Spotlight blog 3: Option 1

Peer pressure is pervasive, especially with ages that are still in school such as elementary to high school. I don’ t think college students are effected that much by peer pressure because by that age they’re not as easy to persuade. The first website I looked at was for parents. The website gave parents tip to give to their children about how to deal with peer pressure. The first tip was to take a deep breath; when a peer asks you to do something you don’t feel comfortable with doing, just take a deep breath. I thought that was a weird tip to give someone. Not only will your child be peer pressured, there might be a possibility to their getting bullied as well. The second tip was to tell the peers that they are doing bad things and could result in consequences. Most children that do risky things and peer pressure others already know that they are doing something that they shouldn’t be. That being said, I don’t think that this tip is very helpful either. The only helpful tip that came from this website was thinking about the consequences that come with having risky behaviors.

The second website I researched was for college students. The website said to be confident about yourself. Peer pressure comes from conformity, which is people having the tendency to submit to a group. I thought this was a good tip because the more confident you are in yourself, the less likely you are to change your views or morals. Another tip was to become friends with people who share similar values and morals. There will be no need for peer pressure if your friends do the same things as you do. The media makes it seem like college is all about partying and getting drunk, but they are just as many people that don’t go out than the ones that do. You just have to find a group of people that do what you want to do.

The last website I looked at was for teenagers. I think peer pressure effects teenagers in high school the most because they’re still trying to figure themselves out. It is easier for them to actually give into peer pressure. The first tip was to ask a lot of questions. When someone asks you if you want to smoke, ask them why they smoke. I don’t think that this is a good tip because you don’t want to make the person uncomfortable, especially if it is your friend. You don’t want to come off as being judgmental. The best tip that this website gave was to say no with confidence. Confidence is key in any group dynamic, if a person senses insecurity they might keep asking you do something that you don’t want to do. Another good tip is to try not to put yourself in a stressful situation. If you don’t like drinking or smoking, and feel uncomfortable with saying no, then find friends that do alternative activities.

https://www.greatschools.org/gk/articles/5-steps-resist-peer-pressure/

http://www.mycollegepal.com/blog/how-avoid-peer-pressure-college

http://www.yourlifecounts.org/blog/20-ways-avoid-peer-pressure

 

Media Production: New Findings Pave the Way for Resilience to Stress

 

In this day and age where stress affects everyone, it is important that more research is done about stress biomarkers. Constant exposure to chronic stress can lead to serious mental illness such as anxiety and depression. Stress can affect individuals differently depending on their biological makeup. Some individuals might respond negatively to stress while other might respond positively and form resilience. According to Thomas Larrieu’s research, stress plays a significant role in a range of mental illnesses. Yet, stress does not disturb everyone equally; while some individuals become depressed when dealing with continual hardships, others acclimate and endure. Larrieu and his team set out to show the risk influencers and biomarkers for susceptibility to social status depression.

The findings from an experiment lead by Thomas Larrieu helps us understand why individuals have different responses to stress. The experiment primarily tested if social status effects susceptibility to stress in adolescent mice. In particular, the researchers exposed mice to chronic social defeat stress (CSDS). Before finding out the effects of social status on stress, the researchers had to distinguish the subordinate mice from the dominant mice. Within the mice population, to initiate social status, the young mice were placed into cages of four for seven weeks before exposure to any stress. After seven weeks they measured social ranking by performing several tests on the mice. One test, categorized as a social confrontation tube test; consisted of putting two mice from the same social environment in the middle of a tube. The mice were previously trained to get out of the tube by walking forward. For the test, the mouse that walked forward and essentially made the other mouse back out of the tube was considered the dominant mouse, the mouse that was forced to walk backward was the subordinate mouse. With this social test and several others, the researchers were able to determine the social ranking of the mice. They ranked the mice from 1 to 4, 1 and 2 being dominant and 3 and 4 being subordinate.

After the researchers established the social hierarchy of the mice, they started to expose the subjects to different scenarios that would induce stress. When dominant and subordinate mice were exposed to a very aggressive mouse from another species for ten days, the dominant mice showed social avoidance whereas subordinate mice were not significantly affected. Researchers then analyzed the effects on the brain when mice felt defeated and showed signs of depression. The researchers measured the concentration of metabolites in nucleus accumbens. The nucleus accumben plays a role in motivation and reward that would affect whether an individual is resilient or not (Schlaepfer et al.). The more activity there is in the nucleus accumbens, the less likely the individual is susceptible to depression. The experiment showed that subordinate mice have more activity in their nucleus accumbens when exposed to stress than dominate mice do. From their findings, the researchers discovered the biomarkers for resilience to stress in mice. The resilience to stressful situations comes from the amount of activity in a nucleus accumbens.

After discovering the correlation between social status and susceptibility to stress, the researchers did recognize the fact that some mice could have been more susceptible to stress just from having trait anxiety, which could have affected the results. Nevertheless, they hope that their findings can help with the progress of researching vulnerability to stress. Now that stress biomarkers have been detected in mice, there is a greater possibility that scientists will find ways for humans to become more resilient to stressful situations.

 

 

I did not find it hard to summarize the research article. I found it harder to summarize the pop culture article. I thought the research article made more sense to me, so I was able to summarize it with no problems. The research article went into to detail about how the researchers came to their conclusions, whereas I was a little skeptical about the pop culture article because I don’t think there was enough information. I had to leave out other tests the researchers conducted to determine their social ranking. I also left out other procedures they did to induce stress on the mice. I left those components of the research out because I did not feel that was the crucial points that needed to go into the summary. I wanted the reader to have one example of how the researchers assigned social status and how they exposed the mice to chronic social defeat stress. While reading the pop culture article, I questioned what procedures the scientists conducted to figure out the mice social hierarchy. I also wondered how they were exposing the subjects to stress. It was important that I elaborated on some of the researcher’s procedures that lead them to their conclusions to reduce skepticism from the reader.

I did not think much about journalism before this assignment. I am more skeptical about reading pop culture articles. But now, if the author does leave out some vital information I will be a little sympathetic, knowing that they have a word count and not all the information can go into the article.

 

First Impression-Motivation

I am a transfer from another small liberal arts college in Maryland. I did not like the school that I was at before, athletically or academically. I knew if I wanted to have a positive college experience, I would have to transfer. Elizabethtown was the first institution to recruit me for basketball. I remember having a tour at Etown when I was a senior and I thought it was a very nice school. It was in my top three colleges but I decided to go to the college in Maryland because it was closer to my house. When I made my mind up that I was going to transfer, I immediately pictured myself at Etown. I am glad I made the switch because Etown sets me up for success academically and athletically.

I am the most motivated when it is close to the due date. I know that doesn’t sound great, but it is the truth. I have more motivation to study when the exam is close. I have more motivation to do an assignment when the due date is close. This isn’t the best way to handle work in college. It can make you very stressed out. I try to motivate myself to do things earlier so that I won’t be rushing trying to finish the assignment on time. The bigger the assignment is, the more motivation I have to complete it. What motivates me to be successful in school is my G.P.A. I always strive to get good grades so that I can get scholarships for graduate school. The better my grades are the more likely I am to get scholarships. Focusing on the big picture is what helps me stay motivated. As a part of my motivational plan, I will print out a picture of my dream car (a Mercedes G-wagon) and put it up on my wall. So every time I look at my dream car I will be motivated to work hard so that I can be successful enough to afford a G-wagon. I will also write motivational quotes on post its and stick them on my walls. The quotes will motivate me to work hard.

Johari Window-Bonus Post

Doing the Johari Window was a great way to see what others thought of you. Frankly, I was shocked by the characteristics people picked for me. The most shocking trait that multiple people picked was extroversion. To me, I am a total introvert. I would definitely rather be by myself than surrounded by people looking at me. I feel most calm when I am by myself. I guess some people didn’t know that about me. The highest trait that was picked for me was intelligence. I wouldn’t say that I am not intelligent, but that was not one of the traits I picked for myself. The second highest trait people picked for me was caring. I would say that I am caring as well but there were only so many traits you could pick for this exercise. It was interesting to see what traits individuals picked based on their relationship with me. My sister and my mom said that I was an introvert because those are the people that know me best. They know I’d rather be by myself than have all eyes on me. But from a person who doesn’t know me very well, they might assume I feed off of other people’s energy. I think the Johari Window is a pretty good measurement of personality. It’s good to see what others think of you because you might posses traits that you never thought about having before someone brought it to your attention. I think it gets you thinking about who you are and how people perceive you. Its a great way to find out what others think of you, I would recommend it to everyone.

http://kevan.org/johari?view=Lauryn%20Nicole