Theoretical Lense Case: Miguel

--Original published at MaddieHinson

To discuss the issues relating to Miguel, I want to look at it from a humanistic perspective. From this, it is believed that Miguel is generally a good person, but his psychological issues are because he is not his true self currently. These psychologists believe in the importance of the hierarchy of needs being met. Abraham Maslow’s model has self-actualization, love and belonging, as well as physiological needs that need to be met in order to have a fulfilling life. Currently, Miguel isn’t sleeping well (physiological), he is arguing with his roommates (love and belonging), and he is a perfectionist who is making small mistakes (Self-Actualization). Based on this theory, these are the reasons Miguel’s life is not going in the right direction.

From a behaviorists’ point of view, they will observe Miguel’s behavior and look at different factors that could be causing his issues. For instance, Miguel picking fights with his roommates is due to the fact that he is getting bad grades in school and not getting enough sleep.

Using a cognitive psychology perspective, we would look at Miguel’s brain activity and how it links with his behavior. Being a perfectionist, Miguel is having a hard time processing all of the issues going on in his life right now.

Culturally, looking at what’s wrong with Miguel would be to take into account where he grew up, and what types of customs he was raised with. Different areas deal with failure in different ways, and Miguel might have been around people who get down on themselves when they mess up. So a cultural psychologist, would say that this is why Miguel is having these issues.

From a neuroscience perspective, it would be determined that Miguel has some type of mental disorder, whether it being depression, or anxiety that is making him lose focus and miss out on sleep.

Looking at Miguel’s issues from a psychodynamic point of view, it would be said that Miguel is having these issues due to something that happened earlier on in his life. This could be from earlier failures in his childhood, where his parents could have been strict about getting perfect grades or being the best athlete.

Introductory Blog Post

--Original published at MaddieHinson

Hi, my name is Maddie Hinson. I am a Junior Business Administration major with a double concentration in management and marketing. Honestly, I hadn’t even considered taking psychology until about a week ago. One of my classes had gotten cancelled and I needed a replacement, and this one happened to fit in my schedule. Although it wasn’t my first choice, I think this is something that is going to benefit me in the future. Psychology seems to be embedded in many areas of business, especially with marketing. I had a class last year in marketing, and we would have discussions about why we choose certain products over others, and a lot of it had to do with psychology. I had taken a psychology class in high school and my teacher was phenomenal at giving examples to go along with the concepts and she just made it a positive experience for me.

The first thing I think of when I hear the word “psychology” is the brain. We all have brains but there are parts of them that make us all different, and that is intriguing to me. I think it’s also kind of crazy how if the brain gets injured, the person it belongs to could act completely different than how they did before the injury. Concussions have been a big area in sports, mainly in football, and I think that’s something worth studying and paying more attention to.

Looking over the syllabus, I think the section about memory is something that I am eager to get to. I think it’s weird how there are certain parts of our life that we can never forget no matter how hard we try, and then other things we try so hard to remember and can’t seem to. I also think the coping with stress is a topic that I would be interested in. Everyone has stress, and I think it’s interesting to hear how differently we all deal with it. The third topic that I’m excited to study is personalities. Over the course of my life, I have come to now myself pretty well and how I operate, but I think it is a useful tool to be able to figure out how other people work, especially in the business world.

A topic that I am not thrilled to be studying is, Psychology Then and Now. I do believe it is important to learn about history, I am just not a fan of it. I also am not big on talking about emotions, for the sole reason that I am not great at describing my own ones. Lastly, the subcortical brain section seems like there could be a lot of memorization that goes with it, so I’m not too excited about it.

By the end of this class, I would like to know how we use this knowledge that we have gained about humans to help better ourselves and those around us. To me, learning something isn’t the reason we go to school, it’s what we do with what we have learned that makes it count.