Mental Health in the Workplace

I wish that back in 2016 I could have seen what my life would have been like today, as I feel like a completely different person, my whole attitude towards life and mental health has completely changed for the better. Back in 2016, I was working at a job that was...

Internet addiction

When Henry Ford came out with the Model T in 1908, it eventually changed life as that generation knew it. When television became mainstream in the 1950s, the American world was forever altered. When the internet became a household standard in the late 90s-early 00s,...

Gottman Couples Therapy

The Gottman method was developed by Drs. John and Julie Gottman, beginning in the 1980s. Highlighting the value of marital friendship, shared fondness and admiration, and managing conflict, the Gottman approach focuses on giving couples the tools they need to repair...

Impact of Pets on Mental Health

Animals have undergone a dramatic transformation in roles in the past few centuries. Whereas animals used to serve as mere assistants in survival and aids to physical labor, they have now edged their noses into people’s homes and beds. Undoubtedly, pets do...

Mental Health and Criminal Justice

Mental health training should be a requirement for criminal justice professionals (cops, firefighters, EMS, guards, troopers, even judges/magistrates), and mental health professionals should be essential staff in every jail and prison. There are so, so many issues...

Role Identities in the Stanford Prison Experiment

Role identities are concepts of the self in different roles. Each participant in the study took on a role identity for their assigned position, whether it was guard or prisoner, that role was taken on and lived out to the fullest. The participants that took place in...

Unethical Activism

              Unethical Activism Written By: Judy Laut               Several economists have alluded that saving lives is not as important as saving the economy. One of those economists, Sean Snaith, has stated “…there are eight billion people in the world, so the...

New age learning

New-age learning is something I never thought I would be involved with. When I first attended college everything was done at a brick and mortar with face to face interaction with our professors. I had one professor who had a favorite student and they seemed to always...

Coping and Pain

My mother once told me that she is a passive-aggressive type of person, explaining that she seems to bottle everything up inside until those emotions burst from inside, usually at the person causing the distress. My father seems to be the same way, wearing a smile on...

Restorative Justice

I think the prison system should be massively reformed. As it stands, our system is punitive, as it focuses on punishment, rather than fixing the problems. A lot of offenders can be helped, if given the right tools to succeed. There are a few possible models that can...

The Importance of Self-Reflection in PAR

When discussing the use of Participatory Action Research (PAR) to enact positive change within disadvantaged groups, some individuals can be skeptical due to the potential bias arising from the integration of researchers into the society being studied. The inclusion...

Misleading Media

In times today there are many different ways to get important information; one of those ways is through the media. The media has continuously proven to be partially, if not fully, biased at times to meet their specific agenda. The media outlet has done activism...

Bullying

Bullying rears it’s ugly head in many circumstances. The workplace, in school, online, pretty much anywhere where people are gathered in some type of collective setting. It affects many and often has it’s reasons deeply rooted in pain, guilt, fear, and...

Do Looks Matter in a Relationship?

People would like to believe that they are not shallow and that “personality” is the most important part in a relationship and looks are just a plus. Of course, personality is important when looking for a significant other, and the compatibility has to be there in...

Hang in there, we’ve got this!

Positive Vibes, Positive Mind, Positive Life! Do you ever consider yourself a positive thinker, or do you think you find difficulty doing so sometimes? The textbook talks about how optimists are considered as people who “look forward to the future” and they “believe...

Crying is okay!

When I first became a parent, I was clueless on so many things. But, I was terrified of doing the wrong thing. So, I joined all these groups online giving advice on what to do in different situations. I’m a psychology person, so a lot of how I think and form opinions...

Do you still like me?

Oh man. Relationships are harder to be in today than ever. With the addition of social media and online profiles and dating its easy to get yourself into trouble with your significant other. Being in a relationship takes work and effort. Josh Gressel, Ph.D. (2019)...

Mom Groups Are The WORST!

Mom Groups Are The WORST! Written By: Judy Laut Mom groups on Facebook are the absolute worst. I envy anyone that’s never experienced such horror. They’re like a bad car wreck, you know that you shouldn’t look as you drive by… but you always...

The Factors that Started My Relationship

When I first saw my boyfriend, it was not the first time he saw me. About 7 years ago I was a night shift leader at Dunkin Donuts. Another Dunkin was getting remodeled, so a couple of workers came to my store. This was the first time Steve noticed me, but I do not...

The Internet is Undefeated

Connection Successful Remember when “community” referred to the people in your neighborhood and other groups of people that you were cool with and would physically see in person? Remember those days when you played outside every day until the sun went down as kids and...

Campus Community

Schools, namely universities are a terrific way to build engagement in communities and meet new people. There is a rise in more schools recently offering online platforms for learning, but I think in general, many people, even young people still yearn for the...

Distribution Among the Community

With the COVID-19 pandemic currently underway, hospitals and government officials everywhere are attempting to properly distribute medical supplies. Oftentimes, this can lead some to question who “deserves” which supplies, occasionally putting a moral...

Essential vs. Non Essential

There is a greater need for community now more than ever. Right now there is a threat that society is facing that has greatly affected a major primal need humans have- socialization. With Covid-19 impacting every single person the sense of community people have has...

Communities Coming Together

With everything going on in the world today it has been very important to come together.  With the social distancing we are not able to come together physically but we can use technology and still support one another. I know many people who have been doing work...

Divided color

The moment people discover the distinction that someone is usually different from me is usually when they perceive the division into ‘we’ and ‘them’ and this creates stereotypes about ‘them’. Even though they are all different and...

Hear ye, Hear ye! CALLING ALL PROCRASTINATORS.

Instructions: Read this RIGHT NOW. Or are you waiting till later? “I get everything done at the exact moment I say I’m going to do it”. Said no one ever. Who are we kidding? Many of us have procrastinated in something within our lives. The textbook defines...

Self-Handicapping, Depression, and Covid-19

 SELF-HANDICAPPING, DEPRESSION, AND COVID-19   Covid-19 has changed nearly every aspect of life as we knew it. Turmoil and chaos are becoming the norm. Grocery stores are empty, schools are closed, hospitals are overwhelmed, and the deaths continue to pile up....

PREJUDICE

Oftentimes people believe that adults become prejudice when they are older and it develops as they mature and form their own opinions on life. However prejudice is a learned behavior that begins in childhood. When a child is younger they absorb whatever material they...

Is it news, or are we all playing telephone?

Do you remember as a child playing the game “Telephone”?  Where you share a message and have to pass it on to your friend and they pass it on to their friend and keep it going?  By the end of the last person, the message is all mixed up from the original...

THE WORLD IS ON A PAUSE, BUT NOT EDUCATION.

While a majority of us, including myself, regularly take online courses are accustomed, many other students are not used to this lifestyle. Online school is a lifestyle. It is harder and challenging, in my opinion. Many of us have no option other than taking online...

School Performance and Emotions

Children’s performance in school has a lot of different aspects to it. It’s not just simply how intelligent they are, how well they test, how much they study, et cetera. These things are definitely relevant, but we are ignoring something that is pretty...

Discrimination in the Workplace

Racial and gender discrimination used to be a much bigger problem than it is today. While we still see discrimination today, there are laws that protect people from being discriminated against in the workplace. These laws are put in place so people feel comfortable in...

Education on Discrimination

For our discussion this week we had to watch the Frontline video. I think that this video and the exercise that was asked to be done by the 3rd grades was really an amazing idea. It was very clear that the children who were put in the lower superior group, which was...

Emotions run high even when the news is fake.

The human race is unique from any other species on this planet due to our higher cognitive thinking. However, sometimes it is our big hearts that gets in the way of our big brains. Have you ever heard a story from someone and it made you so mad but later you found out...

Propaganda on Facebook

Propaganda- “information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view.” I found this topic to be appropriate during these trying times. Since the world is in the middle of a...

He said, she said “What?”

This week’s Blog topic, Media and Communications creates a most fitting theme to the current pandemic sweeping our country. I will refrain from going into too much detail on the actual pandemic and stick mainly with the topic of media and communication. Communication...

Fear Factor

Was Fear a Factor for You? Do you remember a time in your childhood when you watched something via the media (like a TV show or movie) that made you so scared that it gave you nightmares for some time? Did you fear going to sleep because of it or were you on edge...

Mobile Technology’s Role in Tracking an Epidemic

Looking at the spread of an epidemic is difficult to do – especially when testing kits are in extremely limited supplies and only the already sick, celebrities, and other high profile people are being tested (Resnick & Scott, 2020). However, over the past...

Media Censorship

  There are many examples of fake news. There are many examples of where news has spread via media virtually unchecked and unchallenged with little to no known reliable source. However, prior to the unfolding of the current crisis of COVID19, there was a good...

Media Fear

  I feel like this lesson was perfectly timed. With the Coronavirus pandemic here, the media is promoting a lot of fear lately. Promoting fear is a big seller for the media. According to Psychology Today, fear based news focuses on reporting dramatic narratives...

Fake News

“Eating garlic will protect you from the Corona Virus”, “miracle mineral supplement, called MMS, can wipe out coronavirus”, “Colloidal silver kills some strains of coronavirus within 12 hours”, “Drinking Water every 15 minutes will prevent you from getting sick”...

The Dark Side of Social Media

Social media has gained a lot of popularity in recent years. At this point, you’d be hard pressed to find someone in almost any group without a social media presence. Many people prefer it to other forms of media, because of its reach, accessibility &...

Deconstructing Violent Crime

I recently took CRIM 100 and I found the course to be very eye opening and interesting from a social psychological standpoint. What makes one country more susceptible to criminal violence over another, or what makes one country more prone to property crime? In this...

Quis Custodiet Ipsos Custodes

My experience with Swiss law enforcement is a very negative one. Even though I’m trying to be law abiding citizen, it is my feeling that laws in this country are constituted in such a way as to try to get you every opportunity they have. Since I have arrived in...

Eyewitness Testimony..Reliable or Unreliable?

Eyewitness Testimony has been a controversial topic in court cases for as long as I can remember. Eyewitnesses to a crime can either make or break a case depending on what they can recall. A person can be convicted of a crime or not convicted of a crime depending on...

What Would YOU Do? (Bystander Effect)

To Get Involved or Not To Get Involved Have you ever found yourself in a position in which you’ve seen something (like a crime) that shouldn’t take place and you didn’t intervene or do anything about it because you thought that someone else out of the good amount of...

Media and it’s effects on Jurors

The media loves to go into a frenzy and get the story first before anyone else. But Pretrial publicity of criminal or civil cases that are circulated among jurists can create opinions among jury’s before any of the evidence has even been brought to trial....

A jury of our…’peers’?

When we hear the word peer, we tend to think of our friends, our classmates, or even the people we work with; we tend to see these individuals on the same level as us. When we go to vocabulary.com, it defines the word peer as “a person who is of equal standing...

Take the right steps forward

It is unfortunate to believe there are child and youth that struggle with feelings of depression, anxiety, antisocial tendencies and other troubling life aspects. Take a second to think back to your youth. After school did you come home to parents that were happy to...

Stop the police and community racial profiling!

Often times, police in our country profile certain individuals, such as African Americans in particular and automatically assume they are in the middle of some criminal act, or are criminals period. African Americans have a different protocol to try to save their...

Prisoner Exposure to Nature

After recently reading a book titled Your Brain on Nature, I found myself curious about the effects that nature has on people locked up behind bars. The Japanese term called Shinrin Yoku (or Forest Bathing) has been on the upswing recently in various circles on the...

BORN OR MADE: THE MAKING OF A MURDERER.

Are criminals born or made? Is this perhaps a matter of nature vs. nurture? One of the oldest questions in criminology is whether criminals are born or made. Are serial killers a product of nature or nurture? While genetics determine our personality, behavior, and...

Who can blame the bystanders?

We dream of being like the hero in the movies we saw when we were young, but we miss out on the opportunity to be a hero in our daily lives. One reason is the dispersion of responsibility. The bystander effect indicates that the more people around you, the less likely...

Bystander Effect

The bystander effect is the phenomenon that people in groups feel less inclined to help an individual in need (Gruman, Schneider, & Coutts, 2016). When I came across the bystander effect I felt ashamed. Why wouldn’t we help someone in need? Apparently...

Wrongful Convictions

Criminal justice is something I am very interested in. I actually have considered taking a minor in criminal justice. Something that has always stood out to me is wrongful convictions. People who are sentenced to jail time for a crime they did not commit and in most...

Working with a team

Throughout my life, I have been apart of several teams, from sports teams, dance teams, teams at work, and even a team here at Penn State. The most exciting and well-oiled teams I had the opportunity to be a part of was with the Student Ambassadors and the Penn State...

Facilitated Progression

I am a huge fan of Tuckman’s stages of group development, as they were the foundation of how programs were designed when I worked for Outward Bound Intercept in Florida. “Intercept courses are structured wilderness expeditions that help address behaviors such as...

Teamwork Makes the Dream Work!

Group Effort Each of us has most likely had experience in being part of a group, whether it be a sports team, an organization, club, group project, etc. Within these groups/teams, everyone has their own role. The textbook defines a role as “a set of behaviors expected...

Group Projects, Yay…

Just hearing the word “group” is enough to make me cringe a bit. I think it is safe to say that we have all been involved in some sort of a group before. Fairly often we find ourselves in group situations, think about your job or a friends group. Be sure to think...

Cultural Diversity and Racism

Ethnic Harmony We live in a society that consists of diverse people that come from different areas and backgrounds of life and are different shapes and sizes. The textbook talks about “diversity” in relation to physical abilities, religion, gender, social class,...

How About Just All Being Humans

I officiate lots of basketball games these days, all around Eastern Switzerland. Switzerland is a beautiful country, famous for its nature, chocolate, and neutrality. It possesses top notch public transportation, healthcare, and educational systems. It’s a country...

Genocides, why are they still happening?

Did you ever ask yourself how genocides could happen? How can a normal human being, that grew up in the same society you did, suddenly come after you to kill you? It sounds so unlikely, but still it happened, and not just once but over and over again. My mother keeps...

Diversity in my Relationships

Personally I can relate to diversity in two different areas of my life. One is in my personal life. I grew up having a best friend who was Spanish. We were best friends since we were in 5th grade. I spent a lot of my childhood at her house and things were very...

Ignorance, err…I mean privilege…is bliss.

Growing up middle class in the Midwest, I was raised to believe in the “American dream” and bought into the “hard work pays off” ethic. While I do think that hard work increases one’s chances of success, I now consider other contributing factors such as race, class,...

MACHISMO IS HARMING WOMEN

When we hear the term macho, many of us think of a macho man. The term Macho is defined as having or characterized by qualities considered manly, especially when manifested in an assertive, self-conscious, or dominating way; Having a strong or exaggerated sense of...

Benefits of Diversity in the Workplace

When discussing the issue of increasing diversity in the workplace, many of the benefits that diversity can bring to a workplace are not always so well understood. An important point of consideration is marketing these concepts to businesses and other entities that...

Feminism

Feminism WHY PSYCHOLOGY SUGGESTS THAT THERE MAY NOT BE EMPOWERMENT AND STRENGTH IN NUMBERS Written By: Judy Laut     In 2020, feminism, “the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities” (Merriam-Webster, n.d.) is a highly debated...

Generation Gap

In the image above you can see many differences between these two people. Just by looking at the picture, it does not seem that they have anything in common. Do you see any way these two people can relate to each other? What if I told you the one thing they have in...

“It’s just the Baby Blues”

Motherhood should be the most rewarding event in a woman’s life. The media is full of examples of babies gurgling happily and mothers and fathers holding their child with an angelic smile on their faces.I knew, something was wrong with me. After the birth of my first...

Teens gone wild

Last year several teens in our local community got in serious trouble for sexting. These were high school age kids. Is sexting a common problem among teens? and how do you prevent it? Current studies show 20 percent of teens have sent nude or partially nude photos of...

Why Aren’t We Talking About This?

I recently took a class called “The Biological Effects of Aging” and discovered much more than the fact that humans get old. I was most surprised with regard to the statistics surrounding potentially terminal disorders such as cardiovascular disease, stroke, and...

Successfully Changing Health Behavior

I’ve started playing basketball from very young age; I got my first basketball when I was 3, started shooting hoops when I was 6, and playing organized basketball at the age of 8. I’ve continued to play it through elementary/ junior high, high school, and college. I...
SUICIDE: MILITARY’S WORST ENEMY

SUICIDE: MILITARY’S WORST ENEMY

Suicide is the tenth leading cause of death in the United States. Suicide is a serious topic within the general population, as well as the military. Suicide rates for active-duty service members and veterans are rising. According to statistics, 20 veterans die by...

Girls Are Autistic Too!

For a long time, autism was a developmental disorder that boys were primarily diagnosed with. On rare occasions, girls were diagnosed but it didn’t happen very often. Professionals just thought that it was something that boys usually had. For a girl to be considered...

Social Anxiety Disorder

Avoided Encounters       Have you ever had to speak in front of people or been at gatherings (unfamiliar ones and sometimes not) and felt nervous, with your palms sweating, like there was a giant weight on your chest or like there was a giant rock in your stomach?...

Blog Entry #1 – Social Traps

Social Traps      The textbook refers to Social traps as a form of social dilemma that “involve short-term pleasure or gain that over time leads to pain or loss (Platt, 1973)” (Gruman, Schneider, Coutts, 2016). Within this dilemma, people decide if they want to please...

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Reading about depression and anxiety this week is something that I think a lot of people deal and don’t address. I know personally I am one of those people. I have extremely bad anxiety. I worry so much about everything. I worry about my job and withholding the...

Is climate change increasing Natural Disasters?

You are sitting watching the news.  Another natural disaster strikes and terrorizes a city leaving hundreds of people without food, water, and shelter.  This seems to be the norm now with an overabundance of natural disasters.  Is this something that is truly...