Attitude Change Concept Map

After some difficulty I finally uploaded my concept map. I hope I have done this right.

A bit more on how beauty is perceived in our culture.

I wanted to add a bit more to my post about the stereotypes society places on who is and what is beautiful, and the show that Oprah did relating to it. I am currently working parttime in a local Cnaberra school, and everytime I walk into a classroom or down a hall way, I am confronted by students who are trying to fit in to a certain image. Okay, not all students do and many express their individuality, but so many are trying to find where they fit in, in this school community environment. On top of that they are bomarded by what "society" believes is beautiful and desirable- from magazines, television, other students, advertisments at the local shopping centre, the almost pornographic music video clips (a pet hate of mine), I could go on. Most days they come into class and they are happy but every now and then I hear comments as I pass through the room/hall/quad or I notice glances between the "cool" kids and the no so. It saddens me that this notion of what is "beautiful" and "cool" is stopping students from talking and interacting with each other. Very rarely, (especially in one of my classes where this is almost jumping out and hitting me in the face, it is so obvious) do they attempt to break down this wall and talk to one another in class. What can teachers do when they students aren't willing to do so?

"Confronting Issues of Beauty"- The Oprah Winfrey Show.

Okay, so I know I posted last week about a segment on the Oprah Winfrey show to do with child pornograpy on the internet (see my blog), but when I turned on the television again yesterday after arriving home from work, there was this really interesting story. I had missed part of it but it was to do with issues surrounding beauty and what society portrays as beautiful. Oprah was interviewing an 18-year-old girl, Kiri, an African-American who had replicated the "doll" experiment by the Clarks' in the 1940's-(they asked black children to tell them which doll—a white one or a black one—they thought looked most like them, and which was good and which was bad. They found that black children identified with and preferred white dolls to black ones. They concluded this was proof of internalized racism)- oprah.com accessed 29/8/07. Kiri turned this experiment into a seven minute documentary into interacist beauty that her and her friends had experienced, calling it A Girl like Me. The segment was part of the show called Children Ashamed of the Way They Look.

The show then had various other guests and one other guest and her story that very much interested me was the story of SuChin Pak, a Korean-American. She documented her life in the series My LIfe (Translated), where she reveals what is like to be caught between two cultures. In her asian culture the emphasis of beauty -which I found quite bizarre- was the fascination with having a crease in the eyelid. The rationalisation being it made the Asian eye more open and rounder.

We often hear people in our culture saying things such as "I wish I was more tanned, had blonder, straighter hair, or I wish I looked a certain way" and the racist attitudes and comments directed to people of "darker" complexions have been well documented throughout the world's history, but the story of SuChin Pak really made me stop and think that this problem of self-image, self-concept and individual esteem is really a world wide problem that needs to be addressed. But how do we when it is so wide-spread?

The link to the Oprah show on Children Ashmed of the Way They Look is below.
http://www.oprah.com/tows/pastshows/200705/tows_past_20070528.jhtml

A reply to: The social world of the "computer".

On reading Ruth Hart's (see link below) comment on The social world of the "computer", I became very interested in this topic. She presents what is probably the sentiment of many parents here in Australia and around the world, on child use of the internet. Not long ago, perhaps a few weeks there was a story on Oprah about a teanage boy who innocently bought himself a video camera so that he could chat to friends via the internet. It seemed innocent enough until a "friend" made a a suggestion that he remove his t-shirt. From this his life spiralled out of control, unbeknown to his mother and step father. He went from being an innocent teenage boy, who was smart enough to run his own legitamate business, to a porn star. In attempt to reclaim his childhood, he moved to his father's home in Mexico, thinking he would help him out of this mess, however his father saw this a chance to make money and fully exploited the situation and his son. Needlees to say, the authorities wanting to end this big business of child pornography found Justin and helped him out of this situation and he is now risking his life in trying to identify Justin's "clients".

As you can probably tell this episode had me glued and crying that such a beutiful young person had his innocence stolen from him in the most horrifying way. His ulter ego was found out by other students at his school and he was ruined. But he was brave enough to go on national television to "out" his experiences and to let society know that this is a very serious problem.

Until I watched this episode I thought the internet was such a great tool for communication of ideas, for a chat and to keep in contact with friends from around the world, and I still do but this issue has really made me think about how as adults, be us parents, teachers or any other adult working with children and teenagers, make this tool of communication safe that they can benefit from its many advantages and keep them from the predatory "evil" of some other users.

Below is a link to Ruth Hart's blog that started me on this issue and the likn below that is a link to Oprah.com where there is video footage and written information on this story. Have a look it is very interesting for people who are interested in working with adolescents or children in the future, or even if you aren't, and then let me know what you think.

http://sopsych.blogspot.com/2007/08/social-world-of-computer.html
http://www.oprah.com/tows/pastshows/200602/tows_past_20060215.jhtml

A call for help

Hi guys,
I was just wondering if anyone knows of where I can get a hold of some videos or DVD's relating to personality development. I am currenting teaching the unit part time at one of the local college's. I have searched the school library and the ACT public library and htey have very poor resources, if any on the topic. I am desparate for something as my student's keep hounding me, but I want to show them something interesting while still educational. We are looking at of course Freud's psychoanalytic theory, the humanistic approach, the trait approach, the behavioural and social learning approach and the cognitve approach to personality development. I am really wanting a video/dvd that looks at the trait approach and twin studies.

Please let me know if you know of any good resources out there, I have searched everywhere and I am just about to start seraching the university library.
Thanks

A decision finally

Hi guys,
After much confusion I have finally decided that I will answer the question related to attitude change. The question is: What factors determine the succes of attitude change programs? Descride theoretical bases and reserch evidence about the key elements underlying attitutde change programs.
Ok so there are a whole heap of key terms at the back of the chapter summary, which will help my essay and understanding. However, so far from my readings this is my understanding (not very in depth yet, but a basis to build upon).

A person has a belief and this belief has an attitude attached to it, which includes different emotions that are aroused when thinking about that belief. These emotions can be positive or negative which will in turn effect implicit and explicit attitudes (those we keep to ourselves and those we share with other people). These explicit attitudes therefore produce a "duplex mind" or different competing attitudes in the conscious mind. This happens when person's explicit attitude conflicts with their implicit view.

This is only a very basic introduction to this topic but I will definietly be adding more information as I sift through all the information on the topic. I think I decided on this topic as it seems that many people are focusing on prejudice, stereotyping and aggression and I believe this topic is interesting in looking at how people can change their attitudes and therefore bring about change.

Confusion Reigns

Hi guys,
I was reading through some of the other blog topics, and now I'm am really confused as to what I want to do for this assessment. I was going to base my blog on Prejudice, Stereotyping and Aggression, but now I want to answer the question on attitude change. Since my last post I have done a fair amount of reading into the first topic and also the second, and I find both very interesting. What are the causes of prejudice, and aggression and also how can people's attitude's change? I guess I am going to have to decide very soon.

Blog 1-Prejudice, Stereotyping and Aggression

I have chosen this as my topic for blog 1 and while I have only done minimal research for it so far (sorry James), I concluded from what I have read that it is a vicious cycle. An parent stereotypes a group which leads to a prejudice, an incident occurs involving this group and then we aggression towards this group. A child witnesses these stereotypes and also develops a prejudice against this group and therefore the cycle continues, down the line through generations. But how do we stop it? Can we stop it? Do we start with the child and try to educate them to think freely and past these prejudices' through contact with this group? Or do we educate the adult, the same way or do we attempt a community approach, in educating both groups about each other's cultures, histories, their futures etc? I think this blog is really going to take a lot of my time in trying to answer these questions for myself and the questions for the assessment.

Gender and Education: What are the issues?

Hi guys following is a reading analysis that I completed for another subject at university: Socio-Cultural Politics of Education. Even though it has a educational theme, I though it would be good to issue to raise in social psychology and education=. The question: Are our boy's achievement's suffering in the classroom? This looks at the topic of Gender and education. We didn't need to seacrh for any sources, it is more our comment on what we read in relation to the topic. So read through it and comment if you feel like it.

A Response to Gender and Education.

In Brendan Nelson’s letter, the one central issue surrounding the issue of boy’s education is the underachievement of boy’s due to the high priority placed on girl’s equity programs over the past twenty-five years, therefore drawing attention away from the needs of boys in the classroom. As educators, we know boys learn differently from girls, but what we need to determine is how they learn differently and how we can use these strategies in the classroom to the benefit sexes.

The reform of girl’s education in the 1970’s, was an attempt to achieve equity in girl’s education, to bring them to a level where they could be equal to males in education, and therefore the workforce, allowing them to be contributing members of society. As we now know, this reform happened at the expense of boy’s education and ultimately their learning and level of understanding suffered (Nelson, 2003). Gender equity in the past primarily focused on equal opportunity for girls and women, but since the 1990’s there has been mounting concerns from males in society about gender reform and the influence of feminism on these reforms (Wadham, Pudsey and Boyd, 2007, p235). However there are two assumptions being claimed about the need for gender reform, the first that feminism has benefited girls to the hindrance of boys education, and the second that boys need more male role models and schools need to be ‘boy friendly’ (Wadham, Pudsey and Boyd, 2007, pp236-9).

From the research presented by ACSA, 1997, pp57-78; Foster, 1994; Kenway, 1997; and Weaver-Hightower, 2003 (as cited in Wadham, Pudsey and Boyd, 2007, pp236-9) it has been shown over the course of a decade that there was a decline in boy’s education achievements and an improvement of the achievements of girls. Are boy’s achievements suffering because girls are excelling or are they at the same level as before the introduction of feminism and girls are excelling out of sight? And did this occur in previous decades, since the feminist movement encroached on education? And if so, was the divide in educational achievements as large as it is now? What we need to examine are the strategies used before the feminist movement, to see what worked for boys learning.

Due to this impingement on education, Wadham, Pudsey and Boyd (2007) believe that feminism has left men and boys in a some what kind of ‘cultural purgatory’ (p236), meaning men and boys no longer know how to be men and boys, and therefore suggest that possibly the only way to rectify this is to have more male role models at the primary level of education. We need to address this shortage of male primary teachers by introducing programs where boys are interacting with male role models where they are kept interested in school and learning. But what about the role of the female teacher in boy’s education, can she inspire them to stay on at school and succeed.

Boy’s troubles in education are understood through their achievements which are contrasted against those of girls. But how do we determine the achievements of boys if girls keep excelling beyond their reach? Boy’s educational achievements should be contrasted against their own previous learning and how they have improved or declined in their achievements. Why should they be compared to girls when they learn and respond differently to teaching strategies that are used, and which seem to benefit girls?

Brendan Nelson’s letter on gender equity and reform talks about how it is time for an overhaul on curriculum in an attempt to bring boy’s education achievements up to and on par with that of girl’s, but not at the expense of girls. But how will this happen, when we see from clear example that this is exactly what happened when gender equity and reform in girl’s education occurred. Change needs to occur in line with the changing world and therefore cultural reform, if we want our boys to be equal with girls in terms of their success at school. Isn’t it ironic that a quarter of a century ago, it was girl’s lack of educational achievements at school that were the main focus for reform? Could it be an issue that is cyclic?

Wadham, B., Pudsey, J., & Boyd, R. (2007), Culture and Education. Published by Pearson Education Australia.

Nelson, B., (2003), Message from the Minister. Department of Science, Education and Training, NSW. Reprinted in Wadham, B., Pudsey, J., & Boyd, R. (2007), Culture and Education. Published by Pearson Education Australia.