2022

In order for an individual to detect that a person is telling a lie, the person needs to understand the psychology of lying to know the reason behind the act. In fact, having knowledge on the psychology of lying can help you become more observant to the different signs of lying, as well as the mentality that comes with it. This is useful in order to avoid being put in a sense of doubt or under emotional stress when you are confronted with it. Fear One of the reasons why a person tells a lie is because of the fear of possible consequences involved when telling the truth. This psychology of lying is quite prevalent in younger generations when they are hiding something sensitive from their friends and family members — opting to tell a lie rather than being punished for telling the truth. It is a sign of escape of possible punishment that comes with the act of telling the truth. Self-Image Improving their own image in the eyes of their friends and families is one of the reasons why people tell a lie. In order to uplift their social on par with others, a person would often create stories, usually on the spot, to make sure that the other party is kicked out of the limelight. This psychology of lying is just a temporary rise on the social ladder, and will often be replaced with embarrassment when the truth comes out. Harming Others Another purpose is to attack other people, indirectly, by telling a lie about them. In fact, this is often seen felt by prominent individuals in the society. In order to lower the status or career of this individual, a person will often create a lie that will put others into a state of doubt regarding their own beliefs and truths. To summarize, people may lie due to the fear of the consequences when they tell the truth, to boost their self-image inappropriately, or to deliberately harm others. Using the psychology of lying, you’ll be able to handle circumstances when people are not telling the truth. Source by Michael Lee

This research study identifies the principles, history and theories of positive psychology. It also analyzes current research on positive psychology. Finally, it shows how these concepts can be used in practice, even in organizations. Researching the history of positive psychology, Dr Martin Seligman is the happiness professor and the unofficial father of positive psychology, the controversial study of human happiness. Humanistic Abraham Maslow, in his 1954 book about motivation and personality first used the term positive psychology. Martin Seligman made it the theme of his presidency of the American Psychological Association in 1998. He claimed psychology up to then was answering no and I, instead of yes and we. Getting people to be constructive is a better predictor of increased commitment and love than teaching people how to fight. William James argued that in order to study optimal human functioning thoroughly, one has to consider the subjective experience of an individual. For that belief, in 1906, James is considered, by some psychologists, to be America’s first positive psychologist. Earlier influences on positive psychology came from philosophical and religious sources. The ancient Greeks had many schools of thought. During the Renaissance, individualism started to be valued. Utilitarian philosophers, such as John Stuart Mill, believed that moral actions are those actions that maximize happiness for the most number of people, and that an empirical science of happiness determine which actions are moral. Thomas Jefferson and other democrats believed that Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are inalienable rights, and that it justifies the overthrow of the government. The Romantics valued individual emotional expression and sought their emotional true selves. According to Dr. Seligman, during hard times, strengths and positive emotions help people get through. Seligman defines a “good life” by using own strengths consistently. Work, leadership, institutions and culture are interrelated and integral to positive psychology. Even if people were financially free, people would still do something with their time, after getting all the fun and travel out of their system. Therefore, happiness at work transfers and contributes to people’s life happiness. Work naturally shapes people’s network or circle of influence, as humans like to group up with people who share commonalities with their work, industry, and professional experiences. Individuals can also think of times when they were not stimulated at work; their work was repetitive and meaningless. Studies have shown that the workers, who thrive, are the ones who are continuously challenged in meaningful ways, so work can become fun and play. Besides, more and more scholarly articles stress the importance of happiness at work and slowly but surely more organizations are realizing it and make it their goal and mission with employees. To create positive institutions, it is important not to keep secrets, following a mission and have effective conflict resolutions skills. According to Seligman, there are five traits to positive institutions: continue growing, CEO modeled, being bigger than its sums of the parts, empowering to make decisions, and being clear with the mission or purpose. Positive leaders create positive companies and institutions. Again, positively and positive energy is contagious, because, from a quantum physics perspective, everything is energy. Therefore, people tend to gravitate towards other positive people, positive leaders, positive teams, institutions and positive cultures. The proposed model to link positive psychology and business, to make businesses successful and sustainable, is to center them around the VIA Human Strengths. Institutions or organizations are seen as micro-society and micro-communities that expand outward. Coming from strength or love, versus lack or fear, always produces far better results and outcomes. Change is about strength. All of these principles could be summarized by saying that it is best to see, focus on and bring out the best in people. These principles are true across different cultures worldwide. Optimism for the future reduces anxiety. Hope for life after death helps coping with death, but denial of life after death helps celebrating and appreciating life more. The essence of joy is enjoying the present. The thought of eternity or immortality helps valuing life, as there would be no reason to keep something of no value. Positive psychology studies happiness and how that relates to love and gratitude. What faith offers, such as community, gratitude, forgiveness, purpose, acceptance, altruism, and eternity, increases well-being. Marriage is the hope for happiness. We choose a career, or fly believing, hoping, or having faith. The chance for error in faith makes humans humble and open to hope that feeds love and joy. Positive psychology also studies meaning and motivation and how these relate to happiness. Life purpose is the meaning and direction of one’s reality or experience and goal creation and pursuit. Quality relations and quality life are achieved through negotiation of adversities. To understand whether a political action is good or bad, it is possible to look at motivation or the motive, such as the general group/public good purposive and committed principle, versus a personal self- need. Reading articles on positive psychology, evidence shows optimists lead healthier, less stressful, and more successful lives than pessimists (Weisberg, 2010). Positive psychology studies the power of optimism and its correlation to more resiliency and health. Resiliency is exemplified in the book of Viktor Frankl about a man in search for meaning. Frankl studied why some of his fellow concentration camp mates made it like him and other did not, given the same constant conditions. Frankl hoped to see his wife again. Psychiatrist J. Nardini, another camp survivor claimed: “It was important to think of one’s self as better than what the environment implied.” According to Martin Seligman, optimism allows to overcome challenges. Seligman describes pessimism or giving up as learned helplessness. Managers with a positive attitude made better decisions than other colleagues. Negotiators with positive facial expressions were more likely to gain concessions than those who with a poker face. “Positivity” generates less stress-related hormones, and diminishes inflammatory reactions to stress. Here is a wonderful application of positive psychology. IntenSati is a high-energy cardio workout that incorporates positive psychology. Positive

Most of us who work in some aspect of philosophy have had the experience of trying to explain to someone that philosophy is not psychology. To those members of the philosophical set, the distinction may seem obvious, but any attempt to spell it out requires some careful thought and reflection, which is what I attempt to do in this exercise. Is Psychology a sibling of Philosophy? Surely in the past they were close siblings, members of the same family, philosophy. Today the relationship between the two is more problematic. Does work in philosophy have any relation to the student’s psychological state? The answer also is not a clear-cut one. Philosophy can help a person psychologically, but this is not central to the function of philosophy. Some History: Historically in Western Philosophy, Psychology was part of philosophy until the 19th century when it became a separate science. In the 17th and 18th centuries, many Western philosophers did pioneering work in areas that later came to be known as “psychology.” Eventually psychological inquiry and research became separate sciences some of which could be characterized as the study and research into the mind. In short, psychology became identified as the science of mind insofar as its function is to analyze and explain mental processes: our thoughts, experiences, sensations, feelings, perceptions, imaginations, creativity, dreams and so on. It is mostly an empirical and experimental science; although the field of psychology does include the more theoretical Freudian psychology and the more speculative Jungian psychology. When we study Western Philosophy, we find a concentrated effort to maintain a distinction between philosophical and psychological considerations. But these have not always been kept separate. Even today some areas of philosophy remain intermixed with psychological considerations. It may be that some forms of philosophy can never break away completely from psychological issues. . Traditionally, philosophers in the Western tradition did not always observe a wall of separation between philosophy and psychology. For example, Baruch Spinoza’s great work, Ethics, includes many observations and insights about our reasoning processes and emotions. The early works in Epistemology (theory of knowledge) by such thinkers as Rene Descartes, John Locke, David Hume, and Immanuel Kant include a great deal of observations and statements about mental processes connected with knowing and belief. In other words, these writings tend to mix psychological statements (process of knowing) with conceptual philosophy. But there are differences between psychology and philosophy which are significant and should be observed in careful writing in either area. In our critiques of these 17th and 18th works in epistemology, we try to separate the philosophical theme (logic, conceptual and propositional evaluation) from the psychological aspect (causes of belief, mental process underlying perception). Scientific work that seeks to understand and explain the workings of the brain and the neurological processes which underlie thought and experience (viz., psychology) is different from philosophical inquiry into mind, consciousness, knowledge and experiences. Edmund Husserl, the founder of phenomenology, takes great pains to keep his philosophy separate from empirical psychology. But it is not clear that his analysis (or other analyses) of the phenomenology of different experiences remains something clearly distinct from psychology. But in large part the problem remains, especially in such areas of philosophy of mind, of keeping philosophical work free of psychology altogether. Moreover, we should not assume that in all cases these must be kept separate, as some work in philosophy surely requires consideration of the psychological sciences. Even today the student will likely be surprised by the number of psychological insights that Spinoza offers in this great work, Ethics, back in the 17th century and similar psychological observations by Friedrich Nietzsche in the 19th century. William James, the great American pragmatist, includes much psychology in his philosophy. He has much to say about the stream of consciousness and special experiences, such as religious experiences. Current Concerns: Philosophy of mind: There is a sense in which the mind is a psychological construct; there’s another sense in which it is not. “My mind is such and such” can be restated as “my thinking is such and such.” Sometimes it is the psychology behind my thinking that is the issue; but other times we’re interested in what could be called the conceptual-propositional issues; and still other times we might be more interested in the literary-artistic expression of ideas, values, and perspectives. (In this latter connection, see Walter Kaufmann’s book, Discovering The Mind.) In Epistemology we’re concerned with the concept of knowledge; but our primary interest is not one of describing the psychology of knowing. Our interest is not in the process by which we come to know something, but in the clarification of concepts associated with knowledge and belief; and in the logic of propositions related to knowledge. Included among the philosophers who engage in the philosophy of knowledge are Bertrand Russell, D.W. Hamlyn, and Richard Rorty. In the area of academic philosophy, besides the large field of epistemology, we have philosophy of mind, theory of consciousness, philosophy of language, Cartesian Idealism, and the free will issue. Ordinarily these are not seen as forms of psychological inquiry. They are more directed to conceptual and propositional issues. Included among the philosophers who engage in work on knowledge, language, and mind in this vein are Ludwig Wittgenstein, Gilbert Ryle, D.W. Hamlyn, John Austin, and Daniel Dennett But psychology is very much a part of those philosophical studies of special experience, such as the religious experience, the mystical experience, and even moral experience. A good representative of this approach is the great American pragmatist, William James. Much of his work in philosophy does not stray too far from his psychological interests. Some aspects of philosophy are concerned with the nature of human thought. This interest is distinct from psychological study, description and theory. But to be adequate and credible it needs to take into account the work of psychologists and the cognitive scientists. The subject of human thought is a big topic which can be approached from different directions. One

As adults, we may have had some psychological problems that we dealt with. These issues are typically normal because we undergo stress and fatigue at some point of our lives. Children might not have that kind of stress or problems because they are still young, but still they need some of the psychological help when it calls. Young minds can also be affected with psychological problems that can trigger their behaviors. One of the most influential events that can affect to the psychological being of a child is their memories. When they are presented tragic events that are difficult for them to understand, they tend to have that memory until they grow up. It will be a reason for them to develop a specific personality. Child psychology is what helps us see and find out all these signs. Whenever a child is introduces to a new environment, perhaps a chance of school, they will have that feeling of lack of self esteem. They are not that open to meeting new people at a sudden time. They might feel really down and stressed at first. It will take time depending on the child how quick he can adopt such situation. Also, children are often being afraid of their dreams which they do not understand. If a child had a dream which terrifies him too much, he will then be afraid to go to sleep knowing he might dream of that again. In child psychology, there are methods for them to do in order to cure these thoughts in a child. It can be that the certain dream he had has a relevant with his everyday experiences. Each of the dreams may have meanings he does not understand but the specialist will. When our child has these sorts of problems, it is better for him to be consulted to a psychologist right away. Children that are not properly cured can end up being mentally challenged. They can also be irritable, angry, and uncontrolled. Their behavior can worsen if not treated immediately. We need to take care of our children not only with his physical and educational needs but as well as his psychological need. It is best for us to always consult the specialist right away if we are seeing signs of any psychological problems. Source by Ryan English

From two Greek words: psyche, which means the mind or the soul and logos, which means study, the science of Psychology has been studied and defined by many people throughout the ages. Hilgard, Morgan, Silverman, and Schlesinger are just a few. A careful analysis of their foregoing definitions of psychology reveals common points: Psychology is the scientific study of the behaviors of living organisms; the term behavior must not be solely attributed to man’s physical reactions and observable behavior; and thoughts, feelings, and attitudes are also connected to the term behavior. The primary goals of Psychology are mainly to describe, identify, understand and explain behavior, to know its factors, and to control or change behavior. Psychologists often apply their knowledge and understanding of human behavior to solve issues and help in our society. Different areas of specialization in Psychology are studied to provide better understandings of this science. Among these are the traditional fields consisting mainly of: Clinical Psychology which deals with the diagnosis, treatment, and evaluation of psychological problems. It also relates to Psychiatry which pertains to more serious problems; Counseling Psychology which deals with administering, storing, and interpreting psychological exams; Educational or School Psychology which deals with students’ learning and adjustment; Community Psychology which deals with problems of the aged, prisoners, and other problems in the community. It also focuses on providing accessible care for these people; Social Psychology which deals with the behavior of man individually and in groups; Industrial or Organizational Psychology which deals with issues of people in the workplace; Personality Psychology which is concerned with the uniqueness of a person; Developmental Psychology which deals with factors affecting human groups; Experimental Psychology which focuses with the basis of scientific research; Physiological Psychology which is concerned with the functions of the brain; and Comparative Psychology which targets the differences of the species. Aside from these, several branches of Psychology were discovered during the 70’s. Forensic Psychology deals with legal, judicial, and correctional systems. Environmental Psychology is primarily concerned about issues relating to the environment. Computer Science, on the other hand, uses computer programming for behavioral analysis. There is also Engineering Psychology which seeks to make the relationship between man and machines; and Psychopharmacology which deals with the relationship of behavior and drugs. Furthermore, the latest fields of Psychology that were recently developed consist of: Health Psychology which focuses on multidimensional approaches that emphasize lifestyle and health care systems; Sports Psychology which applies psychological principles to improve performance and enjoy participation; Cross-culture Psychology which examines the role of culture in understanding behavior, thoughts, and emotions; and Women Psychology which emphasizes the importance of promoting research and study of women. Source by Allan Wu

On the evolutionary, contemporary and universal dimensions of culture and identifying the main research areas in cultural psychology The term culture would mean the entire gamut of activities, beliefs, lifestyle, habits, rituals, arts, ethics and behavioral patterns of a society. Yet despite the wide definition of culture, the elements of culture being too varied and divergent, it is not easy to provide a relationship between culture and psychology. There are two common ways by which the relationship between psychology and culture is studied, through intra-cultural psychology or behavioral patterns within a particular society and intercultural psychology or behavior and psychological characteristics between societies. Intra-cultural psychology seeks to understand the cultural basis of behavior by studying the peculiarities of a society, its rules and norms and shows how traditions shape or influence the collective psyche of the people within the society. However in psychology this is simply considered as ‘cultural psychology’ a straightforward term denoting the study of cultural traditions and their effects on the psychology of people. This sort of categorization may be misleading as it tends to see cultures as fundamentally different units and highlights differences rather than similarities. Cross-cultural psychology focuses on finding universal patterns of behavior or beliefs that are common among people of all cultures and this is what has been described here as ‘inter-cultural’ psychology. The terms ‘intra-cultural’ and ‘inter-cultural’ psychology would be more conducive to finding a psychology that shows convergent patterns of cultural behavior among people across societies. The psychology of culture requires further development in the areas of defining culture and in finding cultural roots that would highlight collective psyche or universal patterns of behavior. Humans are finally united by common emotions and psyche and this broader cultural psychology has been promoted by Carl Gustav Jung who focused his studies on the importance of deriving or understanding the collective unconscious with those elements or archetypes that are carried from one generation to another. Culture has been defined as the accumulated experiences of a society as a whole that has been socially transmitted so the collective unconscious in Jungian terms would serve as a repository of cultural imprints that shape human behavior right from childhood. The three predominant schools of cultural psychology have been identified as having activity, symbolic or individualistic approach (Carl Ratner explains this well). The activity approach highlights social activities of a group, the symbolic approach defines culture as shared meanings and concepts or symbols. The individualistic approach highlights the interaction of the individual with society and through this, individuals construct their personal culture. But I would downplay the personal aspect of culture and suggest culture as mainly a group phenomenon akin to individual conformity in society so apart from activity and symbolism, culture should be defined by its beliefs, values and ethics. Culture is finally about shared activities, shared symbolisms and shared belief systems. The story of the birth of human culture would be closely related to the story of human evolution as with the formation of tribes, humans learned and adapted to group behavior. Man was born alone but became a social animal primarily due to survival needs and the development of culture is thus rooted in man’s own needs for security, safety and survival. Humans follow rules, norms, traditions of a society simply ‘to live’ and culture is about conformity. So the psychology of culture is also the psychology of conformity and even the non conformist in a way conforms to certain basic social and cultural rules and traditions. As ‘culture’ represents a broad spectrum of human activity, cultural psychology should involve the study of: Evolutionary and historical patterns of human behavior, closely related to anthropology Contemporary social trends (for example: celebrity culture, workplace culture, globalization) closely related to sociology, and The intra-cultural and inter-cultural patterns of behavior to recognize the universal elements in human cognition, emotion and perception Thus there seems to be three dimensions to the study of culture in psychology – the evolutionary, the contemporary and the universal. The evolutionary and historical dimension of cultural psychology would have to be largely explained in terms of Jungian psychology whereas social psychology becomes an integral part of the contemporary dimension. The universal dimension for the study of cultural psychology uses behavioral patterns or cognitive psychology to gauge at how people are programmed to behave in certain situations and whether these behavioral patterns are common across cultures and if not, whether there are only culture specific behaviors. Psychologists have claimed that there are certain culture specific behaviors and certain universal behavioral patterns among humans and it is important to understand whether it is possible to delineate behaviors that are culture specific or intra-cultural and those that are universal or inter-cultural. If such an attempt is made, then it is possible to say that ethics and values, legal structures, lifestyle, activities, rituals and beliefs can widely vary between cultures and these elements represent intra cultural similarities and inter cultural differences. Yet certain attitudes and worldviews or opinions, emotions and perception, as also basic human traits of say intelligence or imagination are not culture specific and may have intra-cultural differences and inter-cultural similarities. For example emotions and emotional expressions are common across all cultures so we all cry when we are sad and laugh when we are happy. We also have common attitudes and opinions such as supportive views towards honesty and we universally detest crime. This is however the universal behavior found across cultures although there may still be variations. The strong intra-cultural beliefs and attitudes that are not universal are usually related to customs rather than emotions, for example attitudes towards marriage and courtship, vary widely between cultures or even dining table manners differ between cultures. Thus human emotions and expressions and behavior motivated by such emotions tend to be universal or inter-cultural and customs/traditions and human behavior motivated by customs tend to be intra-cultural or culture specific. Cultures in today’s world are largely shaped by religious belief systems, political and social or economic systems and

Reading the title to this article probably has you shaking your head thinking how ridiculous even the title sounds. Pop psychology has given some truly valuable techniques a bad rap by being inappropriately taught or used. But before you reject this advice out of hand, read on to hear my explanation as to why reverse psychology is the most effective way to get your ex back. Here is a scenario the belies the basics of reverse psychology. Your ex knows you better than anyone else, and also knows that you are an emotional person prone to outbursts. Chances are, during the argument that led to the breakup, you further solidified their ideas on how you will react to a give situation. He or she has come to accept that with you, emotional outbursts are just part of the territory – history to this point has given him or her no reason to think otherwise. But here is the kicker, you aren’t going to react this way any longer. Reverse psychology is a highly powerful, and highly effective strategy. As your ex has certain expectations as to your behavior, they are expecting emotional calls where you beg and plead for another chance. But they aren’t going to get those calls. They are going to get silence. You are going to act in the exact opposite way that he or she expects you to react and this is going to send them reeling. Sever all contact and move on with your life as though the breakup is part of the past and you care not to dwell on it. You know that you don’t really feel this way on the inside, but to get the most out of using reverse psychology techniques, you need to display yourself in manner where you appear happy and content with your life post-breakup. Look fabulous and hit the town with your friends. Let them know that you want to look your best since you are single again, and you want to be hot enough to be approachable. Your ex isn’t interested in you anymore, so why should you wait around for no reason? Of course, this news is going to make its way back to your ex and they are going to be left dumbfounded. You are acting completely differently that he or she expected you too and now it looks as though you are moving on. They are going to try everything they can to get in touch with you to get a second chance before it’s too late. Source by Monique Delancy

On the five types of intelligence and why we need to develop comprehensive intelligence tests that will measure all types of intelligence. If in your teenage years you felt like an alien from another planet, felt like you could not relate to people, felt like a social misfit, odd, out of place, never had too many friends, felt like a loner, felt that the world is too stupid for you to be part of it, and still feel a bit out of place, my recommendation is that you go to the nearest psychology laboratory and measure your Intelligence Quotient (IQ). That’s what many young adults must do to avoid getting into a prolonged depression. Your IQ score if it’s unusually high or at the level of genius will give you significant insight into your own emotional condition and the state of the world around you. Then you’ll stop feeling depressed or suicidal and will simply start looking at the world from a different perspective. You’ll also find the apparent stupidity of the world around you rather amusing. Intelligence is a general cognitive ability to acquire and apply knowledge. It also refers to learning, self-awarenesss, creativity and perception. Intelligence literally means to comprehend or perceive and most Western philosophers from Thomas Hobbes to David Hume have referred to intelligence as ‘understanding’. Understanding and perception are terms used by philosophers, although the concept of intelligence is considered very important in psychology. Psychologists largely agree that intelligence is the ability to understand complex ideas, to adapt to the environment and to solve problems. A popular theory used by psychologists is the ‘two-factor theory’ of intelligence developed by Charles Spearman. Spearman used a statistical method called factor analysis to divide intelligence into the ‘g’ factor which largely stands for general factor and ‘s’ or specific factor that gives us unique or specific abilities to complete specific tasks. The general factor or ‘g’ is very important as a person with a high general intelligence will be able to do or learn anything without much difficulty. Logic, spatial ability, linguistic and mathematical ability are all part of general intelligence. Academic achievements and occupational success are predicted with the g factor. According to this theory, the specific factor or ‘s’ could be musical or artistic ability or technical ability. Some people are more adept in using computers and technology and have a high ‘s’ factor related to technical ability. Psychologist Robert Sternberg identified three types of intelligence in his triarchic theory namely analytical, creative and practical. Analytical intelligence is the intelligence that you use to write analytical essays and the problem solving skills required for standardized tests. Creative intelligence is about coming up with novel ideas and concepts and indicates the level of creativity in a person. Practical intelligence has to do with logic and it is required to perform daily tasks. In this exposition, I go beyond the theories of Intelligence in psychology and suggest that there are basically five types of intelligence – General or Cognitive Emotional Social Creative Technical I’m inclined to add ‘spiritual intelligence’, but spiritual awareness is a combination of creative and emotional intelligence, so I won’t put that in a separate category. General or cognitive intelligence is similar to the g factor and relates to general intelligence. This is the intelligence measured in intelligence tests and if you get a high IQ score, it means you have a high general intelligence which makes you capable of handling all situations in an intelligent manner, whether you are running a business, playing chess or training your child. Creative geniuses as we know have high general intelligence and high levels of creative intelligence which is actually one’s ability to imagine or create things. If you have high creative intelligence it means you’ll be very creative in all situations, whether you’re writing a book, cooking or making love. A poet or an artist will tend to have high creative intelligence and high cognitive or general intelligence. A scientist will usually have large amounts of technical and theoretical knowledge and will thus have high technical intelligence and high general intelligence. Criminologists, psychologists, social workers, politicians deal with people all the time and these occupations need high general as well as high social intelligence. Psychologists, politicians, parents, teachers require high social and high emotional intelligence along with the common general intelligence because emotions are the central part of a growing child or adolescents and teacher-student or parent-child relationships. Firefighters, rescue workers, emergency workers need very high levels of emotional intelligence along with high general intelligence. Doctors, nurses, paramedics, mechanics, engineers need technical skills and high levels of technical and general intelligence. Businessmen, entrepreneurs, innovators need varying levels of creative intelligence, general intelligence and technical intelligence depending on the focus of their business or enterprise. Professors and academics usually have very high levels of general intelligence, although they must have the requisite technical knowledge in a specific subject or subjects and thus tend to have high technical intelligence. Professors are also teachers so they must have social intelligence to successfully interact with their students. Journalists, diplomats, activists all have high levels of social intelligence along with the general intelligence.. Traditional IQ tests tend to measure just the general intelligence, and anyone with an IQ score of 145 and above is considered a genius. Yet IQ scores do not adequately measure the other types of intelligence. IQ tests don’t measure creative intelligence and yet highly creative people are considered geniuses. It is generally agreed that high creativity also indicates high intelligence. The logic is, when someone is highly intelligent and is able to manipulate several concepts, they are also able to come up with unique or creative solutions and ideas. Traditional IQ tests also don’t measure social intelligence or emotional intelligence. So these IQ tests may be fundamentally incomplete in a certain way. It has been argued that high IQ people are not always socially and emotionally adjusted. I will argue, that geniuses are well liked in society

Where do I get off writing about the Psychology of Collecting? I have no degree in any of the behavioral sciences. (Took a Psychological Foundations of Education to get my teaching credential some years ago. Got an ‘A’, but frankly, I thought it was all a bit silly.) The answer is simple. I’ve made a hobby of observing people’s hobbies. Talking to them -or more accurately- listening to them talk about a subject they love. (And I have to say that there are worse ways to learning about something. An interesting discourse and a dull discourse are often separated by little more then the discourser and his or her interest in that subject.) Collecting might be thought of as a subset of a larger human behavior named -if only for the sake of convenience – hobbies. But I’m not sure this is true. I theorize that collectors and hobbyists are entirely different things. Take model train people as evidence. I used to take my casework to train shows when they came to northern California. Nice people the model train ‘hobbyists’, but they come in two distinct flavors. There are those who build tracks and little cities and mountains etc. and then play with their trains.   Then there are collectors who are somehow compelled to own a sample of every locomotive the Lionel made in a given year. Or all the locomotives Lionel ever made. Or all the locomotives, cars, tankers, cabooses, etc of a given scale / year / manufacturer. Often they don’t even open the package -reduces the value, I’m told. Both the builders and the collectors go to the same show and -I suppose- talk to each other -but they are completely distinct species. PATHOLOGICAL COLLECTORS: There are some poor souls who are pathological in their collecting. Not my word, ‘pathological’. The research folks use this word to describe collecting to the point that it interferes with daily life. Their houses are filled -and I mean literally every-square-foot- floor-to-ceiling-filled- until-it-crashes-through-the-floor-below FILLED with stuff. These people usually have no interest in the stuff in their collection, but pitch a fit if someone tires to take any of it away. There is some research indicating how this might be explained.   Steven W. Anderson, a neurologist, and his colleagues at the University of Iowa studied 63 people with brain damage from stroke, surgery or encephalitis who had no previous problems with hoarding before their illness, but afterward, began filling their houses with such things as old newspapers, broken appliances or boxes of junk. The good Doctor says: These compulsive collectors had all suffered damage to the prefrontal cortex, a brain region involved in decision making, information processing and behavioral organization. The people whose collecting behavior remained normal also had brain damage, but it was instead distributed throughout the right and left hemispheres of the brain. Anderson posits that the urge to collect derives from the need to store supplies such as food–a drive so basic it originates in the subcortical and limbic portions of the brain. Humans need the prefrontal cortex, he says, to determine what “supplies” are worth hoarding. I need to make one last point before moving on to the merely nutty-non-pathological-collectors. All the reading I’ve done suggests that collecting for -what-ever reason and to what-ever degree- is little understood and there is really not all much clear research out there. This takes me back to my starting point -I get to pretend to be an expert on the psychology of collecting because t’aint no one else out there who is any better qualified then I am. NUT-CASE (non-clinical) COLLECTORS: Somewhat less ‘traumatic’ / ‘dramatic’? – and it’s pretty clear I’m on thin-ice psycho-babble here – are the merely obsessive compulsive disorder collectors. No detectable brain damage – just good old OCD – or we might call it OCCD, (Obsessive Compulsive Collecting Disorder). But I wonder how many people who are truly committed to a given subject, (coin collecting, the Denver Broncos, UFO’s, conspiracy theories, you name it) have family and friends who look at them, shake their heads and mutter something about OCD under their breaths. But before we get on to collectors -Collectors with a capital C, coins, stamps, model railroad car Collectors, etc., we might consider the collector in all of us. There is a delightful story written by Judith Katz-Schwartz – Remembering Grandma. Her grandma was a refugee -as a very young girl- from Tsarist Russia who collected…. and I quote… …the tops of Bic pens neatly wound with rubber bands; hundreds of tiny garment snaps threaded onto safety pins; at least one hundred glass jars, all sparkling clean; eighty-seven neatly rolled and clamped Ace bandages. I thought this was a little funny, till the chap with whom I share a wood shop reminded me about the two big garbage bags I have filled with carefully cleaned BBQ sauce bottles. I love BBQ sauce and eat it on almost everything.   About a bottle a week. No idea what will ever come of them, but I KNOW the day will come when I’m dang glad I have all these empty BBQ sauce bottles. Judith sums it up beautifully and with kind & rare insight, I think. In the above mentioned article, she closes with…. Some people collect for investment. Some collect for pleasure. Some folks do it to learn about history. And some people “save things” because it helps them to fill a gaping hole, calm fears, erase insecurity. For them, collecting provides order in their lives and a bulwark against the chaos and terror of an uncertain world. It serves as a protectant against the destruction of everything they’ve ever loved. Grandma’s things made her feel safe. Though the world outside was a dangerous and continually changing place, she could still sit safely in her apartment at night, “putting together my things”. Then there was an episode from the TV sit-com Third Rock from the Sun. You might remember that Dick -(John Lithgow) became obsessed with Fuzzy Buddies. I take “Fuzzy Buddies” to be the producer’s way to avoid being sued by the folks that make “Beanie Babies.”   If one were to be perfectly honest about things, I suspect most –

Anxiety is a very common disorder in today’s world, largely due to the fact that we feel hurried, pressured and pushed to perform, pay the mortgage, deal with kids, and on top of all that, live a full life. No wonder we have anxiety. But what is anxiety trying to tell us? From a Jungian Psychology perspective, anxiety is the psyche’s way of telling us that the way we are living is out of balance. Rather than view anxiety as something to be eliminated, with medication, we need to see that the psyche is giving us a clear message about our one-sided life and is gently asking us to change this. Viewed in this light, anxiety symptoms are there to guide us out of a lifestyle that is no longer working. Carl Jung argued that anxiety symptoms are purposive, functional and have a goal – the alteration of our lifestyle. When we eliminate the symptoms through medication, we deny the wisdom of the psyche in making normal, natural change. Anxiety often appears in mid-life, when many of us experience a mid-life crisis. The first half of life is aimed at establishing our identity, our relationships, our occupation, and building up the necessary resources to accomplish all of these tasks. But, there comes a time when we need to turn inwards, to encounter the contents of the unconscious (often provided to us in the form of dreams) and search out the essential meaning of life. What is my purpose in life? Why am I here? How could I be living a more balanced, natural life? It is anxiety that often propels us towards answering these questions. When next you feel intense anxiety, ask yourself what the psyche is trying to tell you? What is it that I am doing that creates the anxiety, then begin to address the causes of the symptoms, rather than the cure. If we answer the question – what is the anxiety trying to tell me – we begin to address the cause. This may mean some change in the way you life your life, but this change does not necessarily mean that you become less competent, or less valued, rather, it means that you begin to value the wisdom of your psyche more than before. By addressing the causes of the anxiety and making lifestyle changes, the anxiety should diminish, having achieved its goal – leading you towards a more full, balanced lifestyle. Source by John Betts