Luu Minh Huan

ID: 20130726

Personal behaviors and personalities psychoanalysis

Psychology is the scientific study of the behavior of individuals and
their mental processes. Throughout Introduction to psychology and from
our textbook, I have been able to observe various examples in which
psychological concepts and theories can be used to analyze human
behaviors, mental processes, personalities, relationships, etc In this report,
I will attempt to analyze my everyday behavior characteristics and
personalities using psychological ideas that I have learnt during the course.
As such, due to the large scope of class topics, I will mainly focus on
memory, learning and behavior conditioning, development, personality, and
social psychology. In my opinion, these areas have the most impact to my
behaviors and myself at the moment.
Memory is crucial in order for us to store and retrieve information, as
well as making inferences about the world based on previous knowledge.
Usually, our memory is working so well that we do not consciously notice of
how useful it is. In my experience, I have encountered various scenarios
when I realize how useful memory can be. When I play a game on my phone
with simple controls (tap left to jump and tap right to slide) for a long time, I
am able to both watch a video and play the game. Also, if I switch the
controls around by accident, I notice a significant decrease of proficiency in
my gameplay. This is one example of production compilation in action. Due
to production compilation, all the little actions (tap left two times then tap
right, etc) are compiled together to create the familiarity and expertise
during the gameplay. As such, it reduces the mental capacity needed to play
the game and enable me to do something else while playing. But production
compilation can also lead to error, as we see from the act of switching the
control around. In this case, the compilation of actions is different (tapping
left instead of tapping right) and thus I made more errors in my gameplay
compare to the usual setup. This behavior can also be explained by encoding
specificity. Because the setting of subsequent gameplays is the same as the
setting of the first few gameplays, I am able to recall the specific actions
needed to perform a smooth gameplay with few errors. But if the setting is
different, I will be more likely to forget what to do during the game. Another
example of memory in action is when I remind myself of what to do and a
few minute later, I have no idea what the task is. I have a vague feeling that I
need to do something but unable to remember what it is specifically. This can
be explain as the memory of needing to do something is registered in the
short-term memory because the memory is needed for only a few minutes.
As such, due to the limited capacity of the short term memory, if I memorize
other information or occupy myself with another task during these few
minutes, the memory will be overridden by the new information and I will be
unable to retrieve the memory. The vague feeling of knowing is probably

because the memory is partially registered in the working memory. To be

able to remember the task at hand, I often employ the use of retrieval cues.
By rewinding in my head what I was doing a few minutes ago, I find specific
keywords that might link to the task I forget. For example, if I forget that my
friend told me to do his laundry, I can rewind my conversation with him to try
to find specific words to retrieve that information.
Most of our behaviors and learned reflexes can be acquired through
conditioning. Next, I will explain some of my behaviors using classical and
operant conditioning theories. One example is the link between drinking
coffee and my sleepiness. As a student with lots of morning class, I usually
take coffee to stay awake during the class. When I smell coffee, I feel more
energetic and awake for a moment. When I dont drink coffee, even though I
sleep a lot the day before, the feeling of sleepiness is constantly present
throughout the day. This is one example of classical conditioning. For the
case of alertness after smelling coffee, the conditioned stimulus is the coffee
smell and the conditioned response is alertness. Due to repeated pairings
between coffee smell (conditioned stimulus) and coffee itself (unconditioned
stimulus), the coffee smell becomes associated with alertness (conditioned
response). In case of feeling sleepiness without coffee, the environment
factors (state of just waking up, before going to class...) is the conditioned
stimulus and the compensatory alertness is the conditioned response. The
environment factors (conditioned stimulus) are repeated paired with drinking
of coffee (unconditioned stimulus) to associate with the compensatory
alertness. Without the presence of coffee, the environment factors will lead
to more sleepiness because there is no more compensation from the coffee.
Another example of conditioning is my use of operant conditioning to
improve my study. When I have to study a lot at one time (for term exams), I
usually combine study sessions with short breaks. In this way, the behavior
of studying is positive reinforced by the break. Also, this is an application of
Premacks principle of learning. The more desirable behavior of taking a
break reinforces the less desirable behavior of studying.
Throughout human development, there