Final Thoughts 

The practices I learned best from this semester is analogical problem solving and four principles of attention from the Ted Talk. I relay on the analogical problem solving method the most but try not to get fixated on previous techniques that I used but rather look for similarities. I think the analogical problem is a great way to solve problems because it using knowledge from past problems and solving currents ones.

When it comes to building things, and solving labor problems, I topically would use the analogical problem method. Learning about this method has been helpful because now I know what kind of problem solving method I’m using when solving future problems.

The principles of attention from Ted Talk break down the four types of attention that are used in daily living. The first principle of attention is that; certain things are already included in the systematically included into the priority maps base on detectors for such items. Example is recognizing/ detecting certain food. The second principle of attention is looking at something for certain amount of time would cause the priority map to change to adjust to my current interest.

Thirdly, the priority map can take into account our likes and dislikes because of the reward system. Our brain wants to look at whatever give us the most pleasure and avoid the ones that don’t.  Lastly, we have the ability to ignore things that are attention grabbers. 

I did not find the blogs to be beneficial because I don’t see how it helped with understanding the materials from the chapter. This is my second hybrid class and I think I would take another course like it. This class was different from the other hybrid class because the materials were not taught in class but rather we had to read the book and kind of figure things out on our own. One thing I do like about the class is that, I would be able to use what I have learned in future classes as well as my private life. Taking the class reinforce my desire to go to graduate school for clinical psychology starting next year. Thank you for teaching the class and Happy Holidays!!

Problem Solving  

I’m not a master at problem solving nor do I go looking for it but pride myself in being good at solving problems. I have different stages that I go through whenever I encounter problem and I must complete each stage for the problem to be solve.  I relay on the analogical problem solving method the most but try not to get fixated on previous techniques that I used but rather look for similarities. Though solving a problem is stressful, I get a rush from it. It like my reward system get activated because I could fix/ solve something.

Scenario:

Mariama have been working hard and preparing herself for her trip to Sierra Leone. She has a large family that still live in Sierra Leone. She decided to buy clothes for her half-sister, father, favorite cousin and auntie and more cousins. Now she is a full-time student with two jobs and an internship; so, you can see how stressful it was for her between September to October. It was easy for Mariama to shop for the females in her family but it was difficult to shop for the males. Mariama’s best friend told her about layaway at Burlington Coat Factory. She had three different layaways under the same number. For the fourth layaway, Mariama put it under her friend’s name because she was ashamed and didn’t want the sales associates to judge her. By mid-October there was only one layaway at Burlington. The company that ship to Sierra Leone were scheduled to pick up the clothes on the last week of October. But there was a problem. Mariama hadn’t find clothes for her dad. She went shopping and could find her some pants and shirts but she didn’t have enough money to pay for the clothes. There was still clothes on layaway that she had to pay but Mariama didn’t have enough money for her dad’s clothes and the layaway. Mariama decided to pay for the last layaway instead. However, Burlington’s sale associates couldn’t find her layaway. There are two problems in this scenario; 1. Mariama don’t have enough money to get her dad’s clothes and second, her layaway that had her half-sister clothes was missing.

Stage one: Mariama started laughing and tell jokes because she refused to believe that she doesn’t have enough for her dad’s clothes and her layaway is missing.

Stage two: Mariama is displaying massive amount of attitude towards the workers at Burlington because she waiting for 30min. Thankfully She realized that she was being rude, so Mariama try to be passive aggressive instead.

Stage three:   Mariama was very sad and felt hopeless and start to freak out inwardly and try not to have a panic attack.

Stage four: Mariama try to calm herself down by telling herself that it fine and it not that serious for her to be acting in such a way. She starts thinking of ideas to solve the problem.

Stage five:

 A light bulb went off in her head and Mariama realized that two weeks ago, she took out the layaway that was under her friend’s name and not under hers as she had thought. Mariama talked to a manager and inform the manager of the mistake she had made. The manage looked up the layaway under Mariama’s name and found out that “missing layaway” was not missing but was rather under a different name.

Stage six: Mariama apologies for the mistakes. But then she remembers that she still doesn’t have enough money for her dad’s clothes. Mariama remembered that she has a coat and shoes that she bought but then realized that it made her look funny. Mariama went back home and retrieve the coat and shoes and return to Burlington. Mariama got a refund for the coat and shoes. With the refund money and help from her boyfriend, Mariama could buy the clothes for her dad.

Definition: Attention is the behavioral and cognitive process of selectively concentrating on a discrete aspect of information, whether deemed subjective or objective, while ignoring other perceivable information ( chapter 4). 

Overt Attention

Overt Attention is the link between eye movement, attention and the perception of our environment. Cortical and sub-cortical structures. Attention can be influenced by stimulus salience such as the color, contrast and movement. The rolling of the red ball in chapter two is a good example of attention influence by stimulus. Bottom-up process plays a role in stimulus salience because it depends solely on the pattern of light and dark color.

Covert Attention

Covert attention is keeping our eyes stationed on an individual or object but our attention is directed elsewhere. Covert attention can be useful when not trying to appear distracted and yet attending to a more important thing. I use covert attention in my daily life more than its required. Last weekend I went to a bar with my friends. I’m very antsy when I go to places that have more than two humans. My friend decided that she wanted to dance and while we were dancing I found myself listening to two girls. The girls’ conversation consisted of “omgs” and a lot of flirtatious comments. The reason my attention was diverted was because I did not want to dance but I still danced because my friend doesn't like dancing by herself. Overt attention was turn on as soon as I walked into the bar. I scanned the room and I found us a seat by the window. I also used bottom-top processing when examining the bar and finding all of the emergency exit signs and bathroom.

Selective Attention

Selective attention gives us the ability to prioritize and attend to some things while ignoring others. Goal-driven control is driven by an individual’s current goals and learned priorities. Reflexive attention is when our attention is diverted to a sudden change in our environment. Loud bangs or flashing light. Stimulus driven control is not dependent on current behavioral goals.I think I have a high functioning selective attention because I stay attended to whatever I’m doing regardless of what is going on in my surrounding. I simply tune out anything irreverent to me. Cierra and Tierra carpool with me every day to school. They are very chatty and I am not a morning person, I would tune them out and focus on the road or think about my schedule for the day.

The Brain

The brain regions that are involved in attention are superior colliculus and pulvinar nucleus, thalamus. Damage to these structures can result in defects in overt and covert attention. Neglect disorder occurs when the brain’s attention network is damaged in only one hemisphere caused my stroke (Ogden, 2012). More severe and persistent effects occur when the right hemisphere is damaged. Have attention bias in the direction of their lesion (Ogden, 2012). Right hemisphere lesion would bias attention toward the right, neglecting the left.

Perception 

Perception is a very interesting concept. Perception is a very interesting concept. I stay from drama because of my cognitive ability to look and understand both sides of an argument but it has also given the appearance that I am passive and easy to walk over. My families’ perception of me comes from their inability to get to know me and truly understand my dry sense of humor. My perception of the world and life in general has somehow caused me to question everything, but I’m also open-minded to other's choices and decisions. Cognitive perspective looks at how we think and reason, how we remember things, why we remember some things better than others, how we go about solving a math or a logic problem, why we are likely to pay attention to some things and not to others, and so on. For example, the back of the car to me is known as the boot and in the American English language it is known as a trunk. So at first when people would talk about the trunk of their car, I used to envision a storage compartment.

So at first when people would talk about the trunk of their car, I used to envision a storage compartment.