Thinking Outside of the Box

              I’m sure we’ve all heard familiar phrase “there’s more than one way to skin a cat” or “milk a cow”. We would hear this said perhaps during a discussion on how something should be done when one person/or set of people would insist on accomplishing a task the same way they were able to accomplish something similar in times past. They remained closed off to accepting a new and sometimes “better” way of completing a task, because they relied on their ‘mental set’, which is defined as a preconceived notion about how to approach a problem, which is determined by a person’s experiences or what has worked in the past. (Goldstein, 2014, p. 339)

This concept comes to mind as I think of myself as it relates to parenting. I have a four year old daughter and five month old son, who as you can probably guess couldn’t be more different. When my husband and I learned that our second child would be a boy, of course we knew that things would be slightly different as they got older, but we assumed the baby phase would be practically the same. We couldn’t be more wrong. Even the hospital staff didn’t give us the same “teaching/coaching” as they did with our first. Everyone who entered our room asked the question; “Is this your first child”? Once they learned that it was not, the conversation shifted, as if we were “pros” on all things baby. As it turns out, the simple things such as what baby wash, diapers, bottles and even pacifiers to use were different. Even what soothed our daughter, doesn’t even come close to what soothes our son.

For the baby shower to celebrate the soon coming of our son, we asked our family and friends to purchase a specific brand of diapers because it was the brand that worked well for our daughter. However, once our son was born, it took us much longer to realize that those diapers weren’t the best brand for him. After more than two to three dozen ruined outfits, and another dozen soiled bed sheets, it dawned on us to try another diaper. Had we not be so “stuck” on our previous experience, we may have thought to try another brand sooner. The same was the case with our choice of bottles. All in all, I would have to agree that because we developed mental sets on how to care for a newborn, it was more difficult to find an effective solution. In the five months of our sons’ life, we have learned that raising multiple children is not so “cookie cutter” and that we have to think outside of our own mental box.

References:

Goldstein, E. B. (2014). Cognitive Psychology: Connecting Mind, Research and Everyday Experience (4th Edition). In E. B. Goldstein, Cognitive Psychology: Connecting Mind, Research and Everyday Experience (4th Edition). (p. 339). Cengage Limited.

Most women can recall being a young girl, thinking of and planning out her wedding day. Looking through magazines or online for the “perfect dress”, deciding what flowers she would hold, what colors her bridal party would wear, etc. Now, by the time our wedding day comes, some of us remember a few of those memories and try to include our childhood dreams into our big day. Did we have that horse and carriage or did we opt for a limousine? Did our bridesmaids wear pink? Did we have that ice cream bar at our reception? At the conclusion of your wedding day things shift from mere desires on a list, and instead becomes a part of your long term memory in which we can visualize almost every aspect of what most call the most important day of your life.

My husband and I just celebrated our sixth year wedding anniversary on the tenth of October and as we ate dinner, we reflected on the day we said “I do”. I remembered the nerves, the overwhelming joy, and even the fear that many don’t speak of that comes with beginning a new journey. I recalled what it felt like to walk down the aisle towards my now husband. We even laughed as we spoke on the things that fell apart on that memorable day and made mention of all the family and friends that surrounded us six years prior. We were able to recall this experience because of what Endel Tulving (1985) coined as episodic memory; which is the ability to “travel back in time” to reconnect with events that happened in the past. More specifically, it’s the ability to recall and mentally re-experience specific details about a personal event.

A lot of us unknowingly rely on this type of long term memory as it helps us “hold onto” the details of important events in life. Whether it’s the day your children were born, the day you received your degree after many years of schooling, or your wedding day- because of episodic memory, it is a day to remember.

References:

Tulving, E. (1985). Memory and consciousness. Canadian Psychology/Psychologie Canadienne, 26(1), 1

Perception is defined as experiences resulting from stimulation of the senses (Goldstein, 2015, p. 52) or the ability to see, hear or become aware of something through the senses. But if most people have access to their five senses, how is it possible for everyone to see, hear or smell the same objects/atmospheres, but still discern something completely different? It all has to do with perception, or our interpretation of how we see the world. Our experiences allow us to understand situations differently, which in some way changes our “reality”. Let’s explore some examples.

I’ve known my husband for almost eight years, we’ve been married for almost six, and the entire time we’ve known each other he’s worked third shift. At the same time, I’ve always worked first shift, so our realities in regards to time have always been so different. Eleven o’clock in the evening is late to me because I’ve been up all day while he sleeps in preparation for his overnight shift. That same eleven o’clock in the evening is early to him since he just started his shift. Notice that the same time of day is perceived differently based on our experiences. So when we spend time together, someone always has to compromise their reality in order to fit into the other person’s reality/norm. I’ll either have to stay up “late” or he’ll have to wake up “early”. Our own personal circumstances plays a very important role in how we perceive time.

Another example of how our experiences affect our perception allows us take a look at a phenomenon known as “top-down processing”. Top-down processing using prior knowledge to influence our perception, or uses what we’ve already experienced to dictate how we feel or perceive a thing.

A personal experience of mine would be giving birth. I have a three year old daughter and a two month old son. Throughout my pregnancy with my daughter, I had no personal encounter with giving birth so although I had personal testimonies from other people, I didn’t have my own experience. However, after having gone through labor with my daughter, I was more aware of and had formed my own perception of what labor could be like when it came time to give birth to my son. During labor with my daughter, my pain medication started to wear off while I was in the “pushing phase”, so I knew from experience that the epidural provide pain relief. However, the option for pain relief was off the table during labor with my son because he came too quickly. I can remember the doctor telling me that it was time to push and there was no time for the anesthesiologist to come and administered the epidural. I panicked based on what I felt at the end of my labor with my daughter and perceived that I wouldn’t be able to deliver my son natural.

One final example I’d like to take a look at is quite simple and something we all can relate to. We’ve all received a text message or an email that looked something like this: “Go0d M0rning” or “C U L8tr” or maybe even “my shirt is wrt”. Even through those typos, it is easy to understand what the sender actually intended. There are even times when someone sends a message and we don’t even notice the typo because our brains automatically saw the correct word/spelling there.These are all examples of “top-down processing.

Goldstein, E.B. (2015). Cognitive Psychology: Connecting Mind, Research, and Everyday Experience,     4th Edition. Cengage Learning.