

http://www.ekrfoundation.org/five-stages-of-grief/

http://www.recover-from-grief.com/7-stages-of-grief.html

http://psychcentral.com/lib/2006/the-5-stages-of-loss-and-grief/

Terms Used: Defense mechanism, denial, projection, regression, sublimation,

My topic of interest is suppression. In the textbook suppression is defined as the process of removing a thought by conscious, intentional, and deliberate means. It is also stated that the ability to stop a thought given by an external source is beyond our power. And what is more, attempting to suppress such thoughts can actually make it worse. Studies have shown that when people are asked not to think about a specific thing, they generally think of it even more, sometime to levels of obsession. It is as if until we resolve such thoughts, they remain with us. So it is best to let our conscious mind contemplate such thoughts until it achieves a sort of comfortable resolution, and then it can discard the idea to the unconscious and more on to other things. It seems people are innately aware of this fact so they use the defense mechanism of denial to rid themselves of unwanted thoughts. People simply will not acknowledge the unwanted thoughts and find others things to occupy their thoughts instead.

A Wikipedia entry thought suppression gave some good leads as well as empirical research of suppression. It was stated that although the white bear experiment is a valid one, there are criticisms to be made with the results. The first being the object of suppression was a simple one. Most people when wanting to suppress something have a target that is more complex in nature. Second, is the sort time frame set in the parameters of the study. Over a longer period of time you will see different results of suppression efforts. This entry led me to find articles written by Daniel Wegner, who is the lead psychologist cited by the book that led the white bear study. It turns out Dr. Wegner has done extensive research of the subject of suppression. He is social psychology professor at Harvard University. Among his research interests and contributions to the field of psychology include his work on thought suppression and idea of free will. He has given us the concepts of ironic process theory and transactive memory. He argues that free will is an illusion and has done numerous studies to investigate the illusion of control.

Dr. Wegner has done several following up studies on suppressive thought and appears to be the authority on this subject within the field of psychology. Anyone who wants to look at his complete of published work in the field can visit the second link below. In a 1994 study, he looked to see what the effects of chronic suppression of thought would be. He developed a reliable method to measure individual’s chronic tendency to suppress thoughts. As suspected, chronic suppression is correlated with obsessive thinking, depression, and anxiety. It was also found that the levels of chronic thought suppression within individuals can predict the future development of obsessive thoughts, but not compulsive behaviors. It was also predictive in finding whether individuals who desired not to be depressed would become depressed.

I think it is quite clever and useful that Dr. Wegner was able to expand so much on the idea of thought suppression. He has concluded that thought suppression leads to obsessive thinking, and not the other way around. He not only found ways to measure it, but also ways to make this information useful by linking it to future consequences, such as anxiety and depression.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_suppression
http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/~wegner/pubs.htm
http://www.wjh.harvard.edu/~wegner/pdfs/Wegner&Zanakos1994.pdf

For this assignment I decides to look further into Freud’s theory of unconscious dream analysis. For Freud the tensions of our daily life continue to build in the unconscious and are vented during a dream state. Only during this dream state are we allowed to access our unconscious core. Due to the disturbing content, could only be expressed in a symbolic form. It was at this point that Freud decided to categorize the mind into three parts: id, ego, and superego. That while we are awake the unconscious (id) is always sending impulses and desires that, some that can be disturbing and even disrupt social life. That is where the superego comes into play, suppressing those impulses and desires before they ever enter into consciousness. The same goes for our dreams, for when we are dreaming we get a glimpse into our id. At the same time you are more vulnerable to the id’s true desires which can lead to psychological harm that can entire the conscious mind and wake the individual. The superego steps in and censors and translates the id’s content into these symbolic forms, before emerging in the ego. Which is one of the reasons we very seldom remember our dreams and have a hard time deciphering our dreams.

As a way to break through the cryptic symbols and nonsense and analyze our dreams, Freud come up with a technique known as free association. A way of taking the first symbol one remembers from their dream and then systematically taking what comes to mind next to see where it leads. Once the free association was completed he proceeded with grouping and arranging the images acquired into five processes: displacement, projection, symbolization, condensation, and rationalization. Displacement is the desire for something or someone in a different form, projection is putting one’s own desires into another to see how they play out. Symbolization is the acting out of urges that are repressed were as condensation is the opposite, hiding ones true feeling or urges to make them less obvious. Lastly is rationalization, or otherwise known by Freud as the “final stage of dreamwork” the coming together of a dream in a more meaningful form (secondary revision). To Freud most dreams occurred due to sexual content in one’s life, were anything long and narrow represented the male genitals and anything with an open cavity represented the female genitalia.

I also looked into what types of dreams are out there and what they may mean. I found that there are ten basic categories, but I found the following the most interesting in part due to I myself have had these kind of dreams. Physiological dreams, were the dream is in direct contact with the ego to illustrate the conscious world. An example would be that in your dream you are tossing and turning around may just mean that you are not tiered enough to go to sleep. Another kind is recurring dreams, were the dream is repeated due to the fact that we are ignoring the message the id is trying to tell that can affect our conscious life. Compensatory dreams are the dreams that reveal what some may call “different side”. It’s the part of ourselves that we keep hidden from others, like a college law student that dreams of adventure and mystery. These are ways to balance personality and to seek experiences we wouldn’t normally.

http://www.dreammoods.com/dreaminformation/dreamtheory/freud.htm
http://www.dreams-dictionary.org/
http://www.dreaminterpretation-dictionary.com/freud-dream-interpretation.html

I chose to find out more about Freud's dual-instinct theory. Freud thought that there were too many different bodily needs to list, so he emphasized two general categories: instincts for life and instincts for death. The instincts for life, or Eros, maintain life and ensure individual and collective survival. These instincts include things such as food, water, air, sleep, etc because they all contribute to the life and survival of an individual. The death instincts, or Thanatos, push the individual toward rest, inactivity, and energy conservation. Freud gave primary emphasis to aggression. When focused on the self, aggression manifests itself in self-criticism, sadism, depression, suicide, masochism, alcoholism, drug addiction, and unnecessary risk taking such as gambling. When focused on others, aggression manifests itself in anger, hate, prejudice, verbal insult, cruelty, rivalry, revenge, murder, and war. These bodily based instinctual drives toward life and death provide the energy to motivate behavior. Instinctual drives provide the energy for behavior, while the ego provides its direction.

The death drive was an extension of Freud's earliest writings, having to do with conservation of energy in the organism, and was also the latest version of the dualism that was a constant in his work. In Freud's earlier thinking, mental conflict had originated among component instincts of the libido. In the new conception, all these previous instincts were subsumed under the libido, or Eros, and opposed to the death instinct. According to the logic of the pleasure principle, energy was to be conserved at all cost. Freud saw evidence of the death drive in his observations of primary masochism and of hate, which he thought preceded any feeling of love. Freud believed that the death drive was expressed as aggression, and that it was frequently joined to libidinal energy. Freud's dual instinct theory left unanswered the key question about how and when the instincts conflict. He considered increases in aggression to be due to frustration of instinctual wishes. Freud abandoned this theory in 1920, and replaced it with the theory of life and death instincts, in which aggression is considered necessary and normal in fusion with the sexual instincts, the representatives of the life instinct.

http://science.jrank.org/pages/10903/Psychoanalysis-Dual-Instinct-Theory-Death-Drive.html

http://books.google.com/books?id=OcoQTQwTDu8C&pg=PA323&lpg=PA323&dq=dual+instinct+theory&source=bl&ots=MbRApdch4o&sig=1jYAn0UsPlaRDbn54vD-OGcqIpc&hl=en&sa=X&ei=aziHT7DcMsKKgwfB1ai4CA&sqi=2&ved=0CF4Q6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q=dual%20instinct%20theory&f=true

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1749-6632.1969.tb14081.x/abstract

The subject I chose to seek out more information was on the Freudian dream analysis. First of all, Freud believed that dreams have a functional purpose for the unconscious to vent its wishes and desires. Freud also believed that a dream’s storyline represents its manifest content and the symbolic meanings of these events represent its latent content. These are ways that the unconscious can express its impulses without awakening the dreamer. He used a free association technique in order to understand the significance of the events in the latent content, or symbolic. Freud’s interest in dreams sparked more intense research on the topic. Today, we recognize that dreams are indeed function, yet serve neurophysiological activities, memory consolidating, stress-buffering or copings, and a problem-solving function. The problem with Freud’s ideas was that they were too limited in that dreams actually serve multiple purposes.
http://www.dreammoods.com/dreaminformation/dreamtheory/freud.htm.
This website describes this topic in a differently and more detailed. It explains that these unconscious desires being acted upon during sleep are those of the ID. These desires may be pleasurable or harmful and the unconscious transforms these feelings into a symbolic language. To Freud, the reason we cannot remember our dreams when we awake is because the superego protects the conscious mind from the harmful desires of the ID. This site also describes the difference between the manifest content and the latent content. The manifest is what the dream is literally saying, while the latent content is what the dream is trying to say. To understand these images, Freud developed five different processes consisting of displacement, projection, symbolization, condensation, and rationalization. Displacement is when a desire is symbolized into something else. Then, projection happens when the dreamer projects their own desires onto another. Next, symbolization is when the dreamers repressed and suppressed thoughts are acted out. Condensation is when the dreamer hides their urges. Lastly, rationalization occurs as a secondary revision, where the dreaming mind makes a dream more logical or and comprehensible.

http://www.smithwebdesign.com/worldofdreams/theory.html. This site is also a great source of acquiring more knowledge about Freud’s interpretation of dreams. According to Freud, dreams were simply a conscious way for the unconscious to satisfy its fantasy. These dreams represent a wish fulfillment developed in early childhood before thoughts were repressed. This website also shows a diagram of what Freud imagined the mind to look like. To him, it’s divided into unconscious, preconscious, and conscious. It’s also divided into the Id, Ego, and Super-ego. I also took a look at the non-freudian theory of dreams on the same site. Even though the meaning of dreams is still a controversy, new research has found it serves as a broader purpose than those proposed by Freud. More research has been on the different sleep cycles, especially REM. The Activation Synthesis Theory proposes that during REM sleep the brain activates itself and then synthesizes the information generated into dreams. It was developed after the discovery that the brain stem sends messages to the visual cortex during REM, similar to wakefulness. Basically, the brain takes the messages being sent from the pons and tries to make sense of them.
http://library.thinkquest.org/C005545/english/dream/freud.htm. Freud used dream analysis along with hypnosis and free association in order to understand the unconscious’s hidden desires. His work on dreams opened the doors for dream research and studies. This site describes an interesting perspective of the sleep cycle. In order to fall asleep we must remove ourselves from the distractions of the environment by lying in a dark room with warm comfy blankets. Yet, our brains do not have an off switch, so it’s still active during sleep, thus producing dreams. This site also describes Freud’s sexual meaning of these dream symbols. He believed that the latent content of the phallus is symbolized into either male or female organs, masturbation, and sexual intercourse. This site also offers information about the types of dreams, including repetitive dreams, predictive dreams, nightmares, and lucid dreams. This is an example of just how much of an influence Freud was in this topic. There are also scans, such as the electroencephalograph, which can measure the activity of the brain during sleep. I also enjoyed the interactive psychological tests on this site, such as the dream test, which determines what kinds of dreams I usually dream about. Overall, it is evident and clear that Freud had a huge impact on dream research, which has also been used as a treatment technique in psychoanalysis.

The unconscious mind is unobservable and it is difficult to prove anything about it. However Freud believed that people repressed traumatic memories into inaccessible areas of the unconscious mind. Most common traumatic events that are repressed involve physical or sexual abuse. Surprisingly, individuals that have experienced traumatic events that don’t recall what happened are still affected by it. How can something you don’t remember affect you? For instance, children of abuse often “forget” the event(s) taking place, but often have trouble forming relationships in the future. I wonder how accurate repressed memories are. If they have been repressed for years and suddenly resurface from an outside stimulus, I think it is plausible that the mind can continue to create ideas in your head.

In one case, a daughter stood trial against her father for a gruesome memory that had been repressed for 20 years. She was playing with her children when they asked her a question and suddenly she started remembering detail after detail about her father raping and murdering her best friend at the age of 8.This brings up much controversy and as a result, The False Memory Syndrome Foundation formed in 1992 by a group of families damaged by false accusations of child abuse. There is clearly not enough evidence about repressed memories and their accuracies to measure them as reliable, yet psychotherapists eagerly accept the concept and accuracy of repressed memories. Curiously, if these detailed memories are not true, where do they emerge from?

Suppression on the other hand has more evidence to back it up. It is impossible for someone to choose not to think about something. The more they tell themselves not to think about it, the more they start thinking about it. If you are worried about something, like your weight, you can’t just decide that you aren’t going to think about it, because environmental stimuli will inevitable trigger your thought. If you were trying to forget about an ex-boyfriend, certain cues may remind you of him, such as his name, if someone else were to mention him, a picture, something he left at your house and so on. In fact, when purposely trying to suppress something, it has an opposite effect. Don’t think about unicorns, although you weren’t thinking about them before, you are now and it will be hard to get unicorns out of your head. Instead of thinking that we are able to control our minds process, it is more realistic to think of suppression as a temporary store for memories that can easily be retrieved.

Overall, repression and suppression are commonly confused. The difference lies within the unconscious (ID)and the conscious(EGO)mind. Repressed memories are involuntarily stored in an inaccessible place and commonly referred to as “motivated forgetting”; whereas suppressed memories are voluntary and we attempt to forget certain things, which usually fails.

http://changingminds.org/explanations/behaviors/coping/repression.htm

http://www.jprlawcorp.com/articles/alleged-abuser-recovered-memory

http://faculty.washington.edu/eloftus/Articles/lof93.htm

After reading chapter 14 about unconscious motivation I was most interested in learning more about defense mechanisms. Being that these are used by everybody I thought it would be interesting to explore many different defense mechanisms and to see if some were used more often than others.

I need to take a short break to applaud UNI and Rod library for their vast array of online journal articles. Thank you, you’re awesome. Anyway, the first journal article I found was one that sought to test the validity of a psychological test to determine defense mechanisms. It ended up being congruent with other research done in the field and came to some interesting findings. They determined that there are some significant differences between defenses used by males and females. Men, according to this article, are more likely to turn to drugs and alcohol as a coping mechanism. They are also more likely to isolate themselves from those around them as a coping mechanism. The researchers decided that this is probably due to the fact that this is a socially learned behavior with some biological aspects as well. Women on the other hand turn to social support and prescription drugs more often than males. This is yet again probably a culturally learned behavior with some biological aspects as well. Females also participate in a coping mechanism called “pseudoaltruism”. This means that they satisfy their internal need through helping others, therefore, it is not really altruism because they are getting something in return. In the discussion bit of this paper it suggested that suppression is another defense mechanism that is considered to be a ‘mature mechanism’ because it isn’t developed until later in life. This then spurred me on to explore age and defense mechanisms.

I found another journal article which explored that very topic. They compared young adults(17-29) to older adults(60-85) on their TAT scores, which measure defense mechanisms. After the tests had been compiled there were many significant differences in the two groups. First off, young adults scored significantly higher in maladaptive defenses such as inhibition, passive aggression (indirectly expressing anger), and regression (returning to an earlier stage of development) when confronted with stressful events. Secondly, the only defense mechanisms the older adults were significantly higher in were pseudoaltruism (helping others to help yourself) and denial (unpleasant external realities are ignored or their acknowledgment is refused) and those were both neutral defense mechanisms; not good, not bad. Lastly, young people were significantly more likely to exhibit affiliation (seeking help from other people), fantasy (gratifying frustrated desires by imaginary and omnipotent achievement), and somatization (experience bodily reactions to stress and seek medical attention). The basic assumption of this data can be that as we age we grow into more positive defense mechanisms and drop off more immature /destructive mechanisms.
The third site I visited simply defined these various defense mechanisms because I couldn’t decipher from the studies what they meant. In addition to the defined items above there were a few others that were really interesting and I could see them in other peoples lives, which may be me projecting these ideas, haha. One of these was deflection, which is when an individual redirects the attention to another and often happens in group settings. Another is devaluation, which is something that I certainly do very often especially with failures I encounter. Devaluation is when individuals cope with failures by attributing negative qualities either to themselves or to others. The last defense mechanism I looked at is restitution which is just like it sounds; it is relieving the mind of guilt by paying back for the perceived wrong in their mind. This allows them to move forward and to escape the guilt they have been feeling.
It’s crazy how much we are motivated by our subconscious.
http://www.crosscreekcounseling.com/defense_mech.html

Segal, D., Coolidge, F., & Mizuno, H. (2007). Defense mechanism differences between younger and older adults: A cross-sectional investigation. Aging & Mental Health, 11(4), 415-422.

Watson, D., & Sinha, B. (1998). Gender, age, and cultural differences in the defense style questionnaire-40.Journal of Clinical Psychology, 54(1), 67-75.

I found that the Object Relations Theory was very interesting and it was something that I'm not very familiar with so I decided to look more in depth into this topic. I found in our class discussion yesterday that stereotype theory which can influence how we perfrom and intereact with others to be very interesting.

The main focus behind object relations theory is forming relationships between others and the reason we connect with others. This website talks about the problems that could happen in our life if we fail to make important realtionships, especaially within our family. Melanie Klein had the basis behind this theory in the alte 1800's. She used to be full on psychoanlytic and believed in all of Freud's theories, when she became a transitional figure in pscyh. Fairbrain also had a large part of this theory, he had more of a personality focus, so it combined these two together. THey said that object relations theory started out with the infants parents and their bond. This website focuses on the beginning of psychology with Freud's instincts and how it led to the object relations theory and how it is important to the adult, if the caregiver and the child develop a strong bond and attachment. They have all of the contributing psychologists and researchers who helped make this theory come to life and not so much analytic.
http://www.sonoma.edu/users/d/daniels/objectrelations.html

The next website is a paper on the infant relations with the mother and how object relations theory has a play in it. This paper has the basic stuff of what object relations theory is and the main people that contributed to it. It talks about how the object is named for the "agent" the person. Emotions grow out of the object, in this case the mother and connect (or don't) with the mother to create the bond. This is a very important bond because it can be a predictor for how one will be able to socialize later down the road. If there is a negative bond, this child may have lower leveld of confidence, self esteem and reliance issues. It creates relationship problems and can cause failed marriages. The paper continues into the history of the theory and its background. That it came from Freud's psychonalytic theories and it grew into something that is more rational and realistic, instead ofbeing focued around intincts for life and death. Which in my opinion is a little silly becuase there are aspects behind that theory that I agree with, but not with the names of instincts for life or death. But this paper emphasizes that object relations theory is a very important part to socialization throughout life.
http://www.psychology.sunysb.edu/attachment/online/attach_depend.pdf

The Stereotype threat is something that has been getting more research. It is related to object relations theoory because it talks baout the social environment and how it can affect your personal life. This is a threat that you will confrom to a negative stereotype of the group you are in. This most often has to do with race. Steele and Anderson have been studying this type of threat in experiments to give possible reasoning for low scores on certain types of tests. They found that scores had shown some difference between race, when race was emphasized before the test. They found that the most vulnerable to the steroetype threat is in academic situations. This stereotype can harm whomever feels inadequate when it comes to taking the test. One of the examples is that females are bad at math, so when this stereotype is emphasized before a math test, or a test with a math portion, there is a drop between men and women in scores. When nothing is mentioned about the stereotype there isn't a signifigant difference. They have also found situations that can create or enhance the stereotype effect. Researchers are trying to figure out what causes this affect and they are trying to find ways to reduce it happening and with people identifying with it. This website went thorugh all of the situations and how they are tyring to reduce stereotypes adn the threat they can cause on people. When a person or gourp of people accept the stereotype, than they are causing detreimental outcomes on themselves.
http://reducingstereotypethreat.org/unresolved.html

I'm interested in learned helplessness as it relates to or is effected by socioeconomic status. Learned helplessness is when person has faced failure eneough times to assume that failure is a general outcome. They believe they cannot impact their environmhent in the manor they wish too. I have observed that socioeconomic status affects willingness to take on challenges, such as advancing in education or managing a healthy lifestyle, and also effects academic performance. I wondered if this was partially effected by learned helplessness as a result of growing up feeling less advantaged.

http://www.ascd.org/publications/books/109074/chapters/How-Poverty-Affects-Behavior-and-Academic-Performance.aspx
The first website I looked at explained that children below the poverty line don't often develop attachments as secure as their counterparts. This effects school performance, causing children to give up on challenges quickly. It also explains that children of this socioeconomic status have more stressful homelives which reduces motivation, determination and effort.

http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst?docId=5000436108
Thi website stated that students from low socioeconomic status are at the highest risk for
dropping out of highschool. It also explains that socioeconomic status is the clearest indicator of academic performance. This could be due to learned helplessness is both task-oriented and performance oriented school work.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cycle_of_poverty
I got some intereting information on wikipedia. It explains that learned helplessbes becomes a cycle in families stricken by poverty, being passed on from parent to child and is referred to as the "development trap." It causes 'situational poverty' to become 'generational poverty.' It went on to explain that beyond lack of monetary resources, individuals confidence in achievement is hindered by the education they recieve. When schools perform poorly, they are more likely to hire underqualified educators.

Upon reading chapter fourteen, one of the topics in the chapter that I found to be most intriguing is that of adaptive unconscious. The story in the chapter was about a man who had his hippocampus removed, and as a result he had amnesia leaving him with no memory of the days before. So every time he went to the laboratory to work on his motor skills it was as if he had never been there before, though he had been there quite regularly. Even though he couldn’t remember the previous therapy sessions, the man still showed much improvement of his motor skills. This was due to adaptive unconsciousness.
Wilson discusses adaptive unconscious as a process that is intimately involved in how we size up our world, perceive danger, initiate action, and set our goals. It is the unconscious that allows us to learn our native language with no conscious effort, recognize patterns in our environments while we think about something else, and develop reliable intuitions to guide our actions. Wilson discusses how people can gain insight into their adaptive unconscious. One of the ways listed is to take the stance of an outside observer, inferring our unconscious feelings and motives from what we do. The example discussed in the article talked about a person who thinks that they are more altruistic, but when examined from the outside stance, they realize that they don’t give money to charities or volunteer their time. At this point, by carefully noting what they do or fail to do they could revise their theories about their own personalities. If people recognize that their conscious narratives about themselves do not match their unconscious tendencies, they can take steps to mold their unconscious into something better.
The adaptive unconscious controls automatic thinking which has five defining features. These include non-conscious, fast, unintentional, uncontrollable, and effortless. The adaptive unconscious can trigger fast reactions, and can detect and learn patterns quickly. This however, can be a disadvantage, because it does not unlearn patters well and therefore can influence out behavior in rigid ways. The conscious mind develops slowly and never quite catches up, especially with pattern detection. People have to stop and think in order to evoke the conscious and reflect on the direction the adaptive unconscious is sending us. This may be one reason why racial and sexist stereotypes remain pervasive, including in people who consider themselves open minded.
In Lehrer’s article, he discusses a test that was performed where different groups of people we given options such as which of the five cars was the best, which apartment is most attractive and other options such as these. The first group had to make a decision immediately, another group could take time for conscious deliberation, and the other group was allowed to sleep on it which allowed them to engage in unconscious thought. By the end of the study, the subjects who were allowed to engage in unconscious thought made better decisions. This showed that if you have a decision to make, use you conscious mind to acquire all the information you need for making the decision but don’t try to analyze the information. Instead, let you unconscious mind digest the information for a day or two. Whatever your intuition tells you is almost certainly going to be the best choice.

Terms: adaptive unconscious, goals, automatic thinking, personalities, conscious,
http://news.clas.virginia.edu/psych/x1115.xml
http://www.rabe.org/journey-to-the-adaptive-unconscious/
http://scienceblogs.com/cortex/2007/02/the_adaptive_unconscious.php

I decided to do some additional digging into Object Relations Theory, because I thought it was an interesting theory that we develop our mental representations of ourselves and others at a very early age based on the relationships we have with our primary caretakers (usually the mother). The general idea is that if we have adequate care, such as a responsive mother who satisfies our needs but allows for enough separation to grow our autonomy, then we will develop to have healthy representations of our self and others and will have generally healthy adult relationships. On the other hand, if we receive inadequate care as an infant (such as an unsupportive/unresponsive mom or an overbearing mom), then we will develop an unhealthy perception of “self” and “others”. This will manifest itself in future relationships. An example of this could be someone who is afraid of intimacy or someone who is overbearing.

There are many theories that look at the infant and caregiver relationship, including Object Relations Theory, social learning theories of dependence, and theories on attachment. Object Relations Theory differs in that it maintains that the link between the infant and mother (or caretaker) is based on drives or instincts. When a baby becomes hungry, a growing tension forms and the baby may begin to cry. The mother then feeds the baby, and the baby then goes back to a satiated state (this state is sometimes call narcissistic or objectless stage). Once the baby is able to distinguish itself from others, it will begin to associate the mother with the comfort/frustration of its environmental needs that may or may not being met. These positive or negative feelings towards the mother (object) will form the foundation for interpersonal relationships.

I found that while the core of Object Relations Theory is clear, there are many off-shoots of the theory. It seems that this happens frequently in psychoanalytic theories because of disagreements about underlying causes. For instance, while some of the theories were pre-occupied about the oral fixation between mother and infant during this period, others were more concerned about the development of autonomy (or ego) as the child is able to individualize and separate from its mother. One interesting thing I read is that this theory receives some criticism because it aims at explaining our social relationships in the context of one dyadic relationship (namely, infant and mother). Can our schemas truly be determined at such an early age? This is determinism is characteristic of psychoanalytic theory. While I think that this theory is interesting and may have some validity, I do think that it is very narrow in scope.

http://www.sonoma.edu/users/d/daniels/objectrelations.html

http://www.psychology.sunysb.edu/attachment/online/attach_depend.pdf

http://www.psychstudies.net/Object%20Relations%20Theory.pdf

Subliminal messaging is a signal or messaging embedded in another medium designed to pass below the normal levels of a human’s limits and mind perception. These messages are unrecognizable to the conscious mind but aimed to influence the unconscious mind. Subliminal messaging can be used in positive and negative ways. Many people seek subliminal messaging as a way to improve their personality, quit smoking and enhancing Memory. The most common use of subliminal messaging is subliminal advertising.
There are two ways in which subliminal messaging can occur, visual and auditory. Visual stimuli are flashed before the brain has time to process them. Visual stimuli can be found almost anywhere ads, television, magazines etc. Visual auditory usually attempts to persuade people to buy things or do something. Audio stimuli are audible volumes such as sound bites or back masking which is when a message is played backwards.
People can easily be convinced to partake in a certain action or avoid a situation through subliminal messaging. Subliminal messaging dates back to the 5th century B.C. In the 1920’s many people thought that the radio was sinister, but BBC wanted to change the negative connotation about radio so they masked certain phrases in their jingle to convince listeners that radio was a positive thing. They added a jingle which said “this is not a noose, really it’s not” played backwards. They believed that the unconscious mind could pick up the subliminal message.
Advertisers target the unconscious mind in hopes that the unconscious mind will remember that logo that flashed many times. So that next time you want to buy a car your unconscious mind will bring up the logo and you will then remember the car.Subliminal messaging in todays society aims to promote products, so that the consumer will be drawn to the product and want to buy them.

http://www.artistmike.com/Temp/SubliminalAd.html
http://zidbits.com/2011/07/how-do-subliminal-messages-work/
http://www.umich.edu/~onebook/pages/tablepages/history.html

Chapter 15 was about positive psychology. Positive psychology seeks to build people’s strengths and their competencies, or potential, in order to cultivate psychological wellness. This chapter states that it is best to look at the individual as a whole rather than as separate parts. This ensures that you are seeing the big picture and are holistic. This is also called the “top-down” approach. Self-actualization is on the top of Maslow’s need hierarchy. It is not experienced by younger people and is the least important of the needs. The bottom of the hierarchy consists of survival needs and transitions into growth needs at the top. From bottom to top, the hierarchy includes physiological needs, safety and security needs, love and belongingness needs, esteem needs, and self-actualization needs. The bottom levels are deficiency needs and indicate that the individual is deprived of food, job security, group membership, or social status. Maslow called this deprivation human sickness, as it is a failure of moving toward growth and actualization. Growth is possible when the deficiency needs are met. When the individual is free of these needs, he or she can focus on fulfilling his or her personal potential. The growth needs they seek to meet, or “metaneeds,” include a sense of wholeness, aliveness, uniqueness, truth, playfulness, and meaning. I found the self-actualization and growth needs interesting because they are individual. Everyone experiences growth needs in varying degrees. If you deprive someone of a “metaneed,” they feel incomplete, out of control, robotic, or easily replaceable. Criticisms of Maslow’s need hierarchy include the idea that age does not matter for which needs are more important.

This chapter also talks about how to encourage self-actualization. This can be done through six steps, including making growth changes, being honest, situationally positioning yourself for peak experiences, give up defensiveness, letting the self emerge, and being open to experiences. The self learns the conditions of rejection, including how to gain acceptance and how to avoid rejection. According to Rogers, the self lives in two worlds—the inner world, or organismic valuing, and the outer world, conditions of worth. The Rogerian Model of the Process of Self- Actualization sums this up. Interpersonal relationships that are caring, genuine, accepting, and confirming support the actualizing tendency. This chapter also talked about good and evil and discussed benevolence and malevolence. The chapter ended with positive psychology therapy. I found this to be interesting and plan on trying out a few of the “happiness exercises.”

I found the section on perfectionism to be the most interesting. I am somewhat of a perfectionist, so reading this section helped me evaluate where I lie on the spectrum. It surprised me that there are three different types of perfectionism; I had always thought of perfectionism as a single thing. The three types include self-oriented, socially prescribed, and neurotic perfectionism. Characteristics of self-oriented perfectionism include an unwillingness to accept personal flaws and failure. Socially prescribed perfectionism is the belief that others have unrealistic standards for the self that are difficult or impossible to meet. From this view, the self must meet these standards to gain acceptance and approval. Perfectionism is problematic because it is unattainable and not achieving the impossible standards can lead to anxiety, helplessness, and suicidal thoughts. However, in combination with supportive and nurturing relationships, these types of perfection can be beneficial. If not in combination with support and nurturance, they can lead to neurotic perfectionism. Neurotic perfectionism is the intense need to avoid failures. No performance is good enough and the individual does not gain any satisfaction from even well-done jobs. The individual feels inferior, self-criticizes, self-attacks, and generally feels negatively. This type of perfection is associated with depression and eating disorders and grows out of childhood experiences with parents whose love is conditional on how well the child behaves and performs. The parents encourage the child to do better and the child never hits the mark to gain his or her parents’ love. The child strives to avoid making mistakes and the harsh parental standards become internalized. The self becomes very critical and uses the withdrawal of self-love as a form of punishment. I have experienced the spectrum of perfectionism so it was interesting to read about the ways it affects performance and affect.

Terms: positive psychology, holistic, top-down approach, self-actualization, deficiency, human sickness, Maslow’s need hierarchy, survival needs, growth needs, “metaneeds,” organismic valuing, conditions of worth, Rogerian Model of the Processes of Self-Actualization, perfectionism (self-oriented, socially prescribed, neurotic)