Assignment 10 - Opening Skinner's Box

Chapter 1 - Opening Skinner's Box

Summary: The chapter talks about the experiments conducted by psychologist B.F. Skinner and the controversy that surrounded his methods of experimentation. Operant conditioning, one of the main categories studied by B.F. Skinner, is the ability to train other humans and animals to perform a range of tasks through positive reinforcement (rewards). Skinner believed that humans are controlled and that free will is simply a response to life's "cues". He also believed that positive reinforcement worked better in establishing behavior than negative reinforcement (punishment).

Discussion: This chapter was very interesting because of the unconventional and controversial ways that B.F. Skinner conducted his experiments. Reading about the myth that Skinner's daughter sued him for keeping her in a box when she was younger, and that she later committed suicide when she lost the case in court was crazy. It is a good way to draw in the reader and get them excited to read on. Reading about all the other types of experiments was pretty cool, too. And, although there may have been a lot of controversy surrounding B.F. Skinner, he contributed greatly to the field of psychology (positive reinforcement > negative reinforcement or reward > punishment).

Chapter 2 - Obscura

Summary: This chapter talks about Stanley Milgram and describes Milgram's obedience to authority experiment. The experiment involved a subject who would be called the teacher and two actors (learner and experimenter). The subject would read a set of words to the learner and for every wrong answer, he would administer shock that rose in intensity for every incorrect answer. When the subject would try to stop the experiment the experimenter (the authority) would ask the subject to continue to test obedience to an authoritative figure. The results of the experiment showed that 65% of people would obey a credible authority, even if it meant harming another human being. The chapter went on to discuss the importance of the Milgram's study.

Discussion: I thought that Stanley Milgram's experiment, although controversial and somewhat messed with the mind of participants, was awesome. It's crazy that someone would even think of an experiment to test how people react to authoritative figures. It makes you think of how you would react if you were in that situation, but the thing is you don't know. You can never know how you would react in a certain situation until you are actually put into the situation. I've always wondered if I would have the guts to cut off my arm if I ever needed to to survive. Right now I say I don't think I would be able to, but I can't know for sure until a situation like that occurs. There are so many things that weigh in on a person's decision, so until given the stresses of a certain situation, you can't fully know how you would react in that situation.

Chapter 3 - On Being Sane in Insane Places

Summary: The author talks about David Rosenhan and an experiment he performed to test how well psychiatrists differentiate between sane and insane people. Rosenhan and 8 friends went to different mental hospitals and pretended to hear a "thud". One in the mental facility for a while, they acted normal and said they were no longer hearing any noises. This allowed them to determine whether or not the psychiatrists could distinguish them from insane patients. However, even though they were perfectly normal and sane, they were given the same treatment as insane patients. Slater then talks about how the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual on Mental Disorders changed due to the results of Rosenhan's study. She also talks about the same study repeated by herself and her findings.

Discussion: It was very interesting to read about Rosenhan's study and how psychiatrists, who go through extensive coursework and training, could wrongly classify a patient. It kind of bothers me how psychiatrists could possibly diagnose someone as insane even though they are perfectly normal because psychiatrists should be reliable. It makes you think about all the patients who are possibly normal but are too drugged up to speak out so they just conform to insanity. When the author repeated the experiment, although she was not admitted to the mental facility, she was given anti-depressants. This is another remarkable finding because it just shows that psychiatrists may not have any idea about what they are doing, but no one questions them because of their authority.  

Chapter 4 - In the Unlikely Event of a Water Landing

Summary: Lauren Slater talks about a crime that happened in New York in 1964, where a woman was stabbed and raped by man. There were witnesses, however, none of them stepped in to stop the crime from happening. After the incident, Latane and Darley conducted studies at NY University to determine why people did not intervene and help stop the crime when they had the time/opportunity to do so. One of the experiments involved a college student that was put in a room and made to believe there were student's in other rooms, by putting tape recorders in the rooms. One of the tape recorders played a recording of what sounded like a student having a seizure and the results showed that: 31% of students reacted to the "seizuring" student when they thought others were around and 85% tried to help when they thought they were the only person around.

Discussion: This chapter I found interesting because it relates to my life very well. I was at the Rec one day and a girl wasn't paying attention to where she was going and tripped over/fell on several bikes. It happened right in front of me and since there were several people around, I just kept walking and assumed someone else was going to help her. Her friend was right next to her, so that may have had something to do with me continuing on without helping but I can't believe I didn't stop to help, now that I look back on it. It's an interesting thing to think about.

Chapter 5 - Quieting the Mind

Summary: In this chapter, the author talks about Leon Festinger's theory of cognitive dissonance.Cognitive dissonance is the phenomenon in which an individual adjusts his/her beliefs to better fit or justify one's behavior. One experiment of cognitive dissonance performed by Festinger was one where a group of people believed the world was going to end on December 21st by a huge flood. Festinger predicted that when the prophecy turned out to be false, a huge effort to gain social support would happen to downplay the disconformation of the original belief. He infiltrated the flood group and his prediction was later confirmed. He also performed an experiment where student's were paid $1 and $20 to perform boring tasks. The student's who were paid $1 said the experiments, which were time consuming and boring, were fun, while those that were paid $20 straight up told the truth and said the tasks were boring. The students that were paid $20 experienced little dissonance, so they were honest in their responses. However, those that were paid $1 had to justify spending a considerable amount of time doing pointless tasks, so they said the tasks were enjoyable.

Discussion: This chapter, to me, was kind of boring; however, the theory of cognitive dissonance was quite interesting. I was watching a show the other day about the "end" of the world on December 21, 2012 and there were quite a few people who had given up a lot because of their belief. It is going to be real interesting when the world does not come to end; I wonder what all the believers are going to say/do. Their was also a real interesting belief from one of the people . His belief was that the world is a computer game and at a certain time on December 21, 2012 there is going to be a portal that opens up, in the middle of a canyon somewhere, that will enable you to teleport out of this "virtual" world. He is going to jump off a cliff at that time to jump into this portal and be released from the video game. Stupid belief that is somewhat related to cognitive dissonance.  

Chapter 6 - Monkey Love

Summary: This chapter is about the experiments performed by Harry Halow on monkeys to determine what the basis for love was. He separated new born monkeys from their mothers and gave them a mother figure in soft, cloth towels. The baby monkeys became extremely attached to the towels. Harlow then made surrogate mother monkeys out of wire and nails, but gave them the ability to dispense milk. He found that the new born monkeys were still extremely attached to the soft, cloth surrogate mothers, although they would approach the wire surrogates whenever they were hungry. The baby monkeys preferred the soft surrogate mothers who could not feed them over the metal surrogates that could provide food. Based on these results, Harlow concluded that touch was the basis of forming love.

Discussion: Although the experiments performed on the new born monkeys were done to further the field of psychology, the torturing of the monkeys was not cool at all. It just makes you question what kind of person Halow was and what kind of environment he grew up in. I don't see how anyone could be so cruel to harm an animal like that. The ONLY silver lining to the experimentation is that now we are more aware of what is needed for proper child development.

Chapter 7 - Rat Park

Summary: I really liked the topic of this chapter and the nature of the experiments. The chapter talks about a psychologist, Bruce Alexander, and his research and experiments regarding addiction to narcotics. One psychologist by the name of Dr. Herbert Kleber believed that the ease of access to narcotics was the main factor in the risk of addiction. Bruce Alexander believed that there is nothing addictive about drugs and that even repeated exposure to enticing drugs does not lead to problems. In experiments on rats, narcotics were proven to be addictive since rats would suffer pain in order to suck drugs through a straw. However, Alexander argued that the rodents became addicted because of the environments they were kept in (i.e. tiny cages). He believed that if the rodents were kept in an environment that was comfortable and "happy", the rats would not care for the drugs. So he created a "Rat Park", a park for rats with sufficient space and clean water, and performed the narcotics experiment. He found that in this environment, the rodents preferred not to ingest the narcotics even if they were previously addicted. Bruce Alexander showed that drug addiction is more likely to occur in sad environments or in times of misery/difficulty; however, if we are happy and have nearly everything that we desire, addiction is not a problem.

Discussion: This was a really interesting experiment, however, like the new born monkeys experiment, it was cruel to force addiction upon the rats and cause them to harm themselves to satisfy their addiction. I do agree with Alexander's theory because I feel like those who grow up in good environments are less likely to become addicted/try to drugs. The results may not be 100% accurate because some people just want to do  drugs because they like the way they feel, but I think there is a high percentage of accuracy.

Chapter 8 - Lost in the Mall

Summary: This chapter discusses Elizabeth Loftus's research about human memory and imagination. Loftus says that humans often confuse things from memory and their imaginations. She says long term memory is very fragile and can be easily manipulated. This led her to believe that many people were wrongly convicted in child abuse cases because evidence based on childhood memories could be easily altered. To prove this, Elizabeth Loftus created an experiment called "lost in the mall" which involved telling participants about ture childhood memories along with a fake memory about being lost in a mall when they were young. The parents of the participants cooperated in the experiment, too. The results showed that a large number of participants actually believed that they were lost in the mall and fabricated stories of how they became lost. Loftus claims that the human mind replaces white spaces in memory with filler memories that may deviate from the truth. If someone trustworthy tell us something about our past, we often believe them and make memories as if it really occurred. However, some psychologist argue that traumatic memories are different from normal memories and are stored differently in the brain; traumatic memories can't be forgotten or messed with.

Discussion: I really liked this chapter because it made me think about memories that I think happened when I was younger and whether or not they are true, partially made up, or fully made up. I recently watch a show that also discussed how memory can be messed with. A robbery occurred and people who witnessed it were asked to describe the person that committed the robbery. Several actors were put in place to make things up about the robber and when they did so, several participants began to agree with them. This showed that memories can be tampered with easily, especially by outside sources.

Chapter 9 - Memory Inc.

Summary: This chapter discusses Eric Kandel and his research on human memory and its storage in the brain. It talks about Henry who experienced seizures and convulsions, due to epilepsy, and had his hippocampus removed by Dr. Scoville. The brain surgery stopped Henry's seizures but also kept him from being able to make new memories. After reading about this story Kandel learned about neurons and human memory. He performed experiments on sea slugs because of their easily accessible neurons and discovered CREB and CREB repressors. CREB is a brain molecule that triggers the production of proteins that hold memories. Later, Kandel started a company that produced pills to help with memory enhancement.

Discussion: This chapter was pretty cool. Reading about something as complex as the human brains is usually interesting and the part about the brain surgery was intriguing. I do think that messing with the human brain whether it be through surgery or pills is not a good idea, though. Unless we know the consequences of removing part of the brain or the effects of taking memory enhancing pill, we should leave the human brain as is and let nature do its thing. Messing with the brain could have undesirable effects and mess up someone's life.

Chapter 10 - Chipped

Summary: Psycho surgery and lobotomies are the main topics of this chapter. The author talks about Antonio Moniz, the father of lobotomy, and his experiments in psycho surgery. The author also talks about the positive and negative effects that a psycho surgical procedure can have on a person's life. However, she notes that some people would rather face the negative effects of a surgery than deal with their depression, anxiety, and other related issues. Late in the chapter, Charlie Newitz and his OCD is discussed. He tried a bunch of different medications, however nothing worked so he underwent psycho surgery. After the surgery his OCD was gone, but also reported feeling depressed. He did think that dealing with depression was better that dealing with OCD.

Discussion: It's crazy to think about how far research on the brain, medicine, and surgical procedures has come. I do not agree fully with taking medicine or surgery because I feel as if it would make you a completely different person. I would not know what it is like, but when you take medicine it puts you in a different place and doesn't allow you to be yourself. Surgery is a little worse because once the surgery is performed, you are stuck with it. Medications can at least stop being taken, but with surgery you will be stuck the way you end up, which could be good OR bad.

Assignment 9 - Obedience to Authority

Chapter 1 - The Dilemma of Obedience

This chapter introduces the book and talks about obedience and how it is an important aspect of social life. The author describes the experiment in some detail, the motives behind conducting the experiment, and a brief description of some of the results. This chapter is boring at first because it does not go into details of the experiment, but it does a good job of introducing the reader to the experiment.

Chapter 2 - Method of Inquiry

In this chapter, the author goes into more detail about each step for setting up the experiment. He talks about the participants, the recruitment process, the characteristics of the participants (age, race, occupation, etc.), description of the learning task, the actual setup of the experiment, and detailed descriptions of the shocking procedure and the machines. This chapter was a little better than the first because it started to build anxiety and a wanting to see what the experiment would yield.

Chapter 3 - Expected Behavior

Stanley Milgram gathered groups of psychiatrists, college students, and middle-class adults and explained the experiment to them, leaving out that the learner was an actor. He asked them to predict the results of the experiment and most of them predicted that subjects would not go through the whole experiment and stop when the learner asked to be let out. This chapter was interesting because it showed how people thought they would react and eventually showed different results than what the experiment yielded.

Chapter 4 - Closeness of the Victim

Obedience depended on the proximity of the victim to the learner. If the learner was out of sight or farther away, the subject was more likely to continue through to the end of the experiment. If the learner was in the same room as the victim, disobedience was more likely to occur. It was interesting to see how face-to-face and remote confrontations could produce such different results. However, it does make sense and is something I have personally experienced. I have texted someone to avoid a face-to-face confrontation with them.

Chapter 5 - Individuals Confront Authority

Some accounts are given of people that participated in the experiment and Milgram discusses some of the forces (background, subject-experimenter interaction,etc.) that affect the way a subject responds. He puts some of the actual verbal exchanges between the experimenter and the subject in the chapter which made for a good read. It was kind of cool to see how the victim interacted with the experimenter.

Chapter 6 - Further Variation and Controls

Changes are made to the original experiment are described in this chapter. Some of the experiment changes were: adding a heart condition to the learner, changing personnel, changing the proximity of the experimenter to the subject, the impact of women, emphasizing the contract of the subject, the impact of the institution, and the option of the subject choosing the shock to administer. I liked this chapter because it showed that the author thought about every possible scenario and made an experiment that would reflect that type of scenario.

Chapter 7 - Individuals Confront Authority II

This chapter was pretty much a continuation of chapter 5 except with accounts from different people. I liked this chapter because I liked to read the conversations the subjects would have with the experimenter. Elinor Rosenblum pissed me off though. She kept on going on about how she ws the most marvelous person and painting herself to be the nicest person in the world. If you're so nice, then why did you do shock the crap out of the person. She reminds me of the Lori in the walking dead; annoying.

Chapter 8 - Role Permutations

The role of the individual was tested to see whether it played an important role in affecting the responses of the subject. Experiments 12-16 reflected the role permutations and they showed that a hierarchy of authority is crucial when choosing an authority to follow. For example, you wouldn't follow someone off the street in a laboratory environment, but you might follow someone perceived to be a scientist.

Chapter 9 - Group Effects

In this chapter, obedience is differentiated from conformity. Obedience comes from an hierarchical authority and the person will say they performed an act because they were just following orders. Conformity comes from following what a group of peers does. Stanley Milgram performs some experiments using these two entities. I thought this was interesting, too, because I do notice that one person in a group usually goes along with what a group will say instead of stating his/her own thought.

Chapter 10 - Why Obedience?

Around this chapter is when the book started to get boring for me. The author begins to discuss some of the reasons why obedience occurs, hierarchical models and their effect on obedience, and agentic shift. This chapter was still kind of interesting but it seemed like he began to bring up the same argument over and over and I got tired of reading it.

Chapter 11 - The Process of Obedience

Again, the author talks about agentic state, although a little more in depth, and explains antecedent conditions, binding factors, and consequences. Some antecedent conditions discussed were family, institutional setting, and rewards; binding factors keep individuals in the agentic state. This chapter was also boring to me because it kept going on and on about stuff in the previous chapter.

Chapter 12 - Strain and Disobedience

Strains and strain-resolving were discussed and how they influence a subject to obey/disobey. When the binding factors are greater than the net strain, obedience occurs; if the binding factors are less than the net strain, the result is disobedience. The author goes on to talk about strain, its sources, and strain resolution. Other than reading the account of the experimenter and the subject, chapter was pretty boring.

Chapter 13 - An Alternative Theory: Is Aggression the Key?

Stanley Milgram discusses the theory of aggression in the shocking experiment which says that the subject wanted to hurt the learner out of frustration/anger. I liked this chapter because it talked about an interesting aspect of the mind. Some people are just angry, so I figured getting aggressive people in an experiment would increase obedience, however, when given the subject was given freedom to use whatever shock level, they remained low. In a psychology class I am taking, we are discussing aggression so this chapter really interested me.

Chapter 14 - Problems of Method

Another boring chapter. The author answers 3 questions from critics of the experiment. He dismisses opposing views and restates his point; the 3 questions were: (1) Did the subjects correctly represent society at large, (2) did they believe the shocks were real from the start, and (3) Can you generalize the results and apply them to real life experiences?

Chapter 15 - Epilogue

This chapter was very cool because it had a Q and A session between a Vietnam soldier and Mike Wallace of CBS news. It was interesting to hear about what he did and why he did it, although what he did was terrible. It gives some insight as to what his mindset was at the time (none; just listen to authority) and how he felt at the time. The accounts of the subjects in the book along with this interview were by far the most interesting of the book followed by the results of the experiment(s).

Summary/Reaction

Overall, Obedience to Authority was a good read. It was very interesting because it showed the nature of human's and how saying how you react to something doesn't always translate. You can never know how you will react until you are put into the actual situation, as the shock experiment demonstrated. I liked reading how the dialogue between the experimenter and the subjects during the experiment. It showed what they felt, what they were thinking, and showed how they were sometimes caught in conflict with their conscience and authority. A lot of the reasons the author gives for obedience to authority make sense because there have been times where I have felt I was in a similar (but not hurtful) situation but followed through with instructions because of the figure of authority. This was a good idea for an experiment and all the variations of the experiment shed light as to what type of scenarios generate higher obedience. From the class readings, so far, Obedience to Authority is my favorite just because of the content of the book and how it relates to life.

Assignment 8 - Gang Leader For A Day (whole book)

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 1

This book reminds me of one I read in my English class called Freakonomics. It may have been mentioned in Freakonomics, I can't remember, but the writing style is very similar. This first chapter really got my attention because I live in an area of college station that is similar. On my street, there are a bunch of college kids and families living around me, but the next street over there are mostly black people living there (not projects but appear to be low income households). A lot of the time when I go to the convenient store on the street corner, I run into several black people in the store and it is interesting to see how they interact with their friends and the cashier/store owner. They talk to the cashier/store owner, who is Indian (and real cool with me and my friends), like he is one of their friends and sometimes try to trick him into thinking they paid for something they didn't. They joke around with him, too, but sometimes they get loud with him and sometimes it's really hard to tell whether or not the situation will escalate and become violent. Either the guy in the book was really naive (which appears to be the case), brave, or dumb because he was trying to conduct a study in what seemed to be a drug infested and gang-run neighborhood. I feel like back then, gangs weren't as violent/crazy as the ones now, so he may have lucked out there.

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 2

Chapter 2 of this book is really awesome because the author is slowly becoming more familiar with the gang, learning the hierarchy of gang members, and observing the different things the gang does other than sell drugs. It's as if Sudhir is being "initiated" into the gang by J.T. The main reason why I like this chapter is the fact that Sudhir has been somewhat accepted into the gang and it is now becoming part of his regular life. The coolest part was when J.T. confronts C-note about moving cars so that there could be room for the monthly basketball game. It would have been crazy/awkward to be exposed to that for the first time. I know I feel awkward when two friends fight even if it's over the phone, probably because I don't like conflict, so I can just imagine how the author felt. Watching C-note getting beat up would have been hard, too. One thing that I've noticed, though, is that the author uses the word "nigger" in the book a lot. I think the gang was using the word "nigga" and from what I have experience the two words have different meanings. "Nigger" has a negative connotation to it while "nigga" is used amongst friends, sort of like bro, homie, dude.

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 3

This chapter was really interesting because it showed that gangs are not just gangs. They are communities that work together with citizens in their neighborhood, even if they have conflicting views. Sometimes the help the gangs give to the community is illegal, but they help out the best they are able to. There is a lot more that goes on inside of a gang, and this chapter sheds light on the thoughts of gang members/leaders and the inner workings that drive the gang.

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 4

Chapter 4 was kind of annoying because Sudhir was supposed to be the gang's leader for a day, but he didn't really do all that much. It still seemed as if J.T. was the gang's leader and Sudhir would just nod and say yea to everything J.T. said. I guess you can't just give Sudhir the power of gang leader and let him do everything on his own, but Sudhir barely did anything with the position he was put in. The biggest decision he made was deciding who to punish between Otis and Billy, but even then he didn't have the gang leader mentality and tried to cancel out their "penalties". 

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 5

Chapter 5 got away from the gang functions and focused more on Ms. Bailey and the tenants of Robert Taylor. It showed mostly how the higher-up people in the community work to get what the families in the community need (Ms. Bailey exchanges liquor/beer for clothing, food, etc.). The chapter gives insight on how the Robert Taylor community survives without money and how each person helps each other. You could say that Ms. Bailey is someone who is looking out for everyone or you could say she using her "help" to control everyone (when she gives things to only certain people). 

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 6

Although Sudhir is a educated graduate student, this chapter made me question his intelligence. When he told Ms. Bailey and J.T. about the secret financial earnings of the tenants, he had to have known that J.T. and Ms. Bailey would hit up the tenants. In a way, there are times where trying to help someone results in drastically hurting others without even knowing, but this seemed to be an obvious situation where he should have known to keep that information to himself. 

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 7

I kind of feel bad for Sudhir because no matter what he does, he seems to get on everyone's bad side. The tenants were against him for giving away their secret earnings, he's against J.T. if he doesn't do everything with him, and the cops are pissed at him because he is keeping track of all their actions by doing this ethnography. When hustlers were being described in the book, it appeared as if they were describing Sudhir. He's a hustler just like everyone in the gang and Robert Taylor. 

Gang Leader For A Day - Chapter 8

This chapter showed just how much Sudhir had learned from the gang.

"How could I learn so much, absorb so many lessons and gain so many experiences at the side of a man who was so far removed from my academic world.”

This quote pretty much summed up Sudhir's experiences with the gang, tenants, police officers, etc. He learned that calling an ambulance in the gang environment is a lot different than calling it in a "normal" environment. In Robert Taylor, that ambulance would never come, but in any other place it would show up quickly. He also learned that gangs have their own organized government and work things out differently than a regular society.

Gang Leader For A Day - Whole Book

Overall, the book was interesting. It's crazy to me how naive/stupid the author was, going up to gang members and trying to get to know them. Now it is well known that you do not mess with a gang at all if you aren't with them because something is bound to happen to you. Sudhir got lucky that he was able to come out of such an experience with no harm done to him. And although I thought Sudhir was extremely dumb for attempting to do this ethnography, it turned out to be an interesting and enlightening experiment. It shed light on the economics of gangs and how things work around them. A gang in the area not only affects the gang and its members, it affects the nearby stores, people living in the area, etc. Today's gangs are much more violent and deadly than those in the past, in my opinion, and it would be awesome, if there was someone brave enough, to study them. It would be really cool to see how gangs have evolved, if they have at all, and see if they still perform "community service" similar to what J.T. did.

Ethnography Idea(s)

Idea for me:

I have never played MMORPG games like World of Warcraft or Runescape before, so I think it would be interesting to see how people, who play the game frequently, behave and to interact with them through playing the game. I like to play video games, but I have never been into computer games and never been exposed to hardcore computer gamers, so this would be something new and interesting for me to do. South Park makes World of Warcraft seem fun.


Idea for someone else:

I'm really interested in sports and play/watch them pretty often and I feel like not many computer science students are exposed to stuff like this, so it might be interesting for them to either play pick-up games, join a fantasy league, or go watch games with others. I know when my friends and I are together the main thing we talk about is fantasy football and it gets crazy with stats and analysis to where it's almost nerd-like.

Assignment 7 - Nonobvious Observation

               I thought the making of the videos was an interesting project to do. Filming the different points-of-view of classmates was cool because you are able to see the world through  another's eyes. Everyone interacts with their environment differently and it's really interesting to see exactly what someone pays attention to or reacts to as they perform everyday tasks. Things as simple as walking to class, ordering food, or even just sitting on a bench on campus create many situations where you unconsciously interact with people and the environment around you. Although the interactions on the videos may not be completely genuine (because of the awareness of the camera), I believe they closely reflect a person's normal interactions. I know when I first started doing my task, the camera was making me think about my interactions, but after a while I felt like I started doing things as I normally would (mainly because I felt people weren't looking at me funny). I think the project would have captured interactions a lot more accurately if the camera was not as obvious. The people wearing the cameras wouldn't have felt like they stood out with a big, clunky camera on their head, thus making their interactions with the people/environment more normal. Nonetheless, the project was by far the most interesting computer science project I have had so far.

               There are several nonobvious things that can be looked at to determine more about a person. You can look at how fast they walk. If they walk slow this can mean that the person is a relaxed, laid-back kind of person. Maybe they are lazy or just like to enjoy their walk and surroundings. If the person walks fast, maybe they are the kind of person who is always busy/in a hurry, impatient, or someone who is often late to appointments. Another thing can be whether or not the person is looking at everything around them or if they look in the direction of their goal the whole time. Looking around can show that the person is new to the environment and focusing on the goal can show that the person is very familiar with the task. The reactions of the people they pass by and whether or not the person looks at the people he/she walks by or looks down can give a hint as to what the person's personality is like. For example, looking down as they walk by others can mean that they are shy or nervous around people they are unfamiliar with, while looking up and making eye contact or even smiling at someone can show that they are friendly, outgoing, and comfortable around people they do not know.

Assignment 5 - Ethnographies

“Ethnography consists of the observation and analysis of human groups considered as individual entities (the groups are often selected, for practical and theoretical reasons unrelated to the nature of the research involved, from those societies that differ most from our own). Ethnography thus aims at recording as accurately as possible the perspective modes of life of various groups.”

- Structural Anthropology (1963), by Claude Lévi-Strauss.

“[Ethnography has a] goal, of which an Ethnographer should never lose sight. This goal is, briefly, to grasp the native's point of view, his relation to life, to realise his vision of his world. We have to study man, and we must study what concerns him most intimately, that is, the hold life has on him. In each culture, the values are slightly different; people aspire after different aims, follow different impulses, yearn after a different form of happiness. In each culture, we find different institutions in which man pursues his life-interest, different customs by which he satisfies his aspirations, different codes of law and morality which reward his virtues or punish his defections. To study the institutions, customs, and codes or to study the behaviour and mentality without the subjective desire of feeling by what these people live, of realising the substance of their happiness—is, in my opinion, to miss the greatest reward which we can hope to obtain from the study of man.”

- Argonauts of the Western Pacific (1922) by Bronislaw Malinowski.

This definition given by Claude Levi-Strauss, to me, is the most straightforward of the 7 listed at http://www.americanethnography.com/ethnography.php, but also gives some details as to what an ethnography’s aim is.  However, the definition given by Bronislaw Malinowski, in my opinion, is the most meaningful and detailed. It seems to be defined from an emotional standpoint because the words used appear to try and provoke emotions from the reader and it has a much deeper meaning than the others. I think a combination of the two definitions would give the best description of an ethnography because of the deepness of Malinowski’s and the straightforwardness of Levi-Strauss’.

From the reading of:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnography
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coming_of_Age_in_Samoa

Ethnographies appear to be almost like debates between ethnographers. An ethnography is supposed to be an unbiased study of a culture, but somehow results seem to get skewed. In the Wikipedia article, Coming of Age in Samoa, Derek Freeman and Margaret Mead butted heads on the data collected from a Samoan tribe (Freeman started the head butting and waited for Mead to die before he started talking crap!). I don’t think Freeman was wrong for trying to disprove Mead’s results. If he tried to disprove without talking so much crap and instead just conducted his own ethnography (which he later did) then he would’ve been cool with me. He went about it the wrong way by calling her out and just saying that she was plain wrong; he seemed to have his own intentions in mind. With that being said, I think it’s hard for any ethnography to be conducted without getting some results wrong. People react differently with different people. I react differently with my computer science classmates than I do with my roommate and close friends. So Margaret Mead’s results may have been the results of Samoan’s reacting to a woman and Derek Freeman’s results may have come from reactions of him being a man. There is no accurate way to determine whether or not a person will act the same way with different people, so results can sometimes be skewed. The best way, I think is to set up hidden cameras and watch without knowing, that way genuine interactions can be recorded and looked at (there is the issue of privacy though).

 In short, I think an ethnography conducted on the same culture with ethnographers of different race, gender, age, etc., would produce differing results. People react differently to different people so the results would differ depending on the ethnographer.

             Ethics plays a big role in ethnographies, too. There is an 8 page code of ethics that ethnographers are required to abide by when conducting research, teaching, applying a study, and disseminating results. Here are brief guidelines for them:

• Conducting Research-When conducting research Anthropologists need to be aware of the potential impacts of the research on the people and animals they study. If the seeking of new knowledge will negatively impact the people and animals they will be studying they may not undertake the study according to the code of ethics.

• Teaching-When teaching the discipline of anthropology, instructors are required to inform students of the ethical dilemmas of conducting ethnographies and field work.

• Application-When conducting an ethnography Anthropologists must be "open with funders, colleagues, persons studied or providing information, and relevant parties affected by the work about the purpose(s), potential impacts, and source(s) of support for the work." 

• Dissemination of Results-When disseminating results of an ethnography the code notes that "[a]nthropologists have an ethical obligation to consider the potential impact of both their research and the communication or dissemination of the results of their research on all directly or indirectly involved." Research results of ethnographies should not be withheld from participants in the research if that research is being observed by other people.

There are also many types of ethnographers:

• "The kindly ethnographer" – Most ethnographers present themselves as being more sympathetic than they actually are, which aids in the research process, but is also deceptive. The identity that we present to subjects is different from who we are in other circumstances.
• "The friendly ethnographer" – Ethnographers operate under the assumption that they should not dislike anyone. In actuality, when hated individuals are found within research, ethnographers often crop them out of the findings.
  
• "The honest ethnographer" – If research participants know the research goals, their responses will likely be skewed. Therefore, ethnographers often conceal what they know in order to increase the likelihood of acceptance.
• "The Precise Ethnographer" – Ethnographers often create the illusion that field notes are data and reflect what "really" happened. They engage in the opposite of plagiarism, giving credit to those undeserving by not using precise words but rather loose interpretations and paraphrasing. Researchers take near-fictions and turn them into claims of fact. The closest ethnographers can ever really get to reality is an approximate truth.
• "The Observant Ethnographer" – Readers of ethnography are often led to assume the report of a scene is complete – that little of importance was missed. In reality, an ethnographer will always miss some aspect because they are not omniscient. Everything is open to multiple interpretations and misunderstandings. The ability of the ethnographer to take notes and observe varies, and therefore, what is depicted in ethnography is not the whole picture.
• "The Unobtrusive Ethnographer" – As a "participant" in the scene, the researcher will always have an effect on the communication that occurs within the research site. The degree to which one is an "active member" affects the extent to which sympathetic understanding is possible.
• "The Candid Ethnographer" – Where the researcher situates themselves within the ethnography is ethically problematic. There is an illusion that everything reported has actually happened because the researcher has been directly exposed to it.
• "The Chaste Ethnographer" – When ethnographers participate within the field, they invariably develop relationships with research subjects/participants. These relationships are sometimes not accounted for within the reporting of the ethnography despite the fact that they seemingly would influence the research findings.
• "The Fair Ethnographer" – Fine claims that objectivity is an illusion and that everything in ethnography is known from a perspective. Therefore, it is unethical for a researcher to report fairness in their findings.
• "The Literary Ethnographer" – Representation is a balancing act of determining what to "show" through poetic/prosaic language and style versus what to "tell" via straightforward, ‘factual’ reporting. The idiosyncratic skill of the ethnographer influences the face-value of the research.

All of these different types of ethnographers somewhat support my idea that there can hardly every be truly unbiased results.

Emotional Design vs Design of Everyday Things

     The “Design of Everyday Things” focuses on how the design of an object affects the users perception of how the object should be used. The primary focus is not the look (pretty or ugly) of the design, but the mappings of functions, feedback given from the object, visibility of certain functions/information, and how the human mind makes models of an object by simply looking at it. It discusses design on more of a scientific level. For example, the book talks about how having buttons, shaped like something associated with their function, helps the user determine what the button does and how it is to be used. It also discusses how information can be gathered from the object and the environment, so that the user can paint a mental picture of the affordance of the object. Emotions are left out of the design and the object's functionality/usability is the main objective the book tries to convey.

     “Emotional Design” also talks about an objects design; however it discusses how the look of an object (attractive or unattractive) affects its ease of use, by manipulating human emotions. Based on the first chapter, the book focuses on how human emotion and aesthetics affect how someone uses an object. When someone is happy, they are more creative and are able to figure out alternate solutions to a problem. When someone is anxious, they tend to pay more attention to details and get tunnel vision. These emotions are taken into consideration and used to design objects that help users during times of stress and/or relaxation. For example, alarms and flashing lights can be used to symbolize danger and help workers focus on the problem at hand, while background music can be used to induce happiness and creativity on the job. However, overdoing the negative emotion triggers can cause even greater problems by stressing out the person and having them focus too hard on one thing, keeping them from finding a solution to the current problem.

      These books differ from one another because “Design of Everyday Things” talks about design from a physical standpoint (not looks though), while “Emotional Design” uses more of a emotional/aesthetical analysis. They are similar in the sense that they both analyze how the mind works and how objects can be designed to cater to the way the mind processes information. Other than that it is the physical appearance of the design versus the emotions a design generates.

     

Assignment 2 - Design of Everyday Things

Design of Everyday Things - Overview

     As a whole, I thought this book was very engaging and kind of made me think more about how things are designed. Before reading this book, I just never noticed or payed attention to why my stove has a knob on one side that controls a burner on the other side or how I know whether to push on the right/left side of door. The other day, I caught myself pulling open the doors in the back of the Bright building without giving it any previous thought. According to this book, it's because it's a well designed door. One of my favorite parts of the book was when the author started talking about whether there is a psychology of materials. It was really interesting how people react differently to materials; when there was glass vandals would break it and when there was plywood they would tag it up. It makes me try to think about what went on in their brain when they saw the glass was no longer there. Why would they choose graffiti over smashing/destroying the wood? They knew they wanted to destroy something the material influenced their choice of destruction. It's like when people slash tires, is it because it causes the most damage? Or is it because tires afford slashing/deflating?

      Another part of the book, that I really liked, was the freudian slips section (Chapter 5). It was interesting because it applies to everyone. Everyone has slipped up before. One funny slip that happened to a friend of mine, a while back, was him trying to say “I don't like boys, I like girls!” but he got ahead of himself and said, “I don't like girls!”. Now me and my other friends always make fun of him about it. Anyway, the chapter just made me think about the way human minds function and how complex they are. I know sometimes I run up to my room to grab something and forget what I wanted to grab. I can't remember until I finally go down the stairs, then it hits me and I have to run all the way back up to my room. It even happened to me today in the morning! I pulled out my phone to see if the bus was near my apartment (they have GPS now so you where they are in real-time, in case you didn't know). I looked at my phone for a good 30 seconds trying to remember what it was I wanted to do. I couldn't remember so I put my phone back in my pocket and as soon as I looked up at the door handle, I remember why I had pulled out my phone in the first place. I guess the handle reminded me that I was going outside to wait for the bus and the thought of the bus made me remember that I wanted to check where the bus was at.

     Mapping was another aspect of design that the book made me notice. I never knew/realized that a lot of things I use have natural mappings. There are some things that don't, but most of the objects I use have natural mappings. I also noticed that natural mappings are extremely helpful. One time I was playing Halo with the look inversion (push down to look up and push up to look down) and I was having a really hard time trying to follow other players across the map. Pushing up to look down was just so unnatural that I couldn't follow through with it during the game. And when natural mappings aren't possible, I do agree with the author that standardization would be really helpful. Whenever I switch from playing Halo to Call of Duty, or vice versa, I always have a hard time because I get used to the controls in one of the games and it causes me to do something I don't want to in the other. If all games of the same genre had the same controls it would be WAY easier, but the standardization of games won't happen any time soon; probably not ever.

     This book made me think about how much thought and effort goes into designing things so that they are used properly by the user. However, one thing that I noticed was that the author had too many experiences with bad designs. Maybe, the designs of everyday objects has improved tremendously since the book was written or the author and his friends were just unlucky. I've had bad experiences with doors, like I'll push on the right side when I should push on the left, but I've never gotten stuck between sets of doors. That seems like you would have to try really hard to be trapped between doors. Maybe it was just that designs, at the time, were REALLY bad. Overall, it is one of the more interesting assigned readings I've had.

Chapter 1: The Psychopathology of Everyday Things

I hate reading, but so far the book is somewhat interesting. I never really thought about why I decide to push/pull a door open. After reading this chapter, I realized how placing a handle/bar closer to one side of a door can subconsciously influence a person to push/pull in that direction. At my house, there are couple of clusters of switches in the kitchen, living room, and hallway, and although I have been living there for almost 6 years, I still have to push every switch to get the right set of lights to turn on. It gets frustrating, having to cycle through several switches to turn the right lights on. I have also realized that the design of a product is not simply thrown together. It is a careful, time-consuming process that is necessary to make sure an object has the ability to be used in the right way. I will probably trying to spot all kinds of bad designs, after reading this chapter.

Chapter 2: The Psychology Of Everyday Actions

This chapter was interesting and made me really notice how often people blame themselves for not being able to properly use something. The other day, after the Thursday night Bears-Packers game, one of my friends was trying to put away a foldable table. Setting it up was really easy, and so was putting it away if you had read the instructions or had done it before. However, this friend of mine had never dealt with this kind of table before and was having trouble folding it up. It was fun watching him struggle so I didn't tell him, until several minutes later, that there was a small latch that needed to be pushed down while folding the table. After he finally got the table folded up, he said "My bad, dude." It was not until I read this chapter that I noticed he blamed himself for not being able to operate such a simple table. The culprit was the latch which was small, hidden, and the same color as all the other metal parts of the table, yet he blamed himself. There are plenty of other times that I've experienced similar scenarios, but never really payed attention to how people blamed themselves for poor designs. I also thought the way people think about thermostats and how they work in this chapter was interesting. I used to turn the stove on high to boil water faster, then turn it down once the water began boiling. My thinking was the heating coils would stay on longer if I turned it on high, which would result in a quicker heat up. I guess I was wrong!

Chapter 3: Knowledge In The Head And In The World

The intro to the chapter was funny because this summer something similar happened to me when my uncle let me borrow his car. He asked me to move his car out of the driveway and park it near the curb. It was night time and it was a car I wasn't familiar with, so when I finished moving it and tried to take the keys out of the ignition, they didn't want to come out. I was outside trying to pull them out of the ignition for about 10 minutes and I didn't want to go inside and ask my uncle how to take them out because I would have felt dumb (maybe bad design?). I turned the steering wheel all the way in one direction and tried to take them out (works on MY car) but they were still stuck. Finally, I found a little button nearby, not labeled in any way, that needed to be pressed while taking the keys out. I though that was a real stupid way to have to take out keys, but it might have just been me being mad at spending 10 minutes outside for a simple task.

I also liked the penny experiment. I had seen the experiment before and guessed the wrong penny and then figured out what the right answer was. Yet, my past experience with this experiment still did not help me guess the correct penny, this time. Like the book says, I guess I know how to use a penny, but it is so meaningless (worthless) in my life that I cannot distinguish the correct penny from a variation of pennies.

The remembering to remember section was another section of this chapter that I found interesting. Many people say they will remind themselves of certain things they need to do, but how are they going to remind themselves to remind themselves? I thought that was pretty funny, yet true.

Chapter 4: Knowing What To Do

I recently took an aerospace class and we talked about making cockpit controls have similar features/appearances so that they could be associated with the specific function, rather than having two similar looking controls and pushing one when you meant to push the other. We discussed making the control for the landing gear like a T-handle with wheels on either side to simulate a landing gear appearance. We also talked about making controls that looked like flaps for the flaps of the airplane. Pretty much the same scenario the book talked about, we talked about in that class.

The part of eliminating feedback, like sound and visuals, to make the design more appealing is good to a certain extent. Sometimes I like to hear the sound of something on/running or I like to see that something is there. I like a confirmation that something is working/running, but if we start trying to eliminate all the "negative" feedback, some people are going to be confused as to whether the object is doing what they want it to. The fan in my room makes a lot of noise, but when I go to sleep I like to hear some noise so I sleep with it on all the time, even if it's freezing.

Chapter 5: To Err Is Human

So far, I like this chapter the best because the slips are something that I, and a lot of other people, can relate to. There was one part in this chapter that talked about leaving your card at an atm machine after taking your money; I haven't done that before but it reminded me of when I would play zombies on Call of Duty and go to upgrade my weapon. After I would put it in the upgrade machine, I would run to check for zombies nearby and several times I forgot about going back to pick up my weapon, and by the time I remembered it had disappeared. My family and I recently moved and I've noticed that sometimes my mom would be half way to our old house before she realized that she was going to the wrong place.

The dealing with error and forcing functions section was very interesting, too. I hate that a chime goes off whenever I don't have my seatbelt, yet I don't wear my seatbelt still. It's uncomfortable and the risk of a crash is low. Typing about this right now makes me think that I should wear it all the time because it's better to be safe than sorry, but as soon as I get in my car my mind changes. I do agree that forcing someone to do an action usually results in them trying to rebel. I don't think there is much you can do to force someone to do something when they really do not want to do it.

Chapter 6: The Design Challenge

Designing products so that all users can use it perfectly is impossible. Even trying to design a product so that 95% of users can use it without difficulty is hard. I think that the amount of experience with a product and whether it was around in your time period has a lot to do with the product's usability. I have a lot of computer science teachers that can barely work a computer for regular tasks, but can code up the most complex projects with ease. This is kind of frustrating to me because they have there Ph.D. and work with computers all the time, yet they don't know how to search for a file when they can't find it on the desktop. That's why I say the period in which it was released matters. I think checking e-mail is a very simple task, but it might be because I've been doing it for a long time. However, my mom has a really hard time checking her e-mail. She thinks that once she types her username into the address bar, her e-mail will magically appear. She works with a computer everyday at work and she still can't get to her e-mail without calling me to walk her through the process. I believe it's because she never had e-mail when she was younger (ideal for learning) and she really has no need for it. I agree that design does play a big role in usability, but I also think the frequency of use and the age at which you begin to learn it, both, play major roles.

Chapter 7: User-Centered Design

I thought the cartoon at the beginning of the chapter pretty much summed it up. There are many products out there that have the potential to be extremely useful/helpful, but the way are designed takes away from actual usability. Many designers (raccoons) model products after how they would use them rather than taking into consideration the users needs (horses). It's pretty much like a math/physics class at A&M. The math and physics professors teach their course as if all the students in the class are experts. They might teach it like that on purpose, but some students have never talked about some of the difficult concepts before and are expected to know them as soon as they walk in the door. Also, they either do the hardest example possible to where it is impossible to figure out how to even approach any type of problem or they give a super easy example to where a single step is needed to solve it and then they give an impossible question on the midterm. They aren't designing their teaching for the students (user) but for people with knowledge, equal to theirs, of the topic. Another example is chairs inside of trailers. The manufacturing companies of trailers place seats that they feel are comfortable. However, my dad and his friends, who all drive trailers, are always complaining about how uncomfortable the chairs are, how the arm rests crappy, etc. The manufacturing companies design the trailer on what they feel would be comfortable, based on sitting in a chair for probably 5 minutes. However, they probably didn't take into account that truck drivers sit down in that chair almost ALL day. User-centered design is very important.

5 Examples of Good Designs:

This is a picture of the window controls for my car. The button on the far right in the middle of the picture is one of the window controls and the other is on the opposite side but kind of hidden in shadow. This is a good window control design because they are arranged where the button on the left controls the driver window (left) and the button on the right controls the passenger window. Also, you push the lower part of the buttons to lower the windows or the upper part of the buttons to raise the windows. It's a natural mapping.

This is the AC vent on the passenger side of my car. This is a good design because it has natural mappings for the controls. The user slides the slider (it's hard to see but it's that thing near the bottom of the vent) to the left, right, up, or down, depending on where they want to focus the air. The dial on the left is used to control air flow. Roll up to release more air and roll down to constrict air flow. If the user can't figure it out just by looking,  there are markers and labels so they can figure it out. Slide the white marker closer to the On or Off labels for the desired effect.

This a picture of the mirror control for my car. It is the black knob on the bottom left corner of the picture. It is a good design because the way you move the knob, that's the way the mirror moves. There is a slight rotation needed, I guess, but when you're in the driver's seat the mirror movement follows the way you move the knob. You move the knob up or down to move the mirror up or down, and move the knob left or right to move the mirror left or right. The control, also, has a natural mapping.

This is a picture of the volume controls for most, if not all, phones. It has a natural mapping and is really simple. Push the up button to raise the volume and push the down button to lower the volume. Of course, the user has to know what those buttons are for in the first place, but if you buy a smart phone you have to know what those buttons do. I think its a good design.

This is a picture of an Xbox 360 controller. It uses a joystick to move. Your character moves in the same direction as the joystick in this game. It's a natural mapping because what you think is what it does. In other games, another joystick is required to rotate your character but it is still a natural mapping because the character rotates in the direction that you move the other joystick. Pretty simple, yet good design.

5 Examples of Bad Designs:

This is a button on an LED flashlight that my dad gave me. It has two sets of LEDs. The button is supposed to control both, but it only gives I or II to distinguish between the two sets of LEDs. After guessing you can figure it out, but the I and the II do not relate to the sets of LEDs in any distinguishable way. I still sometimes light up the wrong set of LEDs, instead of the set that I intended.

These are the light switches that control the upstairs, outside, and downstairs lighting in my apartment. If you were to walk up the these in my apartment, you would assume the leftmost switch is for downstairs, the middle for outside, and the rightmost for upstairs because that is the way my apartment is mapped. However, they are wired to the opposite of that with the leftmost for upstairs, middle for outside, and rightmost for downstairs. I've been living at this apartment for almost 2 years and I still have trouble turning on the light I want to the first time. I turn on the downstairs lights when I mean to turn on the upstairs lights and vice versa. It's too confusing of a design, although I think the person who wired it like that just messed up.

This is the thermostat at my apartment. If you can't see from the picture, it has 3 modes: Cool, Off, Heat. It also has two sets of temperature gauges. I've already gotten used to this, so I know which temperature gauge controls heating and which controls cooling. But, if you were to guess you would probably say the top is for heating, since Heat mode would require moving the lever to the top, and cooling is on the bottom, since the lever would need to be moved to the bottom. It is actually the opposite. The cooling temperature gauge is the top one and the heating gauge is the bottom. This is another confusing design because it makes you think the opposite of what it actually does.

This is the air flow control of a Toyota Corolla. If you want air to blow only on your feet, you point the arrow on the dial straight up. If you want it to blow towards your face only, you point the dial arrow mostly down and to the left. This is a bad/confusing design because naturally down is towards your feet and up is towards your head/face. The car designers could have been mapped this air flow control to the human body where air flow towards the face is near the top and air towards the feet is at the bottom. It would make things a lot easier, especially if you have your eyes on the road.

This is a type of shower faucet I came across when I was at my cousin's house one time. The first arrow is pointing towards a sticker that tells you how to make water come out of the shower head. Unfortunately, when I was at my cousin's house, everyone was asleep and the sticker was no longer there. I probably spent 2-3 minutes trying to figure out how to make water come out of the shower head. Most shower faucets have a little pin you pull on to do this but not this one. It was pretty difficult to find and I got lucky because I just started to messing with every thing on the faucet/shower control. The second arrow points to the part where the water comes out of the faucet. It turns out you  have to pull that down to make water come out of the shower head. It was pretty annoying and, to me, a bad design. It might be one of the worst faucets I've ever come across.