Taste Aversion

            Taste aversion is when someone has an aversion to a certain food or taste, because the person became nauseous or sick after eating that food once before.  They associate being sick with the taste of that food, and no longer want to eat that food. The sickness is sometimes not even the result of the food, but humans make this association anyway. As humans, we are inclined to have aversions to foods that make us sick after eating or tasting them, therefore taste aversions are common.

When I was younger, my oldest brother ate hamburger helper one night for dinner. Later that night he drank a chocolate milkshake, and shortly after, he threw up outside of our house on our porch. Ever since that night, he refuses to eat hamburger helper, because he believes that is what made him vomit that night. My brother has a taste aversion to hamburger helper, because he associates it with getting sick to his stomach. Numerous times my mom tried to tell him that the hamburger helper did not make him sick, especially since no one else in the family had the same reaction to it as he did, but he could not get rid of the aversion.

An own personal experience with taste aversions, happened to me last year right before spring semester ended when my mom sent up homemade chocolate chip cookies for finals week. Right around the time she sent them up to me, I contracted strep throat, so I now associate a very sore throat with her chocolate chip cookies. I have a taste aversion to these chocolate chip cookies, and whenever she makes them, I do not have an urge to eat them. If I just take one bite of one, the taste automatically reminds me of the week last year when my throat was so incredibly sore, and I was in constant pain. Even though, I know the chocolate chip cookies were not the cause of my strep throat, I cannot help but relate the two together.

Many people have taste aversions, since as humans we relate the taste and sickness together. This can actually be a good thing sometimes. If the food was the real source of the sickness, not eating the food again is a smart decision. However, most times, the food is not the actual cause of the sickness.

Elaborative Rehearsal

            Elaborative rehearsal is a way to encode information. It involves transferring information from short-term memory to long-term memory by making the information meaningful in some way. The information can be made meaningful by relating it to prior knowledge or making the information meaningful in a personal way. Elaborative rehearsal can make the long-term memory a lot stronger, meaning that one is more likely to recall the information at a later time. Elaborative rehearsal can be very useful when studying for an exam, because you are more likely to get a good grade on the exam.

When I am studying, I find it a lot easier to understand and remember the information if I am able to relate the information to prior knowledge or relate it one of my own personal experiences. Recently I was studying for one of my exams and it contained a lot of information on how technology is shaping us and changing both our behaviors and our experiences. I found it very easy to relate this to my own experiences with technology in everyday life. For example, technology is changing the way we are shopping, so I thought about this and my own knowledge of how I shop. We were given examples of how technology is changing our shopping experiences, such as buying books on Amazon.com instead of going to an actually bookstore, and since I could relate this example to my personal life I was able to remember this information when taking the exam.

Even in my statistics class, I find using elaborative rehearsal very helpful. When you use real life examples that you can relate to to explain concepts, recalling them in the future is a lot easier. It was easy to remember the difference between discrete and continuous variables, by knowing that discrete are counted, like number of pages in a book, and continuous are measured, like height. I find that when I use elaborative rehearsal during my studying, I tend to get better grades, because I am able to remember the information because it is now in my long-term memory.

Julia Ciamaichelo

Illusory Correlation

            Illusory correlational is defined as someone perceiving a relationship between any two things when no relationship actually exists. Examples that are seen in everyday life of illusory correlational are superstitions, stereotypes, and prejudice. Superstitions exist in many aspects of everyday life, from thinking you will receive bad luck from walking under a ladder to men growing beards during playoff season so their favorite sports team wins the championship.

My brother believes in superstitions when it comes to one of his favorite teams playing in an important game. He has been a huge fan of Florida State University for as long as I can remember. When they made it to the BCS National Championship Game this year my brother was thrilled. He stayed home to watch the game that night in order to have full focus on the game. When I came back home, Florida State was down 24-20 to Auburn, but they then took the lead 27-24. My brother did not want anyone to move from their seats, especially me, since they had taken the lead moments after I arrived back home. When I told him I was getting up to go to bed, my brother freaked out. He had a superstition that if I were to get up from my seat on the couch, I would be the reason Florida State would lose the game.

I tried to tell him that there was no relationship between Florida State winning the game and me staying on the couch. If Florida State was going to end up losing the game, my brother told me he was going to blame me. Once again, I had to explain to him that I going to bed could in no way effect the outcome of the game. I got up from my seat, and Florida State ended up winning the game. The next day I told him once again that superstitions do not really exist, because there is no relationship even though you think one exists.