Krystina Arguello's Blog

Intro to psychology had been a very fun class for me this semester, and a class that has made me super interested in going into the field of psychology. Here is an overview of how my semester in this class went all wrapped up in my last final blog 🙂  History of Psychology Careers of Psychology  Brain, Sensation, and Perception Developmental Psychology & Personality Learning and Memory  Motivations,Emotions, and Social Psychology Psychological Disorders & Therapy Positive Psychology         There were a lot of things that stood out to me in Psycology, but these specific things really made my interest soar.  The link given about the sub-fields and careers in psychology was very interesting. It opened my eyes about how much opportunity there is out there for psychology and how many different branches there are. This was one of my favorite weeks, learning about the brain. It  boosted my interest in how psycholog...

                      Monday, April 23rd Tuesday, April 24th Wednesday, April 25th Thursday, April 26th Friday, April 27th Saturday, April 28th Sunday, April 29th I really enjoyed doing this assignment. I did it before I went to bed for 7 consecutive days. It really helped boost my overall happiness, and made me focus on the positives of the day rather than stressing over the negatives. I highly reccomend this activity! I am going to continue to do this. I enjoy writing down experiences, and this reminded me that life is so good, and that if I focus on the great things in life then all my stress about the small negative things will be completely irrelevent. Life is too short to focus on the negatives! Embrace the good times and live life to the fullest.  "I believe the only thing that we really have control over is o...

The American Counseling Association (ACA) has named April Counseling Awareness Month! The ACA is focusing promotions on mental health counselors, school and college counselors, substance abuse counselors, and career counselors, but the month honors all of us. My experiece with this really changed my whole perspective on counseling. Counseling gives you the opportunity to sort out a problem or issue that you've had trouble figuring out on your own. it is always nice to have that certain person get you through the rough stages that may come in life. Counselors are truly a blessing and should never be taken for granted. Many people do not know that April is counselors awareness month, and through my post i feel like more poeple will get exposed to it and the hashtag #counselorshelp. Through these little things, society can make a difference and speak out though peoples' experiences. "Sometimes, just the act of venting is helpful. Counseling provides a safe haven for...

This is Gina Rodriguez,Gina Rodriguez was born in Chicago, Illinois, to Puerto Rican parents Magali and Genaro Rodriguez. She was named the "next big thing" and one of the "top 35 Latinos under 35," by The Hollywood Reporter. They named Gina winner of the "Best Actor" award at the First Run Film Festival in NY and the film aired on HBO in 2010 and was named one of the "Five Best Shorts." After the years of success in NY, Gina booked a lead role in a feature film Go for It (Lionsgate) in which she received a 2011 Imagen Awards nomination. This very successful actress went through a lot to get to where she currently is. She was put down for many roles because she was a latina. She also rejected roles because of the horrible representation of latinos. Gina is also a supporter of Inspira, an organization that works to spotlight Latino leaders who shape their communities. Take a look at this post, posted on twitter by Rodriguez not too long ago d...

By performing this exercise it made me realize how much I am capable of if I set my mind to the given task. Through my incentive (frozen yogurt) I had a little something to reward myself with through my hard work.  Behavior modification is a treatment approach which is focused on changing behavior. This method is based on the work of B.F. Skinner, a well-known psychologist who developed the operant conditioning theory which suggests that behavior can be modified by consequences and through reinforcement. I really encourage people to try this out, it opened my mind and made me realize that it is possible to modify my behavior of practicing.  "The way positive reinforcement is carried out is more important than the amount."  -B. F. Skinner sources: https://www.brainyquote.com/topics/reinforcement http://www.minddisorders.com/A-Br/Behavior-modification.html

The different types of memory disorders Memory slip -This common trait is actually a disorder of attention - rather than memory loss. As we get older, we find it harder to split our attention between several tasks. This is because too many thoughts in our head clutter up our memory centre found deep in our brain. When our brain can't cope it turns off the electricity that fires up our neurotransmitters - substances that send messages to our brain and switches on our memory. Mental blocks -People often complain of their mind going blank, especially as they get older. This common experience happens when the frontal lobes of our brain temporarily lose track of what our brain plans to do. Dementia -The term "dementia" describes a group of symptoms caused by the impact of disease on the brain. Symptoms typically include problems with memory, speech and perception. Alzheimers - Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia, affecting around 500,000 pe...

Many behaviors are followed by punishment: any consequence of a behavior that makes that behavior less likely to recur. There's a simple rule to clarify it: if the term includes the word reinforcement, it makes the behavior happen more often; if the term includes punishment, it makes the behavior happen less often, whether it is positive or negative. Like reinforcement, punishment can be positive (getting something undesirable) or negative (removing something desirable). For example, a parent who spanks a child for cursing is using positive punishment. But a parent who takes away a child’s handheld video game system is using negative punishment. Of course, both punishments are intended to reduce the cursing behavior. This really stood out to me because growing up there was a lot of reinforcements and punishments in my family, and now I know why my parents did what they did.  Positive Punishment: This type of punishment is also known as "punishment by an appli...

      What is personality?    Personality refers to individual differences in characteristic patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving. The study of personality focuses on two broad areas: One is understanding individual differences in particular personality characteristics, such as sociability or irritability. The other is understanding how the various parts of a person come together as a whole. How is personality tested? In order to study and measure personality, psychologists have developed a number of different personality tests, assessments, and inventories. Many of these tests are widely used in a variety of settings. For example, the famous Myers-Briggs Type Indicator is frequently used.  In 1936, psychologist Gordon Allport found that one English-language dictionary alone contained more than 4,000 words describing different personality traits. He categorized these traits into three levels: Cardinal Traits: These are traits that domi...

The nature vs. nurture debate within psychology is a product of either inherited (genetic) or acquired (learned) characteristics.  Nature refers to all of the genes and hereditary factors that influence who we are—from our physical appearance to our personality characteristics. Nurture refers to all the environmental variables that impact who we are, including our early childhood experiences, how we were raised, our social relationships, and our surrounding culture. The nature-nurture debate is concerned with the relative contribution that both influences make to human behavior. 1) High Blood Pressure & Obesity  An example of this debate is whether high blood pressure and obesity is a health risk that is passed genetically from parent to child. Nurture proponents point to the poor eating habits that cause obesity and the limited ability to regulate personal habits that lead to high blood pressure. 2) Personality The development of personality is of...

By interviewing my mom, I realized adults and teens really do differ in many ways. Teenagers can look like adults, dress like adults, and even act like adults at times; sometimes, it might be hard to tell the teenagers from adults (and other times it isn’t hard at all). But it’s also crucial to remember that their brains are wired completely differently. It’s long been known that at the end of the day, teenagers just don’t think like adults, and that’s because the different sections of their brains aren’t connected the way they will be once they’ve matured a little more. Most specifically, teenagers lack many of the nerve connections that tie the frontal lobe to the rest of the brain, limiting their ability to think ahead. My mom made really good references and was a great person to interview because she currently has 2 teenage kids and she also used to teach teenagers. “Well, no,” you have to say, “your brain is sometimes an explanation; it’s never an excuse.” ― Frances E. ...

What is the color of this dress?  CLICK HERE FOR POLL  http://pollmaker.vote/p/0Z9PRK4P Remember "the dress", a hugely controversial issue that was all across social media? So, how do we know what the actual color of the dress is? Scientists have done research and how our brain perceives these colors.  According to Bevil Conway, a neuroscientist who teaches at Wellesley College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the differences in color perception are probably due to assumptions the brain makes about the illumination of the garment so that it will appear the same under different lighting, a property known as color constancy. People who saw the dress as a white-gold color probably assumed it was lit by daylight, so their brains ignored shorter, bluer wavelengths. Those who saw it as a blue-black shade assumed a warm, artificial light, so their brains ignored longer, redder wavelengths. Those who saw the dress as a blue-brown color probably...