Praise is not always motivating.
"A growing body of research and a new study from the trenches of the New York public-school system�strongly suggests it might be the other way around. Giving kids the label of 'smart' does not prevent them from underperforming. It might actually be causing it."
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Depression/feel-eat/story?id=4387456
One reason I found this article very interesting is because I believe that each of us, including myself, do not often think about the effect that our diet has on our emotions and mood. The researchers in this study came to the conclusion that "Food really does have a lot of power." By properly maintaining a well-balanced diet we can significantly improve our mood. This article analyzes several different foods and provides the possible effects each one can have on a person's health.
An important point here is that mood can affect your eating choices, and what you have eaten can subsequently affect your mood. In some ways, this can be a cyclical process. People who eat harmful foods may sometimes feel bad as a result of their nutritional effects and continue consuming the harmful food to (temporarily) get rid of the negative feelings. In psychological terms, there is negative reinforcement.
This is a very important topic today, and I think each of us should take time to consider this study. As these researchers report, " the average consumer isn't eating a healthy enough diet, let alone a diet that will put them in a good mood." As of today, over a third of adults are obese - not just overweight, but obese. As they say in the article, "Though no studies show that mood disorders and increased obesity are directly related, many agree that there is some correlation."
As I mentioned in my last article, the prevalence of fast food should be of great concern to us, and I say this for a few reasons. Fast food restaurants, such as McDonalds, often use addictive ingredients within their products that may taste very good and increase short-term feelings of happiness, but these artificial chemicals increase the motivation to eat more through grossly unnatural means. When I suggest that we may need to have higher standards on our food (fast food, grocery store products, etc.), I realize some of the criticisms that may arise. Some people would say that consumers could just make these foods in their own home, or people would just find ways around the standards. There are many European restaurants, however, that do have higher standards on fast food than we do. The food may not taste as good in the moment it is consumed, but it is much healthier for one's physical and mental health over the long term.
There are a few psychological concepts at play here. To avoid the tastier, yet unhealthier foods a person must possess effective gratification delay strategies. Another important point here is that many people are not at a "natural" homeostasis level as determined by their DNA and genetic predisposition. I believe the problem here is largely cultural. Also, this is not just an obesity problem or mood problem - there are many factors at work here, and it may take a bit of critical thinking to get a grasp on what is actually going on. As these researchers reported, "(The) rising rates of depression and other mood disorders (parallel) the rise of obesity in the U.S... It is hard to establish cause and effect, but it's not by chance that stress has been going up and depression has been going up and obesity is going up." There is a very big difference between psychological disorders that require medication and mild mood impairments, but the effects of dietary behavior are a critical part of the equation. Some individuals with anxiety problems have shown significant improvement by simply eating a healthier diet. The effects of this problem are very widespread, long lasting, and have proven devastating to the lives of many people.
I would also like to focus on a few of the findings of this study as they relate to happiness in terms of neurotransmitters and overall mood. It mentions all of these foods in depth on the website, but I will try to summarize their information here.
Fast Food is known to be a "mood downer." These are the main points about them the article mentions...
- Unequivocally, fast foods are mood downers. While it may be cheap, fast, or just easy to reach for a donut, a bag of chips, or a hamburger, eventually, your mood will pay the price.
- The immediate effects of a high-fat or sugary snack can be misleading. Often, they give a quick burst of energy and may reduce tension. But these effects run in reverse rapidly. They shift to increase tension and reduce energy.
- Fast food and junk food are usually the most processed foods, where the nutrients are refined to the point where they are absorbed immediately or not at all, leaving no long-term sustenance for the body to feed off of. It is addictive to eat that sort of lipid-laden diet.
- Besides the poor nutrient content, fast food often contains many additives and preservatives that can affect mood negatively. Food colorings and preservatives, like benzoate, and added flavorings like monosodium glutamate (MSG), can cause anxiety, according to Scott.
- Studies have shown that the omega-6 fatty acids often found in these foods, can compete with omega-3 fatty acids and an imbalance between the two can lead to obesity and depression. Since Americans often don't get enough omega-3s in their diets, consuming too many fast food items puts them at risk for mood problems.
Luckily, we have a great variety of other choices, which include...
Salmon - Salmon is rich in omega-3 fatty acids, which help to improve one's mood, one's heart, and possibly even one's mind. Omega-3 fatty acids are used for building neurotransmitters like serotonin in the brain, and some studies have shown that eating plenty of these fats has depression-preventing qualities. Other foods with these acids include flaxseeds and walnuts.
In fact, countries where oily fish are a part of the diet, such as Japan, have lower rates of depression than other countries. These countries often have a healthier diet and lifestyle overall, but their omega-3 intake is higher as well.
Milk
- rich in calcium and the amino acid tryptophan
- bone-building properties
- calcium is known to calm nerves when feeling stressed or anxious
- tryptophan is important for producing serotonin, which elevates mood.
Chocolate
- rich in a variety of mood-lifting ingredients (most concentrated in dark chocolate)
- dark chocolate is high in polyphenols, which are shown to improve cognitive function
- chocolate also contains phenylethylamines, a neurotransmitter that, in low levels, is associated with depression and in high levels can be associated with schizophrenia
- phenylethylamines work by releasing endorphins in the brain and promote feelings of attraction and giddiness.
- "Both sex and dark chocolate activate the same parts of the brain"
(additional foods are analyzed in the main article)
I found an article that interested me on teacher
evaluations. At the school mentioned in the article they are done differently
than at
Often a professor does not know if they are getting the information across to the students, so I think this type of feedback would be useful. Feedback can be a very helpful source, in making changes for the better. Student evaluation is a good way for professors to get feedback on how well their teaching styles is appealing to and helping students learn. Performance feedback can also give the professors a sense of a job well done, if the feedback is positive, and give them something to change or think about if they are getting mostly negative feedback from students.
At this University only 20 professors took part in the Focus Feedback, why do you think that is?
Why do you
think so few professors at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JA96Fba-WHk
This video is from a television show and it shows positive reinforcement. Whenever the girl would do something that one of the guys thought of as "good behavior" he would reward her with chocolate (incentive). He would do this without telling her that it was something good; just reinforce the behavior with a reward.
In the book, in chapter 5, the author discusses extrinsic motivation which comes from environmental incentives and consequences. In this case, the extrinsic motivator would be chocolate, the reward recieved for the behavior. Extrinsic motivation is related to positive reinforcement because of the "do this and you will get that" behavior that people are trying to change or adjust. The motivation was to get the chocolate as a reward for doing what people consider to be a good action or behavior.
These types of teaching happens a lot with child rearing and teaching kids what kinds of behaviors are appropriate and which aren't. Intrinsic motivation happens in these situations because people are recieving positive feedback for their behaviors. So that is a natural motivation for people to do a behavior, when they are rewarded.
The answer to the question of the title, for me, is YES, I am motivated to attend class when their is an attendance policy in place! When I know a teacher is taking attedance I will not skip class, unless I absolutely have to because of personal reasons such as really sick, doctors appointment, or the weather and can't make it to class.
In chapter 6 there was a figure that had Intrnsic Motivation and under engagement Class Attendance. It caught my eye so I wanted to do a little more reasearch to see how other's felt about that. I found an article that said a major predictor for college success is in fact classroom attendance. Within this article Mississippi State University reaches out to their students who have skipped class more than two times, to see if they need help with anything and try to undertand why the student is not coming to class. That could be a good thing for students, they see the professor actually cares about them and their learning, and will motivate the student to come to class.
It's a feeling of autonomy support from the teacher, and will then have the student be motivated knowing that there is an attedance in affect. Normally students who attend college don't want to do bad in any of their classes, so knowing that they HAVE to go to class and its not some free ride, will definitely up their GPA and graduate.
As a student, are you motivated to attend class if there is an attendance policy in place, or do you believe you are not in high school anymore and should be able to come and go as you please and be treated like an adult?
The link to the article above is: http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0129/p15s01-lehl.html
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95949912
I found this NPR article on motivating school children to be rather interesting and perhaps somewhat controversial. It talks about paying children according to their attendance, quality of work, and behavior in class. My initial reaction to this story is that this type of program is a great experiment. We already spend tremendous amounts of money on education, but continue to get very poor results in many schools. I think money has sometimes been mindlessly thrown here and there, and we don't see any good come from that. It has sometimes been said that raising the teacher pay will bring in higher quality people or that bringing in various new classroom materials will help students learn, but the problem seems to be deeper than that.
As was mentioned earlier on our blog, one major problem is "stupid homework." By no means am I referring to all, or even most, homework, but in my educational experience I have had plenty of assignments that have just been downright meaningless. You waste a great amount of time, learn nothing, and feel like you've lost a few brain cells in the process. Another part of the problem is that the belief that homework/studying is unpleasant and to be avoided has been instilled in many of us from a very early age. There seems to be a negative connotation with learning, and I think we should work harder to change that, perhaps by doing more to support "science is fun" programs and others like it. If students perceive educational activities as fun, they will find greater energy to put into their learning.
I also think schools can put too much emphasis on grades, which can subsequently cause some children to focus only on letter grades and many others to become apathetic about the education system. Although I have generally got rather good grades throughout my academic career, and a certain amount of assessment is surely needed, putting so much of the emphasis on a few short (and sometimes poorly written) tests does not seem to be the best approach. Sometimes such tests tell you very little about the students except perhaps their abilities to discern/anticipate what information will be asked on the test and cram accordingly. I think many students feel this way, and they feel discouraged when think that they will not be fairly evaluated.
This may be more a problem in the high school and college environments, but I think another very serious problem with our education is an overwhelming lack of clarity in certain classroom environments. Sometimes students are required to read very old texts that are written in an English language that is very different from our own. It is unreasonable for students to be required to read these texts without any guidance from the instructor - the professor should be there for a reason. In college, I know of at least one professor who gets away with murder by having "discussion-based" classes in which the student is given no other instruction than to "read the textbook" - such professors contribute nothing yet get paid in full. When teachers do not present material in a clear, thought out, and interesting manner, the student can become very discouraged and the learning process is heavily impeded. It is a far from ideal outcome to cause some students to have anxiety attacks and others to give up entirely. More needs to be done to address this problem.
The controversy that arises from this Pay-To-Behave experiment also merits attention. A question that inevitably arises is, "Even if these financial incentives greatly increase academic performance, is teaching children to learn solely for money to be desired?" Some would probably argue that it is no different than receiving an allowance for doing chores or a paycheck for a job, but I am still not entirely sure how I would feel if I were one of the parents. I am not sure I would be comfortable sending a child through this program if I thought it would cause them to place money above everything else.
This site is dedicated to the thought that something as simple as fun is the easiest way to change people's behaviour for the better. Be it for yourself, for the environment, or for something entirely different, the only thing that matters is that it's change for the better.
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