Social Psychology

Assignment #1

Individual Journal

Name: Syed Aswad Al Jaffree bin Syed Sobri

Student ID: 0318625

Session: Monday 4pm

Course: Foundation in Natural and Built Environments

Submission Date: 25/11/14

Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation

Intrinsic Motivation;Intrinsic motivation is a form of motivation in which one is internally motivated by

his or her desires, the feeling of fulfilment in accomplishing and completing a

certain task. Intrinsic motivation is not driven by external factors such as rewards

or punishment, but pleasure in conducting or participating in the activity itself.

From my personal experience, I am able to relate with the concept of intrinsic

motivation through my experience with music lessons, or playing music in

general. I picked up the violin during my childhood through my parents’ wishes

for me to learn a musical instrument. Throughout the years, it became somewhat

of a chore to me as I would only learn exam related playing, and I didn’t enjoy

myself. I only carried on with them because my parents wanted me to.

It wasn’t until I progressed to my teenage years that I became more exposed to

the various genres of music, the different playing styles and the potential of what

a violin could do that I began to enjoy myself and become more immersed in

improving my skills, playing songs from out of the exam scheme and improvising.

From only then on did I feel the drive from within myself to continue my

experience with music, to play for the pleasure of improving myself and learning

more, rather than to simply go with my parents’ wishes.

The intrinsic motivation I felt came to me when I began to take an interest in

playing music on my own. This is an experience of mine with intrinsic motivation.

Extrinsic Motivation;

For my experience with extrinsic motivation, I will relate to the time of my SPM

examinations, which was only last year. For me, I experienced this sort of

motivation when I was extremely pressured to do well for these exams. This

pressure would come from my family, my teachers and to a certain extent,

myself.

Although studying was something that I was not all that interested in, I was

motivated to push on with it for the sake of saving my parents face, competing

with my elder brother who had aced his SPM exams, and for the sake of my own

future. Being a very lazy person and given that I had no interest in my school

subjects, this was especially challenging for me.

However with all of these external factors at hand, I gained the motivation to

work hard in the final months before the examinations, and was able to perform

decently well, making the people around me happy as well as myself.

Aside from that, I also kept on holding on to the fact that all I had to do was work

hard for those few months, and I would be rewarded with a long, well-deserved

(if I had performed well) break.

Thus I would conclude that it was extrinsic motivation that I received that helped

me gain the drive to strive for excellence.

Perception

The Halo Effect;For the topic of perception I would like to elaborate on my experience with the

halo effect. The Halo Effect being defined as a cognitive bias in which an

observer's overall impression of a person, company, brand, or product influences

the observer's feelings and thoughts about that entity's character or properties.

In my experience earlier this year, I was resuming violin lessons under a new

teacher. This new teacher that I was being introduced to was introduced to me by

a high school friend of mine, whom was a very accomplished violinist. She had

told me that this was her current teacher, who she had been under since she

began violin lessons, and that this teacher was very skilled in tutoring students

while being a very talented violinist herself.

All of this information led to me being under the impression that this teacher

must have been “the best teacher ever”, thus giving birth to the “halo effect”

perception. So even as I proceeded to take lessons under this new teacher and as

she had her shortcomings (she would often cut class, rush back early and be tired

when I arrived for class in the evening. In her defense, she had just conceived her

first child at the time), I was still under the illusion that she was a good teacher,

from the impression my friend had given me, and didn’t mind.

The Halo EffectAnother experience of mine with the halo effect theory is during my schooling

days, with my different teachers.

For my physics subject, my class would alternate between two different teachers,

Miss Liang and Miss Ling. Miss Liang was the older, more strict teacher whom was

also a discipline teacher and she would often be the one apprehending students

for disciplinary issues. Miss Ling on the other hand was the younger, gentler and

more friendly teacher who was also the supervisor for the librarian students (I

was a librarian at the time).

Although Miss Liang was the more experienced teacher in the school, my class

often preferred paying attention to and gave better attendance to Miss Ling, due

to us having a more comfortable impression of her, even though she was less

experienced a teacher than Miss Liang.

Our bias toward Miss Ling influenced our preference between the two teachers,

due to the “halo effect” we perceived about Miss Ling.

Social Facilitation and Social LoafingSocial LoafingSocial Loafing is a phenomena in when an individual performs poorly in a group,

due to feeling that his/her contributions may not be noticed or be of great impact

to the cause.

I have noticed this characteristic in myself during group assignments, especially

when there exists a communicational barrier between myself and others in the

group. In a couple of incidents when I was grouped with groups where most of my

group members are fluent in Chinese whereas I am not, they would often

communicate amongst themselves in Chinese and I would be unable to involve

myself in group discussions.

The end result being the rest of the group coming up with the ideas and concepts

for the assignment, whereas I would have to follow. Not being able to

communicate my ideas fluently with the group and having them make any real

impact, I took my leave until all else was settled and they finally required me to

present the assignment to the teacher.

This lack of motivation to work with a group and participate in discussions, I

would attribute to social loafing.

Social FacilitationSocial facilitation is a phenomena in which an individual performs better in

groups, rather than during solo activities. This attitude is often due to the

individual feeling that his efforts would be noticed and would contribute to the

goals of the group.

I would relate the concept of social facilitation in my life to my experiences in

school drama competitions. Back in school when we would all rehearse and

practice for competitions, we would be working as a team, each “actor” and

“actress” would be playing their own unique individual roles according to script

and impromptu.

While everyone in the team was talented and enthusiastic about the competition,

I didn’t feel at all intimidated or envious of any of my teammates’ performances.

This was because although they were all so talented, each of us had a unique and

key role in making the whole play a success. In my own role and in my own way

that no one else was, I felt (I was) essential. This pushed me to do my best and

work well with everyone else to achieve our common goal (giving the competition

a good show, that is).

As opposed to working alone, I felt that my efforts were of impact in my group

and that caused me to further facilitate myself in our work.

Prosocial Behaviour

Altruistic & Egoistic Models of Helping

Altruistic ModelProsocial behaviours are classified as the positive social actions intended to help

others. Altruistic models are when behaviours are done for selfless reasons.

An example of altruistic social behaviour that I have previously observed in myself

is when I offered help to a fellow schoolmate on his way to his car in the parking

lot.

An afternoon in campus after I had found a good parking spot close to the

building, I met a student who was on his way back to his car. He was however,

walking with a limp. Having gotten into a conversation with him, he told me that

he had just sprained his ankle. Out of concern I asked him if he needed a lift back

to his car, as he mentioned he was parked quite a distance away. After he

accepted my offer, I proceeded to get my car and drove him over to his car.

I performed this act out of empathy and concern for his wellbeing, rather than

out of hoping for a reward in return. Thus, I can relate this act to an altruistic

model of prosocial behaviour.

Egoistic Models of HelpingEgoistic models of helping are a prosocial behaviour in which when behaviours

are done for selfish reasons, or for the sake of one’s own welfare.

An example of egoistic social behaviour that I have demonstrated in myself is

when, for example, my parents don’t necessarily need my assistance, but I go out

of my way to provide it. I think this behaviour is common in all children when they

want/need something from their parents.

On occasion, when I have needed some extra money or permission to leave the

house to meet up with friends of mine, I have willingly made myself available to

carry out errands for them, be it going downstairs to get my dad a drink or being

my mother’s personal chauffeur. In return, after having helped them or done

them favours, I would expect a reward in return, or being granted permission for

something I need their approval for.

This kind of prosocial behaviour in which I expect something in return from my

parents, or when I help them for my own welfare, I can attribute to the egoistic

model of prosocial behaviour.

Stereotyping / DiscriminationDiscrimination/StereotypingDiscrimination is a form of negative behaviour directed at a certain group of

people. Stereotyping is a general belief about a group of people that runs the risk

of being discrimination should these beliefs be negative.

Myself being a mixture of races (Malay, Chinese, Indian), I have actually in a sense

become more and less sensitive to the topic of racial discrimination (racism).

While I am very against the idea of racism myself, I have absolutely no issue in

racial discrimination-related humour, so long as it remains in the context of

humour.

While there didn’t really exist any serious discrimination in my schooling days,

there was discrimination against discrimination. All of my schoolmates were all

well versed with all sorts of racial humour and stereotypes, but they were all

against the idea of actual discrimination. In school, we would discriminate those

who were racist or sexist or anyone who practiced any form of discrimination.

My experience with discrimination in school was more towards anti-

discrimination rather than actual discrimination.

Discrimination / Stereotyping

Whilst discrimination was glared upon, racial humour was all over the place in

school. I experienced a lot of stereotyping in school, but none which were

intentionally offensive. Out of fun and lighthearted jokes, maybe.

Most of the jokes we made in school were racial-stereotypical related. Malay,

Chinese and Indian students would all gather to tell each other jokes about how

the Chinese students often wore spectacles because their original pair of eyes

were too small, while the Chinese students would counter saying that the Indian

students were hard to see in the bad lighting. Malay students would try to join in,

but would then be told off that all the Malay girls look the same with their

“tudungs” on.

In conclusion, my experience with stereotyping was not necessarily a bad one, as

stereotyping can have both negative and positive connotations.