Author: Regan Stoddard

We discussed in class the relationship between conformity and obedience within the human mind. For starters, almost obvious, behavior is contagious, people follow other people’s behavior in order to fit in and conform with the group. We discussed in class the experiment done by Solomon Asch and the group of people in an elevator. Whenever a group of people that were a part of the experiment changed positions or were standing facing away from the door in the elevator, nonparticipants followed the group, changing their behavior to match the group (conformity). Obedience is a little different, people comply with social pressures like conformity, but obedience adds in commands of an authority figure, which makes people even more pressured to conform. We also can discuss the Chameleon effect, which is unconsciously mimicking other’s expressions, postures, and voice tones.

All throughout high school, I was always a leader, specifically on my varsity sports teams I was captain. Of course, when you are captain, you want to lead by example and show the rest of the team how to act and work hard. By me always working hard, listening to my coach, having a positive attitude, etc. it got others to follow me, and most of the time the entire team to conform to this behavior. No one wanted to be the odd man out, or risk getting in trouble by our coaches, so if I led by example, my teammates were likely to follow this behavior since behavior is contagious. The Chameleon effect is a big deal on sports teams. If my teammates see me talking back to my coach, having a bad attitude or acting like I do not care, they will follow these expressions, postures, and “voices” themselves; therefore, I needed to make sure at all times these three aspects were always positive because I never knew who was watching me at any time. Even though I always tried my best to get my entire team to comply with similar attitudes and actions like mine, not everyone always would follow, which is where obedience comes into play. Some people needed that higher authority figure like my coach in order to behave, or the social pressures of fans and the other team and games in order to comply. As you can see, conformity and obedience play a big role in places like school and sports teams, especially at levels like middle and high school with many social pressures.

Many people are aware of observational learning, but may not be aware of how it exactly works and what needs to happen in order for it to be successful. Obviously, people can learn through observation; however, in order for humans and/or animals to learn through observation, mirror neurons need to be present and active in the brain. Mirror neurons are neurons that fire in the brain when a human performs an action but also when that human observes the same action being done by another human. The neuron’s purpose is to basically mirror the action being done so when it comes time for the human to perform an action on their own, they have this information already stored in the brain and do not need assistance. Within observational learning, there are four elements that are key to its success, these steps include the following: attention (must notice it), memory (must remember it), imitation (must be able to do it), and motivation (must have the desire). When describing these four elements, the word “it” refers to the action being performed.

The real-life experience that I can apply to observational learning is how I learned how to cook and bake. My parents are both big cookers, my mom also loves to bake, and they are extremely well at what they cook/bake. In our kitchen, at home, we have an island that looks onto the kitchen and I often found myself at home doing homework there, talking to my parents, or even watching them cook in the kitchen. I became interested in cooking around when I was about 13-14 years old, especially after watching my parents cook such good food for years (attention), this is where my motivation came in (desire to cook). Overtime I would ask my mom to further explain what it was that she was doing or I would watch videos on youtube and facebook of people cooking, which is for sure when the mirror neurons became most active in order for my memory to come into effect. After I watched both my parents cook numerous dishes and desserts, I became confident enough to try it on my own. Of course, there was trial and error, and not every dish came out perfect the first time, but I was able to do it (imitation) and eventually able to perfect it. The key out of the four elements to me is motivation, you need the motivation to want to learn how to do something, you need it to understand that you will fail at a task sometimes, and you need it to keep on going so you can eventually know exactly how to perform a task on your own. Observational learning can be applied to so many other situations in a person’s life and can be key to how someone learns something.

One of the most easy ways to remember information, especially for young students, is to use acronyms to learn and understand concepts in school. Most students probably learned PEMDAS in math class or ROY G BIV in art class, as well as acronyms you made up on your own. Whether you made them up on your own or used the acronyms your teacher presented for you, they most likely stuck with you and helped you to remember this information.

Using acronyms to remember information is an example of Elaborative Rehearsal, which is when a person transfers information from your Short-Term Memory to the Long-Term Memory by making this information meaningful. In your short-term memory, you hold a few items for a short period of time, which is why you can use elaborative rehearsal to relate these memories in your short-term memory in order to keep it stored in the long-term memory. If you were to just try to memorize certain information, you might be able to recall it for a short period of time, but it would not be stored in your long-term memory or allow you to recall this information later in life, it would only be temporary.

In your long-term memory you have almost limitless storage and the information stored is relatively permanent, hence why you apply these acronyms in school. The information is stored in long-term memory because you have made this memory meaningful or related the acronym to prior knowledge you know. I know personally that I still remember specific things like symmetric shapes because of a song my teacher taught me in second grade which I can still recall today, retrieving it from my long-term memories because she made the song meaningful, not just straight memorization.

What many people fail to realize is that Psychology has many branches of study that all focus on different parts of behavioral and mental processes. The five roots of Psychology include the following: structuralism, functionalism, psychoanalysis, behaviorism, and Gestalt psychology. Focusing on Psychoanalysis, which emphasizes unconscious conflict and past events, scientists see how past events, mainly childhood experiences, affect the influence of personality traits and psychological problems in humans. More often than not, the reason why people develop psychological problems is because they have unresolved issues from a traumatic experience. Many people try and talk to Psychoanalytic Psychologists about the problems rooted in their minds in order to help them. While Psychoanalytic Psychologists are not always the solution to people’s problems, there is a direct connect to traumatic experiences and people’s future psychological problems (simplypsychology.org). 

Many people in the United States experience a car accident in their lifetime, and when I was 16 years old, I flipped my car while my sister Sam and my friend Erin were in the car. Not only was it a traumatic experience for myself, but also my sister and Erin. Thankfully, none of us were hurt, not even a scratch or concussion, but there was a dramatic mental toll on us, especially myself. After the accident, I refused to drive anywhere for about three months and hated driving with anyone but my parents. The accident also happened in the snow so now I am even more cautious and paranoid when I drive in the snow. I also hate when people make sharp turns because I have this paranoia of the car flipping, like it did in the accident. Affecting my sister as well, Sam is not very trusting of anyone driving, and sometimes not even myself. She too fears cars flipping and becomes very uncomfortable when people exceed high speeds in cars. 

Due to this traumatizing car accident, my sister and I have now developed certain psychological problems and characteristics traits. From this past event, I still have unresolved psychological problems, like my fears of getting into another car accident as well as being claustrophobic. Always being claustrophobic, I think the accident only increased my level of claustrophobia because we were trapped upside down in my car until the fire department came to rescue us. Although I was a teenager, my sister was a child at the time, but regardless, both of us are forever going to remember this car accident, and have influenced our personalities. Another important aspect or term to understand is unconscious conflict, which is a personal inner mind conflict that is buried deeper into the mind and allows people to process or cope with what they have traumatically experienced. Where unconscious conflict comes into play in our accident is the fact that I tried to bury this experience and pretend it didn’t happen, which in return was a catalyst to the growth of my psychological problems (quora.com). Psychoanalysis can become an extreme issue for people who go through things such as abusive relationships or traumatic loss of a family member. Although not all people are affected by traumatic events in their child, many causes for people’s future personality traits and psychological problems are due to these experiences.