Why The Psychology Major Was Perfect For Me

[editec]

I always thought that Social Psychology would be an interesting social science to study.

While I have some doubts about the predictive worth of the psychological study of any individual, I suspect that studying the psychology of the herd might offer us some predictive insights into group behavior.

 

[serenesam]

Interesting post, you'll need to excuse the name-calling, I get it all the time.

Oh not at all, I knew what I signed up for when I first joined this forum.

 

[Divine Wind]

I always thought that Social Psychology would be an interesting social science to study.

While I have some doubts about the predictive worth of the psychological study of any individual, I suspect that studying the psychology of the herd might offer us some predictive insights into group behavior.

Agreed about predicting individual behaviors. It's very difficult and would take much deeper insights than current psychological tools can provide to do it reliably. OTOH, predicting group, or even mob, behavior fits under trend analysis. Everyone from advertisers to political strategists rely on those tools to maximize their advantage over the competition. Often with effective results.

Most of those psychological manipulations are relatively tame. They can't make someone who is peaceful and against violence suddenly go out and commit murder. Stage hypnotists always ask for volunteers to assist with their acts because draftees would be less cooperative in clucking like chickens. Volunteers want to be there and, therefore are more predisposed to going along with the act because they want to do so. Draftees are not necessarily so willing to cooperate.

The Elevator experiment which so upset one of our forum members shows people conforming, but, as any valid sociological experiments would do, doesn't include the statistical data for context. This seems more akin to Jay Leno's "man on the street" comedy bits where 100 people are interviewed and the top 2 or 3 funniest responses are shown to the audience.

This isn't to say people don't conform to peer pressure since they clearly do. We read all the time about kids smoking, drinking, taking drugs and engaging in sex due to peer pressure. We see it in kids wearing Goth, Grunge or other forms of "non-standard" clothing. As much as they want to break out and grow up, they also want to fit in and conform with their friends.

 

[psikeyhackr]

You just sound like a conformist rationalizing nonsense to me.

What could be the point of facing different ways in an elevator just because other people are doing it? The person is just in the elevator to wait for it to move to his desired floor. Conforming to other people's movements is TOTALLY POINTLESS. And not even knowing the people.

That is psychologically conditioned stupidity.

I went to Catholic schools. Stand up, kneel down, genuflect, etc., etc.

I decided I was an agnostic at 12 and stopped going to church when I graduated from grade school It was just conforming to brainwashed nitwits.

psik

Namecalling is an emotional reaction to factual matters. It's normal for young people to rebel against the norm just as it is normal for fledgling bird to leave the nest.

Transubstantiation is a FACTUAL MATTER?



Maybe it is normal in a neurotic authoritarian culture.

Sigmund Freud did not study HUMAN Psychology.

Sigmund Freud studied EUROPEAN Psychology.

A mass psychology produced from the Roman Catholic Church taking over after the fall of the Roman Empire.

The NAZIs said "Heil Hitler" and Americans say "Hail to the Chief" and the Romans said, "Hail Caesar."

Your concept of NORMAL comes from your culture so if the culture is illogically stupid then it has to drive kids crazy to maintain itself. So some rebellion is NORMAL in that context. But what effect does technology have on NORMAL versus LOGICAL.

The Laws of Physics do not care about CULTURE.

Americans spent billions of dollars on nuclear weapons to defend capitalism. Russians spent billions of rubles to defend communism. American capitalist economists FORGET to compute the depreciation of all of the automobiles designed to become obsolete in the last 50 years. Capitalism and Communism are too idiotic and obsolete to discuss. What did Karl Marx say about the effect of planned obsolescence on the Gross Domestic Product?

So nitwits risked blowing up the planet for some defective grade school algebra.

Oh yeah, the word CZAR comes for Caesar. More stupid Roman crap.

psik

 

[Divine Wind]

Maybe it is normal in a neurotic authoritarian culture.

Sigmund Freud did not study HUMAN Psychology.

Sigmund Freud studied EUROPEAN Psychology.

A mass psychology produced from the Roman Catholic Church taking over after the fall of the Roman Empire.

The NAZIs said "Heil Hitler" and Americans say "Hail to the Chief" and the Romans said, "Hail Caesar."

Equating conforming to fellow students in an elevator to fascism is not only a stretch, but seems to be a cover for hidden anger. What bothers you so much about a few students who chose to conform to the crowd in an elevator?

What would you have done? I suspect you'd have glared at them, perhaps even ranted about the evils of the Roman Catholic Church, called them "fucking Nazis!", faked a Seig Heil and stormed off the elevator when it came to a stop.

You know what I would have done? Either asked the cute chick "How ya doin'?", glanced down her blouse or simply said, "Excuse me" moved to the front of the elevator where my back was toward their backs.

Have a nice day, Psikey. I really do hope you relax and feel better. Life's too short to go through it pissed off.

 

[psikeyhackr]

Maybe it is normal in a neurotic authoritarian culture.

Sigmund Freud did not study HUMAN Psychology.

Sigmund Freud studied EUROPEAN Psychology.

A mass psychology produced from the Roman Catholic Church taking over after the fall of the Roman Empire.

The NAZIs said "Heil Hitler" and Americans say "Hail to the Chief" and the Romans said, "Hail Caesar."

Equating conforming to fellow students in an elevator to fascism is not only a stretch, but seems to be a cover for hidden anger. What bothers you so much about a few students who chose to conform to the crowd in an elevator?

Sure, you can talk about a few students while ignoring the same behavior recorded by Candid Camera 50 years earlier. Behavior quite similar to what I observed at a number of Catholic Churches.

This is cultural programming created over centuries.

You can try to blame the obvious on me all you want. I didn't make the videos, either the recent or the old. It is not my fault that you don't see the conformity of Roman culture. Random House dictionary said, "Rome is the matrix of Western civilization.: That is the example they used for the word MATRIX.

psik



psik

 

[Divine Wind]

Sure, you can talk about a few students while ignoring the same behavior recorded by Candid Camera 50 years earlier. Behavior quite similar to what I observed at a number of Catholic Churches.

Dude, Allen Funt did the same thing with his show that Jay Leno did with his. Watching someone not conform isn't funny. Watching someone conform is funny. If you wanted your television show to be funny, and not a statistically accurate scientific documentary, which ones would you show in the 5 minutes of air time allocated to the bit?

Feel free to compare this to "the MATRIX" or other fantasy shows or try to fit it into the paradigm you've established as a 9/11 Truther, but the fact remains, no one has shown here 1) the actual statistics of such a study and 2) how far someone would go to conform.

A few folks turning around in an elevator is not the end of civilization, dude. It's entertainment.

 

[psikeyhackr]

Sure, you can talk about a few students while ignoring the same behavior recorded by Candid Camera 50 years earlier. Behavior quite similar to what I observed at a number of Catholic Churches.

Dude, Allen Funt did the same thing with his show that Jay Leno did with his. Watching someone not conform isn't funny. Watching someone conform is funny. If you wanted your television show to be funny, and not a statistically accurate scientific documentary, which ones would you show in the 5 minutes of air time allocated to the bit?

Feel free to compare this to "the MATRIX" or other fantasy shows or try to fit it into the paradigm you've established as a 9/11 Truther,.

I always regarded SCIENCE as a Truth Movement. That has become the most hilarious thing about 9/11.

You see if physicists are going to explain how a 200 ton airliner could totally obliterate 400,000+ a ton skyscraper which held itself up for 28 years then they need accurate information on the distributions of steel and concrete down the building.

But if physicists are going to explain how a 200 ton airliner could NOT totally obliterate 400,000+ a ton skyscraper which held itself up for 28 years then they need accurate information on the distributions of steel and concrete down the building.

But people on both sides of the argument ARE NOT DEMANDING THAT INFORMATION. This entire business has turned into a farce that helps people believe what they prefer. It is psychological bullshit just like the elevator.

But that says a lot about European culture and so called academia because physics is incapable of caring about any culture. Physics does not care about economists not computing and reporting the depreciation of all of the automobiles on the planet either. But the physics happens regardless.

psik

 

[Divine Wind]

Since this is a Psychology thread and on a wild-eyed Truther thread about your "logic" on what "really happened" on September 11th, I think it is more appropriate to discuss the psychology of Conspiracy Theorists.

Field Guide to the Conspiracy Theorist: Dark Minds | Psychology Today

Conspiracy theorists have a grandiose view of themselves as heroes "manning the barricades of civilization" at an urgent "turning point" in history, Hofstadter held. Jones has a "messiah complex," Black contends. Grandiosity is often a defense against underlying feelings of powerlessness.

Paranoia, 9/11, and the roots of conspiracy theories | Psychology Today

Melley proposes that conspiracy thinking arises from a combination of two factors, when someone: 1) holds strong individualist values and 2) lacks a sense of control. The first attribute refers to people who care deeply about an individual's right to make their own choices and direct their own lives without interference or obligations to a larger system (like the government). But combine this with a sense of powerlessness in one's own life, and you get what Melley calls agency panic, "intense anxiety about an apparent loss of autonomy" to outside forces or regulators.

There is a preponderance of evidence to support the conclusion that conspiracy theories are coping mechanisms for people who feel powerless and inconsequential to give them a sense of control through knowledge. We all know "information is power" and by thinking they "know what really happened" it gives them a feeling of empowerment.

 

[psikeyhackr]

Since this is a Psychology thread and on a wild-eyed Truther thread about your "logic" on what "really happened" on September 11th, I think it is more appropriate to discuss the psychology of Conspiracy Theorists.

Yes, people need to divert the subject to psychology since they don't want to address the physics of skyscrapers having to hold themselves up. It is certainly curious that after TEN YEARS we don't have a trustworthy table specifying the tons of steel and tons of concrete that were on each and every level of the towers.

I guess we need to study the Psychology of Liars who tell really Stupid Lies.

DUH, do skyscrapers have to hold themselves up?

Like I said, "Psychology is the Study of NOT THINKING!"

Of course psychologists are experts at it.

psik