As part of his internship, Trey is working night intake at a
psychiatric hospital in a medium-sized college town. It's been
pretty quiet all evening until a little after 1 a.m. when he hears
shouting in the outer hallway.
Trey looks at Lisa, his fellow student intern, who says, "What's
going on out there?"
A moment later the doors burst open, and a young man, who looks
about 18 years old, is escorted into the intake desk. He is
agitated and has tears on his face, but he is not showing signs of
violence or aggression, beyond the brief shouting he did out in the
hallway.
He plunks himself down in the chair across from the intake desk and
buries his face in his hands, rocking slightly and moaning. He has
a slight body odor and is perspiring heavily.
"He's all yours," Lisa whispers.
Trey ignores her and moves quickly to the intake desk. Lisa runs
off to find the supervising nurse, who has gone on break.
"Hey there," Trey says calmly, bending over to look into the
patient's eyes. "I'm Trey. What's up?"
He is almost surprised when the patient stops rocking, sits up, and
lowers his hands. "Hey," he says quietly. "I'm Matt, and this is
hell, dude."
"Not quite," Trey smiles. "I'm here to help. Can you tell me what's
happened?"
"I'm going all to pieces," Matt says, "little screws and bolts and
debris flying off everywhere."
Trey says nothing; he just waits.
"I had kind of a breakdown in my dorm," Matt says. "I threw my
laptop out the window."
"Ooh, that's rough. Bad night, huh?"
"Bad week, bad month, bad year, bad bad life. Bad
badbadbadbadbadbadbad BA-A-A-AD."
"What happened?"
"Where you wanna start?"
In fits and starts, Matt conveys small clues that hint at his
story.
Matt has always been a "nerd," he says, according to his older
brothers. As a child, he often withdrew from playgroups at school
to play on his own. In isolation, he has always managed to perform
well academically, but in group work or group assignments, he has
tended to resort to outbursts and a refusal to participate. He says
he has always been awkward in social situations and has always
found it hard to carry on "a good, rewarding conversation."
"And I'm freakin' clumsy. Klutzy. A klutz," he says, looking
everywhere but at Trey. "I'm the opposite of an athlete, the
opposite of my brothers."
Although his speech is frequently eccentric, Matt manages to convey
a very brief picture of how, because of his withdrawal, negative
thoughts, and social awkwardness, people tend to leave him on his
own, both at large extended family gatherings or social functions
in his family's community and place of worship.
In his senior year of high school, Matt's grades and SAT scores
gained him entrance to a leading Midwest university-despite his
disruptive problems.
Matt had been looking forward to going away to school, hoping that
part of his problems "fitting in" had to do with his family's
"obscenely proper prominence" in the community, and his older
brothers' "super-dude images, which," he says, "I will never live
up to."
"At the same time," he says during intake, "I was also pretty
nervous, pretty stressed, pretty freaked out, pretty freaky."
In his first week of college, Matt found orientation week
"disorienting," he jokes with a slight smile. "Orientation
disoriented me. It dissed me. I got dissed. There were
people everywhere, like climbing-the-walls-and-on-top-of-you
everywhere."
Except when Trey first initiated a conversation, Matt, for the most
part, has worked to avoid eye contact and continually bounces his
left leg nervously. He is gripping the arms of his chair and looks
as if he's about to fly right out of it.
"My roommate is a jock," he says. "Jocular jock. Oh, Jocularity,
wouldn't you know they'd put me with a
jocular-not-so-very-jocular-jock. They plan that stuff, you know.
Just to keep me from escaping, from making a fresh start. Guy's a
jerk, and now, here I am." He grins and expands his arms, gesturing
the psychiatric ward around him.
"And now here I am, just 8 weeks into my first semester away from
home, and I've just been admitted for totally breaking down,
shooting laptop missiles from the second freakin' floor. They
win."
In: Psychology
what is Nganga's purpose in Multicultural Curriculum
in Rural Early Childhood Programs
In: Psychology
Taylor’s “Libertarianism”
THE THEORY OF AGENCY
What is Taylor’s concept of agent causation?
Does it accurately reflect what people take themselves to be doing when they perform action?
Why or why not?
(24) The only conception of action that accords with our data is one according to which men— and perhaps some other things too—are sometimes, but of course not always, self-determining beings; that is, beings which are sometimes the causes of their own behavior. In the case of an action that is free, it must be such that it is caused by the agent who performs it, but such that no antecedent conditions were sufficient for his performing just that action. In the case of an action that is both free and rational, it must be such that the agent who performed it did so for some reason, but this reason cannot have been the cause of it.
(25) Now this conception fits what men take themselves to be; namely, beings who act, or who are agents, rather than things that are merely acted upon, and whose behavior is simply the causal consequence of conditions which they have not wrought. When I believe that I have done something, I do believe that it was I who caused it to be done, I who made something happen, and not merely something within me, such as one of my own subjective states, which is not identical with myself. If I believe that something not identical with myself was the cause of my behavior—some event wholly external to myself, for instance, or even one internal to myself, such as a nerve impulse, volition, or whatnot—then I cannot regard that behavior as being an act of mine, unless I further believe that I was the cause of that external or internal event. My pulse, for example, is caused and regulated by certain conditions existing within me, and not by myself. I do not, accordingly, regard this activity of my body as my action, and would be no more tempted to do so if I became suddenly conscious within myself of those conditions or impulses that produce it. This behavior with which I have nothing to do, behavior that is not within my immediate control, behavior that is not only not free activity, but not even the activity of an agent to begin with; it is nothing but a mechanical reflex. Had I never learned that my very life depends on this pulse beat, I would regard it with complete indifference, as something foreign to me, like the oscillations of a clock pendulum that I idly contemplate.
(26) Now this conception of activity, and of an agent who is the cause of it, involves two rather strange metaphysical notions that are never applied elsewhere in nature. The first is that of a self or person—for example, a man—who is not merely a collection of things or events, but a substance and a self-moving being. For on this view it is a man himself, and not merely some
part of him or something within him, that is the cause of his own activity. Now we certainly do not know that a man is anything more than an assemblage of physical things and processes,
which act in accordance with those laws that describe the behavior of all other physical things and processes. Even though a man is a living being, of enormous complexity, there is nothing,
apart from the requirements of this theory, to suggest that his behavior is so radically different in its origin from that of other physical objects, or that an understanding of it must be sought in
some metaphysical realm wholly different from that appropriate to the understanding of non- living things. Second, this conception of activity involves an extraordinary conception of
causation, according to which an agent, which is a substance and not an event, can nevertheless be the cause of an event. Indeed, if he is a free agent then he can, on this conception, cause an event to occur—namely, some act of his own—without anything else causing him to do so. This means that an agent is sometimes a cause, without being an antecedent sufficient condition; for if I affirm that I am the cause of some act of mine, then I am plainly not saying that my very existence is sufficient for its occurrence, which would be absurd. If I say that my hand causes my pencil to move, then I am saying that the motion of my hand is, under the other conditions then prevailing, sufficient for the motion of the pencil. But if I then say that I cause my hand to move, I am not saying anything remotely like this, and surely not that the motion of my self is sufficient for the motion of my arm and hand, since these are the only things about me that are moving.
(27) This conception of the causation of events by beings or substances that are not events is, in fact, so different from the usual philosophical conception of a cause that it should not even bear the same name, for "being a cause" ordinarily just means "being an antecedent sufficient condition or set of conditions." Instead, then, of speaking of agents as causing their own acts, it would perhaps be better to use another word entirely, and say, for instance, that they originate them, initiate them, or simply that they perform them. Now this is on the face of it a dubious
conception of what a man is. Yet it is consistent with our data, reflecting the presuppositions of deliberation, and appears to be the only conception that is consistent with them, as determinism and simple indeterminism are not. The theory of agency avoids the absurdities of simple indeterminism by conceding that human behavior is caused, while at the same time avoiding the difficulties of determinism by denying that every chain of causes and effects is infinite. Some such causal chains, on this view, have beginnings, and they begin with agents themselves. Moreover, if we are to suppose that it is sometimes up to me what I do, and understand this in a sense which is not consistent with determinism, we must suppose that I am an agent or a being who initiates his own actions, sometimes under conditions which do not determine what action he shall perform. Deliberation becomes, on this view, something that is not only possible but quite rational, for it does make sense to deliberate about activity that is truly my own and that depends in its outcome upon me as its author, and not merely upon something more or less esoteric that is supposed to be intimately associated with me, such as my thoughts, volitions, choices, or whatnot.
(28) One can hardly affirm such a theory of agency with complete comfort, however, and wholly without embarrassment, for the conception of men and their powers which is involved in it is
strange indeed, if not positively mysterious. In fact, one can hardly be blamed here for simply denying our data outright, rather than embracing this theory to which they do most certainly
point. Our data—to the effect that men do sometimes deliberate before acting, and that when they do, they presuppose among other things that it is up to them what they are going to do—rest upon nothing more than fairly common consent. These data might simply be illusions. It might in fact be that no man ever deliberates, but only imagines that he does, that from pure conceit he supposes himself to be the master of his behavior and the author of his acts. Spinoza has suggested that if a stone, having been thrown into the air, were suddenly to become conscious, it would suppose itself to be the source of its own motion, being then conscious of what it was doing but not aware of the real cause of its behavior. Certainly men are sometimes mistaken in believing that they are behaving as a result of choice deliberately arrived at. A man might, for example, easily imagine that his embarking upon matrimony is the result of the most careful and rational deliberation, when in fact the causes, perfectly sufficient for that behavior, might be of an entirely physiological, unconscious origin. If it is sometimes false that we deliberate and then act as the result of a decision deliberately arrived at, even when we suppose it to be true, it might always be false. No one seems able, as we have noted, to describe deliberation without metaphors, and the conception of a thing's being "within one's power" or "up to him" seems to defy analysis or definition altogether, if taken in a sense which the theory of agency appears to require.
(29) These are, then, dubitable conceptions, despite their being so well implanted in the common sense of mankind. Indeed, when we turn to the theory of fatalism, we shall find formidable metaphysical considerations which appear to rule them out altogether. Perhaps here, as elsewhere in metaphysics, we should be content with discovering difficulties, with seeing what is and what is not consistent with such convictions as we happen to have, and then drawing such satisfaction as we can from the realization that, no matter where we begin, the world is mysterious and the men who try to understand it are even more so. This realization can, with some justification, make one feel wise, even in the full realization of his ignorance.
In: Psychology
1. Discuss group diversity issues
2. Within the context of group, discuss Confidentiality and its limits.
3.List and discuss the many factors that make up group leadership.
In: Psychology
What are the differences between voluntary active euthanasia, voluntary passive euthanasia,and physician-assisted suicide? In which action does the doctor “act last”? Why is this morally significant?
In: Psychology
In Principle 2, Petronio cites five foundational criteria that affect our personal privacy rules. Which factor most shapes the rules you adopt? Is there one factor that seems to include or trump the other four? Do you think any factors should be added to the list?
In: Psychology
Enslaved: True Stories of Modern Day Slavery (2006), Jessia Sage and Linda Kasten
1) Summarize the book, themes, and social problem/issue 2) Identify key people and locations associated with this book 3) Identify the subject matter of the book, for example, immigration, human trafficking, interracial families, etc. 4) Provide a brief history of the subject matter ( 3-4 pages) 5) Did this book add to your knowledge of the subject matter? is so how?
In: Psychology
Explain and write an analysis of the interactions of each of the three types of psychoactive drugs (depressants, stimulants, hallucinogens) and the effects they have on the brain and nervous system in your own words. 150 words
In: Psychology
What is the difference between measures of association and tests of statistical significance? Give an example for each.
In: Psychology
For the book Coming Of Age In Mississippi.
How did her involvement in the NAACP and the Voter Registration Drives affect her understanding of her race? How did it affect her family? In what ways did her involvement in the Movement impact her ability/willingness to engage with her community??
In: Psychology
Answer two questions from the three below (750 words each question). Questions are:
- In what ways does the media misrepresent the nature of crime?
- Violent crime can be a source of concern, but is it the most frequently occurring type of crime in society?
- Is the risk of being a victim of violent crime evenly distributed throughout society?
Exam responses will be in essay format and approximately 750 words each.
In: Psychology
Suppose that the U.S. military deploys the X-47B, an unmanned aerial drone capable of sensing, tracking, identifying, targeting, and destroying an enemy target with very limited human oversight—assume it is a human-on-the-loop weapon. As a weapon in the ongoing conflict with the Islamic State (ISIS) terrorist organization, X-47B is tasked with missions to target and kill senior ISIS operatives. Now imagine a particular mission, in which an X-47B is given a programmed mission to carry out a targeted strike on two ISIS operatives, call them ‘V’ and ‘Z’, whom surveillance reports indicate are currently located in northern Iraq near the Turkish border. According to reliable intelligence, V and Z are instrumental in planning and leading operations to ransack, pillage, and then demolish world historical sites in Iraq (e.g. Khorsabad, Nergal Gate at Nineveh, and Monastery of St. Elijah), looting priceless antiquities and smuggling them to be sold on black markets in Europe and Asia, in order to generate capital to fund ISIS’s continued armed insurgency [for more on this particular practice, see Harkin, “Murdering History,” Smithsonian, March 2016]. V and Z are thereby deemed legitimate and high-value military targets. They are also elusive, with fairly sophisticated clandestine methods for relocating and evading detection; finding their present location required substantial surveillance drone resources over the course of several months.
Further suppose, that you are also in northern Iraq in a village near the Turkish border, working for a humanitarian aid organization providing healthcare services to Kurdish people whose communities have been ravaged and infrastructure degraded by ISIS. Part of your duties involve going out into local villages to distribute medical supplies and provide support services at community centers. Your team is primarily composed of American, British, and German nurses and doctors. Today, you are at one such community center providing care and supplies to hundreds of civilians. In a building 200 meters from the center in which you are working, V and Z are plotting another raid on a nearby historical site. The X-47B has accurately tracked and identified the location of V and Z, it also recognizes that the nearby community center contains many innocent non-combatants. Nevertheless, X-47B calculates that launching a precise and limited strike on V and Z’s suspected location will only produce a blast radius of no more than 75 meters, and determines that the identified non-combatants are not likely to be harmed. After computing its decision-procedure algorithm, X-47B fixes its target and initiates a missile strike to complete its mission, and no human overrides its lethal decision. V and Z are immediately killed, but the building was also housing several tons of explosives used in their demolition of historical sites. X-47B’s calculations did not account for the unknown explosives, which extend the blast radius of the strike to 225 meters. A wing of the community center collapses from the force of the blast, killing 15 civilians and one American nurse on your team, many others are severely injured and a British doctor is trapped under some of the rubble. After overcoming the initial disorientation from the blast, you and your remaining team rush to minimize casualties and treat the civilian victims.
[5 pts.] Was X-47B justified in initiating the missile strike to eliminate V and Z? Why or why not? Use principles of distinction, proportionality, or military necessity invoked in international humanitarian law governing armed conflict to defend your position.
[5 pts.] Who should be held morally responsible for the unintended harms and casualties? As a witness to the atrocity and possible victim, in this hypothetical case, how do you propose that the U.S. military should respond to the consequences of the X-47B’s strike? Defend your position.
In: Psychology
Make recommendations for the Louisiana governor by discussing any actual implementations of anomie theory and the overall effectiveness of such strategies that may have been used in prior implementation strategies. Be creative and discuss some possibilities that you may have in mind.
In: Psychology
From the book Case Studies In Abnormal psychology by Ethan Gorenstein and Ronald Comer.
Case 5: Carlos
1. Describe the biological, psychological, social and cultural factors that contributed to Carlos’ major depressive disorder.
2. What factors influenced Carlos’ willingness (or lack of willingness) to try psychotherapy? What changed his mind?
In: Psychology
Explain how various public and private organizations (for-profit and nonprofit) are involved in the process of managing and ensuring effective delivery of public health services to U.S. citizens. Also explain how they work to help fight against obesity.
In: Psychology