Psychology Articles

Profiling is a science of observation, study and exploitation of traces of a crime scene, a person, or an animal to determine the relevance of such traces to an investigated crime, event or personality and behavior in general.

Anthropological and Psychological profiling

Profiling consists of several major types:

Cultural profiling

Racial profiling

Predictive profiling

Forensic information technology

Drug profiling

Offender profiling

Digital image forensic

DNA profiling

Performance profiling

The information obtained from profiling is known as forensic, such information is widely relied upon by judiciary systems, such as courts, and police enforcement agencies to determine what happens in a crime scene and help in assumption of criminal behavior.

However, such information is not restricted to the use of such bodies, but rather extends to assisting observers to broaden the comprehension of studied cases or individuals when applied by intelligence agencies or any security related bodies.

Profiling and forensic profiling is used in all fields of studies and not only humans, in fact, this science is developing and advancing very rapidly despite scientific criticism to its viable application.

Generally, forensic profiling refers to the profiling practices of discovering the correlation between acquired data related to studied subject or case as an identifying process and a categorization of groups and data acquired, such as nominal data (persons or objects and their relation due to an investigation) and crime data which is physical tracks of criminal activities on crime scenes be it a witness, a laptop or a mobile phone…

The most commonly used profiling techniques are data mining techniques, such as generating profiles based upon discovered data and the relevance of its patterns.

The four phases of profiling (Gregg O McCrary):

- Antecedent: The murderer’s plan, fantasy and drive prior to committing the crime.

- Method and manner: type of selected victims and method used to commit the crime.

- Body disposal: If the murder and the body disposal took place at one or, multiple scenes.

- Post offense behavior: if the murderer tries to publicize himself by reaching the media or contacting investigators.

Profiling is based on common sense, yet its applied measures varies from culture to culture and race to race, it is an advanced investigative tool while its effectiveness is still under a lot of scientific scrutiny since it is mostly a speculative art still. An Indian would shake his head from left to right in an affirmative gesture or expression, while a Caucasian by doing so would indicate to a denial gesture or expression, an owl in the Middle East is looked upon as a bad omen, while in the west it symbolizes wisdom, and so on…

Profiling relates behavioral science and relies on observation and analysis.

It is accepted that the evolution of human racial and physical features generates from their inherited behavior due to a specific environment and way of adaptation. Lets take for instance an African negroid thick lips evolved due to an adapting process to help preserve moisture, an aborigine of Australia or Papua New Guinea developed thick eye browse to protect his eyes from sun rays, a Bedouin desert folk did so with a larger or longer nose to help him breath better in desert climate, and women living in hot and humid terrains tend to have a larger buttocks to preserve body fat etc…

Therefore; profiling relies heavily on the understanding of the subject cultural and ethical background, and that in itself is based upon relative measures and speculations.

Though profiling is regarded to be a part of science, yet a successful profiler needs to be very talented if he is to produce an effective and accurate profiling.

Profiling goes back in history to the middle ages, and Scotland Yard took it a step further, while Sherlock Holmes character made it even more popular, then there is the CSI series of late filling the rest of the empty cup of the thirsty TV shows viewers.

Remember; we apply our own spontaneous profiling in daily life by what we interpret and perceive from the body language that we use from one another.

Till the next article, may you have the best personality profile!

Adam El Masri

Adam El Masri

http://www.paradetect.com/

Abstract:
All over the World serial and mass killings occur almost daily somewhere. This criminal activity is best known in the USA and the UK where the freedoms of society allow murderers to act out their psychotic murders with the protection of rules that ensure freedom of movement, rights to silence and privacy. In the past in China society was so regulated that crime in all areas was extremely difficult to conceal. However in modern China the serial killer has emerged but with backward police and communication methods for detection they often kill for years until accidentally caught more by luck than professional investigations. In this paper we will look at the patchy criminal profile of Chinese serial killers that is starting to emerge.

Background & Cases:
China has a very strict reporting system for crime – it is after the fact reporting – so the police and government keep hidden from the public many aspects of crime as the failure of authority and police to capture or control crime means losing face. Even after a long investigation and pure luck, they actually arrest someone they pay the reward money to the police investigators not the public that provided the information to capture the killers. With this level of inefficiency and low level of intelligence and cooperation within and between police authorities it is not surprising that serial killers can operate and avoid detection for long periods of time. Most of the killers come from low educational backgrounds and rural up bring from poor families which makes it even more surprising they get away with their criminal activity for so long.

A few examples of serial killers in China it will be sufficient to give a feeling for the seriousness of the situation rather than go into detail, the writer will merely give some general overviews, and (for those who would like to know more, then a quick search of Google will suffice to see many of these cases in more detail).

A 33 year old male kills six children and molests five others by luring them to his home and then sexually abusing them and then death.
A 20 year old male murders seventeen young boys by suffocation.
A male age 20, murders ten adults by knifing.
A male truck driver, murders fourteen women, raping first then killing them.
Gang of Four thieves rob, mutilate and murder seventy seven people in their homes.
Male age 29. Known as the Red Dress Killer, murders thirteen known plus numerous attacks.
A 32 year old male, kills twenty children, sexual assault and mutilation.
The Monster Killer, male, murdered sixty five people.
Male 29 year old farmer, murders twenty three young boys age 16 to 20.
A couple lures twelve women with promise of work and then murders them.
Male 34, murders seven during shop robberies.
Unlicensed male doctor poisons over 150 victims charged with three deaths for court purposes.
Male age 38, murders ten people mainly females, including a pregnant woman and mental patient.

As you can see from the above examples compared to the serial killers in the USA or EU it is hard to compare the sheer scale of the problem in China and the amount of victims in each case is much higher than other countries reported except perhaps the USSR where mass serial killers exist. To have a successful profiling system you first have to have access to information in detail about how the crimes were committed, a good developmental background of the killer and the social environment that allowed the situation to arise in the first place.

Criminal Profiling Background:

There are two profiling systems in the world that are sufficiently funded and have had some success in detecting criminals and helping to apprehend them by assisting police to narrow down the suspects in a case and to develop a strategy to capture them.

The most well know is the criminal behavioral unit of the FBI in the USA. Although not based on any real science, it does have a lot of historical data based on past serial killers and their motives, modus operanda, interviews with convicted serial killers for biographies and background. The FBI has a basic model that they train other security forces around the World to follow, one is, data assimilation, collecting information about each case, second, crime classification, looking at the type of crime for example organized or disorganized, third, crime reconstruction, looking at victim behaviour as a clue to why they were chosen by the killer and fourth, profile generation in which an outline of the killers behaviour and motives are assessed with demographics, physical profile and likely perpetrator type. The success rate of the FBI profiling is actually very low at only 17% of profiles actually helping to an arrest. This is thought to be because the FBI’s methods are fundamentally flawed as they have no control group in which to compare and contrast results. They accept the interview often at face value from criminals that lie constantly even after arrest. The other most well known profiling methods are from the UK, mainly led by consulting psychologists who have been employed by the British police to help in difficult cases. Alas on review the UK system does not fare much better than the FBI at 16% of cases when reviewed led to an arrest based on profiling. The British system was based in science where people tend to act consistently and follow patterns of behaviour. The British system was more in-depth, looking at speech patterns, social constructs, interests and obsessions. This approach although still lacking over-all success just as with the FBI, was far more accurate when post analysis was applied. In other words, although the criminal was arrested by chance (the most common way a serial killer is caught), detection or self confession, the profiles tended to be very close to the killers real life, habits and identity although they did not actually help to catch the criminal at the time.

Profiling in China:

As far as the writer is aware of there are no profilers in China and probably very unlikely to happen due to one simple reason, there are no qualified criminal/forensic psychologists in China. Also the police here are in the main street crime orientated which is why they find it so difficult to investigate any crime that is not immediately obvious. The level of education in the police is no more than glorified security guards in most cases. Having said that – one always hopes for change. The education system at all levels in China is dogged by corruption and payments for results – and so Chinese qualifications are not trusted around the World at this time. Until they organize foolproof external examinations systems such as those in the UK and USA this will continue to be the case.

An Attempt at Profiling in China.

Taking the case studies above can we identify in China the most likely suspect in a serial killing case? Here is a preliminary outline, but by know means scientific or proven. This is just an overview of the current situation from reports surfacing after convictions.

Gender: Almost always male.
Age: 20 – 35
Education: Failed high school cannot read and write very well.
Background: Rural upbringing, countryside. Ex-army
Developmental: Mother only after divorce or abandonment.
Mental Health: delusional, grandeur, no empathy shown to victims.
Method: Suffocation, Knifing, Strangulation
Other motives: robbery
Lure/Victimology: money, offer of work
Trophies: Taken in most cases, belts, clothing, and jewelry.
Disposal of Victims: often buried, but some left at scene of crime.
Type of Victims: mainly female adults and children.
History: Most had some criminal backgrounds and prison sentences for lesser crimes.
Other: Cannibalism in one or two cases.

This outline profile of course is quite wide and based on just a few cases. However even from this we can make some useful deductions. A lack of access to guns (as in the UK too) means most murder is committed using knives or strangulation methods. Some societal restriction on the sale of hunting knives as in the UK would go some way to removing access to certain weapons. Lack of access to mental health professionals is clearly a problem in China which is stuck 50 years in the past in the hospitals using outdated psychiatric methods of drugs and confinement. Failure of the education system to support rural children who cannot pay for schooling. Lack of social opportunities makes it easy to lure victims with offers of money or work. Police should cross reference their systems of information – a central data bank – that does not currently exist in China. Most of the killers at some point were still living at home with family – not loners as such – until they started to avoid the police – then moving about from province to province made them difficult to track and find. Most serial killers are statistically married with children unlike the supposed image of the lone lunatic.

Profiling in Fiction:

One of the problems with criminal profiling is television. The first TV program to highlight the science came from the UK with a series called. Cracker in which a psychologist helps the police crack all the difficult cases of murder by smart deduction based on psychological principals. However if you analyze the content most of the outcomes were as in all fiction pure luck. In the USA, there was, Criminal Minds, this was in the beginning trying to be a serious attempt at using profiling in a scientific way but soon as most of these programs lost its way in characterization and mundane stories from any other police series and so in the end was a very poor program from a real life point of view. Other programs such as the CSI were more scientific but just as far from real life as any other TV when the series moves into later seasons. The conclusion is that TV psychology vastly over-estimates the abilities of criminal profiling and that in the real World it is just not that essential to the capture of killers who by and by get caught more by chance that any other reason. A new program called. Lie to Me, shows psychologists who use body language and micro-expressions to catch criminals out in a lie. This is pure fiction and not based on any credible science at all.

Profiling in China:

For the Chinese authorities to start to appreciate the support psychology could give to them – they first have to have a mind-set change to enable them to use more modern ways of looking at crime and victims. They need to allow research at prisons of past offenders to start to build a data- base similar to the FBI model but also to allow in-depth interview of motives by deception psychologists who would use cognitive interview techniques developed in Britain to ascertain real information. This is also difficult as most serial killers are executed every quickly after conviction in China. Also to enable cross fertilization of information across provinces without beucratic defenses. It would certainly benefit China to have a Criminal Intelligence Squad that was made up of experienced detectives, psychologists and criminologists working as a team on any crime, country-wide, with full powers over the local police force to investigate major serial killings when they occur. This would mean just like the FBI’s BU team specialists can be on call to help when the local police stumble and fail to protect the victims of crime. However even before all this – you have to have a teaching regime of criminal and forensic psychology available at university level and experienced teachers to give the courses. That is a long way off – as psychology in China is so poor in general here. The universities tend to concentrate on the soft sciences in psychology such as child development and cognitive work with little attention to the hard sciences in neuropsychology, biopsychology and abnormal psychology. You need good scientists to do forensic work otherwise it is all subjective as in the example of the TV shows that use the science as background to a drama about love and relationships within the characters of the show rather than project real life.

Conclusion:

Criminal profiling in China is a distant idea right now – the necessary backgrounds, education, experts and science are just not available in the education system or the wider society. The police are too unsophisticated and untrained to be able to handle real investigations. If it is not obvious – then forget it. Corruption with in China is still wholesale in all aspects of life and so paying off the system still happens if you are rich enough and the authorities are underpaid and under-educated and so an easy mark for taking money and turning a blind eye to crime.

As China modernizes in its cities and lifestyles, so more crime from the area of those without and those with wealth will continue. The gap now between the middle classes and the rural poor is getting wider everyday and so creating the right conditions for crime where material gain is the most important thing. In China everyone seeks money as a God and empathy for others is non-existent. Perfect society in which to breed major crimes against the person such as the serial killer.

Dr. Stephen Myler is from Leicester in England, an industrial town in the Midlands of the United Kingdom. He holds a B.Sc (Honours) in Psychology from the UKA’s Open University the largest in the UK; he also has an M.Sc and Ph.D in Psychology from Knightsbridge University in Denmark. In addition to this Stephen holds many diplomas and awards in a variety of academic areas including journalism, finance, teaching and advanced therapy for mental health. Stephen has as a Professor of Psychology many years teaching experience in colleges and universities in England and China to post 16 young adults, instructing in psychology, sociology, English, marketing and business. He has been fortunate to travel extensively from Australia to Africa to the United Sates, South America, Borneo, most of Europe and Russia. Stephen’s favourite hobby is the study of primates and likes to play badminton. He believes that students who enjoy classes with humour and enthusiasm from the teacher always come back eager to learn more.

Contrary to popular belief, Genius isn’t about intellect as much as most people believe. Even though they rate genius based on IQ, there are some very smart people who are not geniuses and some very dumb people who are. The reason for this is that Genius is actually more about how the brain / mind works than how smart someone actually is. The brain can be trained to focus on intelligence and thus allow the Genius to become exceptionally smart. However, the brain can also be applied (or not applied) to many other things and thus lead to many, many other outcomes (besides intelligence).

Don’t confuse all of this with people being called a “Musical Genius” or other such thing. In many ways that’s a label people use to try and make the person “more than”. That isn’t to say they are not a Genius, only that the word “Genius” is being used in an arbitrary fashion without regard for what it actually is.

This is very important because Genius is about how the brain works and not what you do with it. That distinction is essential because Genius is something you’re born with and can’t be created later on. It’s like natural hair color – you can alter it to make people think it’s something different, but the reality is set by your genetics. The reason people want to be called or seen as a “Genius” will be another topic of discussion for another time (it’s too in-depth to discuss now).

To understand Genius you first need something to compare it to that you can wrap your head around. To do that the best place to go is to look at the world of computers (don’t worry if you don’t know much about them). A Genius would be the best and brightest computer on the market – the one with the biggest hard drives, most memory, and fastest processor. The average person would be just that, the average computer on the market. Both use the same components to do the same things. The only difference is that the Genius computer can do more things at one time, do them faster, and store more information.

The key to remember in this example is that they both do the exact same thing. The only difference is that the Genius can do more things at once and do everything faster. Sometimes that can be a major advantage, but other times it can be a major disadvantage. Take for example using a basic word processing program (i.e. text editor). If you were to only use the word processor on the Genius computer and nothing else, then all of the amazing resources are wasted. It would actually make little difference which computer everything was done on. In order to get the most out of the Genius computer, it needs to be doing more complex tasks that use all of its resources fully.

That is one of the hardest things about actually being a Genius. If you don’t have something to focus your mind to, it will find many other things to focus on that can make you feel scattered and lost. As an example of that, I myself love to write. The problem I have is that I could write about three hundred different topics at any one time. It can become very difficult at times for me to focus my mind to write about only one topic. Even if I can do that it can be even more difficult to condense what I want to write into a manageable chunk of information. This topic alone I could have written ten times bigger in less time than it took to write this version. That’s because here I have to focus very hard to keep it short and to the point. My mind wants to give you every last scrap of info on the subject all at once.

From all of this remember that “Genius” isn’t about intellect as much as it is about how the mind works. If a genius can focus on learning they will become very smart in whatever fields they study / learn. If the genius has nothing to focus on they can become overly scattered and unfocused in life. Something many people can take to be undisciplined, lazy, or whatever else. However, when you want to do fifty thousand things at the same time – which one do you pick to focus on? That’s the way the genius mind really works. Just understand that it isn’t about daydreaming or wishing for something else. The genius mind isn’t focused on just the “good stuff”, it focuses on EVERYTHING and ANYTHING (usually all at the same time). Thankfully the brain of the genius was designed to do that, otherwise it would literally drive them insane.

As a side note: before you decide that you want to be a “Genius” you may want to understand what you’re actually asking for. Be happy with who you are instead of trying to be something you’re not. Life will be a whole lot better that way.

About The Author:

Devon K has been helping people learn more about themselves and how to live a better life for over fifteen years. To learn more about Devon or if you found the information in this article interesting or educational, why not head to Devon’s website http://www.freefromissues.com.

People have deeply held assumptions about how marriage is supposed to work and, while some of those assumptions are helpful, many of them are so harmful, I call them “toxic.” Toxic assumptions about relationships is one of the central reasons that many people today are unable to stay married for life.

It’s important that we take an inventory what toxic assumptions we hold about relationships. For example, one of the most common is that to make a relationship satisfying “Enough love will take care of everything.” Infinite numbers of people who want to be married and who actually commit to it are shackled in misery by this toxic assumption. For many, it has been the cause of relentless anguish.

Think about from whom you modeled your relationship behavior. Look at how you behave in your marriage, particularly when you are under stress, and ask yourself, “After whom did I model my behavior?” Reflect on your model’s behavior and his success with staying happily marriage. Looking back, do you think that person was a good model to follow? If not, who would be a better model to emulate? What new relationship skills might you need to boost the feeling of well-being you receive from your relationship?

IMPORTANT: Relationship and coping behaviors are learned, not ingrained. Some people are fortunate because good relationship behavior was modeled at home and they grew up with it.

However, others are not nearly as lucky. Often terrible, destructive coping skills were exhibited in the marriage and the unfortunate kids born from it grew up learning them. Are you one of them? If so, you have a lot of work to do, not only for yourself, but for your spouse and kids as well.

My patients, initially, are unable to isolate the core assumptions they learned and now practice, consciously or subconsciously, about how to be married and how to resolve the inevitable conflicts that occur. Consider the following question: Would you hire a surgeon without first identifying the skills, credentials and experience he should have to treat you? After all, the success of your surgery is crucial to obtaining symptom relief and enhancing the quality of your life. It would not be prudent for you to randomly select someone from the Yellow Pages, not knowing the doctor’s credentials and experience.

Unfortunately, many people have adopted the notion that a body of knowledge and experience is not necessary to be happily married to one person for life. The notion is that happily married people are happy because they just “click.” And it continues, that if you “click” before marriage, you’ll naturally “click” afterwords. What a misconception!

Studies clearly demonstrate that “clicking” is mostly irrelevant. What is relevant is that those who are happily married purposely focus on ways to become better spouses throughout their relationships. Purpose-driven effort is applied regularly and frequently by successful spouses on the task of becoming better at “spouseing.” What are the skills these spouses usually target for improvement? Not surprisingly, most involve some form of communication and problem-resolution skills. Many people focus on the development of more accurate and attentive listening skills.

IMPORTANT: Others concentrate on learning to express their unpleasant feelings without attacking their partner. Another toxic assumption about how marriage should work: My partner should be so sensitive to me that he should meet my needs automatically, without me having to explicitly request what I want.

While some unaware spouses label this as expecting a partner to be” sensitive” or ” intuitive,” therapists have labeled this as expecting “mind-reading” from a partner. Spouses holding a dysfunctional belief that expecting “mind-reading” from their spouse is appropriate must “get” that it is unrealistic and self-defeating. Instead, they should focus on learning how to explicitly ask for what they want with poise and good-will.

Most people entered marriage without any purposeful training in “how” to be married. However, if you really want to stay married for life, it’s crucial that you not let this be your demise. Rather, read, take classes, go to seminars. Volumes of help are easy to access from the Internet, community colleges, churches and libraries.

Study proven relationship skills in a format that is purposeful and organized. Identifying and practicing these skills will dramatically boost your chances of having a successful marriage- for life! Practice may not make perfect, but, done diligently, it usually improves results. After all, a better marriage is most closely tied to your commitment to improve, not to the notion that you and your partner, at one time, happened to “click.”

Dr Shery earned his doctorate at the Univ. of Southern Ca and is a counselor in Cary,IL. He provides FREE phone consultations and cutting-edge digital programs to dramatically improve communication with your spouse. They have helped thousands and are guaranteed to make you happier and repair your marriage in days! Get FREE info NOW about these New Self-Therapy Kits while the FREE phone consultations are available!

A few months before Katrina, I caught one of the early Mardi Gras parades in a rural town outside New Orleans. Race relations there seemed different from those here in Northern California. Blacks were more outgoing and friendly to whites, and yet there also seemed to be more racial segregation. At the parade, the floats and teams were strictly segregated. The only integration I saw was a few clusters of black and white teens. I watched a policeman go out of his way to harass a black youth who was hanging out with some white girls.

As I was heading back to my car I saw one group by a 7-11 and thought to ask them directly about the state of race relations. A white girl spoke for them all, “Oh, it’s getting better. The police still give you a hard time but it’s not bad.” I thanked her and walked toward my car feeling pleased and hopeful; it was good to hear from a like-minded youth who was transcending past bigotries.

The girl called me back. “You say you’re from San Francisco?” she asked.

“Are they still letting gays marry there? ‘Cause I think that’s so disgusting.”

OK, not entirely like-minded. She had learned a lesson about bigotry, but she hadn’t generalized it. Me, I’ve seen enough instances of destructive bigotry to extrapolate to a universal pattern. Bigotry against blacks, Jews, the Irish, the Italians, the Chinese, gays-I get it-no bigotry is acceptable. What you don’t do to blacks you don’t do to gays either.

In this election I’m hoping a disenchanted nation will do some careful generalizing. Too much focus on Bush and Cheney’s bad character distracts us from questions about what makes them bad. If we conclude that they’re just bad apples, then what’s to stop equally counterproductive people with different names and faces from taking their places?

Everyone says, “People who don’t learn the lessons of history are forced to repeat it,” but if that statement doesn’t miss the point completely, it just barely grazes it. Sure, we should try to learn lessons-but the real question is which lessons, what generalizations? From Stalin and Hitler should we generalize to no more leaders with mustaches? No more short people?

What we want, of course, is to generalize lessons from history that end up paying off in the future. Unfortunately, although that’s a great goal, it’s useless as a rule of thumb. The future isn’t here yet, so you can’t use it directly to guide your generalizations.

“Son, my advice to you is buy low, sell high, and always learn today what worked tomorrow.”

Still, our society’s accelerated progress over the past few centuries is largely a product of culture realizing that right generalization is the name of the game. Science and engineering are largely attempts to systematize the process of effective generalization. In the hope of promoting that process, however slightly, here are a few generalizations about generalization applied to the coming election.

Undergeneralizing: Sometimes we fail to learn because we fail to generalize at all. Bush voters who now criticize the president tend to defend their votes. Yes, Bush turned out to be a lemon, an exception to the otherwise fine products of the conservative movement. Gore, Kerry, and the whole liberal agenda would have been much worse. McCain will fix things. Abu Ghraib? A few bad low-level soldiers. There’s nothing to learn, no generalization to be drawn.

When McCain said the economic problem was caused by greedy people on Wall Street and that the answer was to fire the head of the SEC, he sounded like unsophisticated leftists I knew in the ’70s. The problem is a few greedy people leading big corporations. Replace them with un-greedy people like me and it will all be groovy.

Overgeneralizing: Litmus-test radicals think they’ve found the one or two factors from which you can generalize to everything you need to know about a candidate. A Christian? Anti-abortion? For gay marriage? Divorced? A loyal spouse? For change? A traditionalist? The Sufis say, “He who’s burnt by hot milk blows on ice cream.” Not all dairy products will burn you. And not all Christians are great leaders. To litmus-test radicals on the left or the right, expert status isn’t earned through careful analysis but through passionate self-certainty. They’ve found the one cause that matters. It’s a priority not because they’ve compared it to other issues but because they can make an impassioned argument for its intrinsic and isolated merit. “But don’t you see, it’s a fundamental right!”

Motivated generalization: An alcoholic ponders what’s causing those daily hangovers. Monday: gin and tonic; Tuesday: vodka and tonic; Wednesday: whiskey and tonic; Thursday: rum and tonic. Clearly it’s the tonic.

Generalization serves two masters. One is, of course, our future selves. We hope to learn history’s real lessons so we don’t have to repeat them. The other is our present gut instinct, which definitely prefers some lessons to others. The alcoholic’s future self wants to avoid future hangovers, but the alcoholic’s gut doesn’t want to discover that those hangovers are caused by alcohol rather than tonic.

Most Republicans don’t seem to want to consider the possibility that they’ve had a substantial chance to try their ideas out in the real world and that in general those ideas don’t work as well as they had hoped. Just this week, days after the $700 billion bailout was announced, I was probing a right-wing friend about the core values and principles that drive his beliefs. He’s for the bailout as the lesser of two evils. On core values, though, he proudly told me one thing he knows for sure. Liberal efforts to regulate the free market have failed over and over and should never be tried again. No mention of the possibility that conservatives have anything to learn here.

This same friend tells me that he relishes arguing with liberals like me because our arguments are so weak and implausible. He’s the second conservative to tell me that this month. In other words, we generalize poorly. We’re either slow learners or we’re driven to our generalizations by our gut instincts, not our rational minds as they are.

Psychological research* indicates that we all generalize through two parallel systems, the rational mind and the gut, and that the gut predominates. The gut is faster acting than the rational mind. It’s often right or we wouldn’t survive. But there’s plenty of evidence that the gut gets it wrong consistently on crucial matters.

Ideally, therefore, we’d be rational about when to use our gut instincts and when to be rational. Among the more troubling findings therefore is strong evidence that most of us assume we’re more rational than we in fact are. We interpret gut instincts as rational instincts. Guts have the upper hand. Our guts tell us our rational minds are telling us that our rational minds are generalizing from the evidence and not our guts. We generalize incorrectly about our generalizing performance and skill.

Me and all my Obama-supporting friends included. We assume we’re the rational ones. Given the psychological evidence regarding everyone’s ability to interpret their interpretive prowess, we’re disqualified as authorities on the subject of our own rationality. So are our equally gut-motivated Republican detractors. Indeed, posterity gets the final word on whose generalizing skills were best. It alone knows how skillful we were at generalizing to the right lessons of history to learn and not the wrong ones. Unfortunately it was unavailable for comment at the time of this writing.For a great new survey of the findings, check out Nudge: Improving decisions about health wealth and happiness.

I’m an out- of-the-closet theorist in anti-theory society. I’m an evolutionary epistemologist, meaning a researcher and teacher focused on the ways we all generalize, drawing conclusions from inconclusive data, shopping among interpretations of evidence, theorizing and employing abstractions whether we know it or not. I look at how we do this stuff and how we could do it better.

I play jazz bass and sing. My big persistent drivers seem to be competition for status, bottomless introspection, assiduous intellectual inquiry, real social change and good company. I love good company.

The American Psychological Association has removed the narcissistic personality disorder from the DSM manual. There have been commentators at New York Times claiming it to have been a mistake. In fact, that is one of the most intelligent decisions that American Psychological Association has made in decades.

The reasons are, and should be, obvious to anyone who bears any familiarity with history. America’s (and the world’s) most significant contributors, from Jefferson to Rockefeller to Edison to Gates to Einstein to Disney to Clinton to just about anyone in Hollywood, would all be seen as possessing this disorder. So would be the founders of – and major contributors to – psychology itself, from Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung down the line. And, lest we forget, so would the ancestors of any white, Asian, or mixed-raced person living in United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Latin America or South Africa – all people who have done the incredibly narcissistic (or possibly even sociopathic) action of leaving their home, their family, their country, their tradition and their way of life to pursue a different way of life in the New World.

For people of these ethnic groups living on the territory of these countries, this can mean either one of two things. Either they have held true to the way of their ancestors – the ways of narcissists or sociopaths – and are living according to narcissistic or sociopathic adaptations; or they have left the ways of their ancestors, in which case they are narcissists or sociopaths themselves. Either way, the narcissistic and socipathic disorders as defined apply to the majority of the population, and using it by members of this population is hypocrisy on a vast scale.

Besides the obvious hypocrisy of pathologizing the people whose contributions have made possible what people have now and the people to whom is owed one’s ancestry, the use of the narcissistic and related disorders has had two vastly destructive real-world effects on the societies in which they have been applied. The first and most obvious has been a de facto holocaust waged against those accused of these disorders, combined with imposition of de facto totalitarianism against everyone else. To claim people criminal by virtue of their personality is to claim people criminal by virtue of how they think. And to do so is to introduce the Orwellian concept of crimethink and create a totalitarianism so absolute that people are not allowed to be free of it even within the privacy of their minds.

For those who are enough removed from democratic principles (and, being such in a democratic country, are by definition narcissistic or sociopathic enough) not to see that as a wrong, there is a problem that even they would identify as a threat, and that is as follows. In pathologizing the people whose thinking is different from that of the place and the time, has been pathologized not only freedom but also innovation and clarity. The direct result of that has been a vast loss of competitiveness in science, technology, and culture, as well as a loss of crucial perspective necessary for the decision making process in business, government, media and society. In both cases, vast violence has been done to the countries that have adopted these beliefs.

The obvious logical implications of the belief in the narcissistic and related disorders surely have not escaped the APA, and they have made the rational and rightful decision to strike this disorder along with several lesser-known disorders from the books. But it will take more than that to get rid of the rot of the destructive thinking that has found its way into the culture since these disorders became introduced into public domain. It is not any kind of pathology to think and relate differently from people around oneself, and it is from people doing just this that has come all the innovation that has made possible the world that people have now. And removing from the culture the fallacious thinking that has been fostered by the belief in this and related disorders will again vitalize the Western world’s innovative capacity and make it again the world leader that it had become by practicing ingenuity and innovative thinking in the first place.

http://sites.google.com/site/ilyashambatwritings

On the need for an individualistic educational psychology emphasizing on the central role of the learner

Education and psychology are related in more than just one way and the psychology of education could be related to educational principles in psychology or how education as a discipline is taught within psychology as a subject and how these two disciplines merge. This is primarily the focus of educational psychology which studies how human learning occurs, what ways of teaching are most effective, what different methods should be used to teach gifted or disabled children and how principles of psychology could help in the study of schools as social systems.

Psychological education would be completely focused on learning methods as structured or imparted according to psychological and individual needs of the students. Education would differ according to culture, values, attitudes, social systems, mindset and all these factors are important in the study of education in psychology.

Educational psychology is the application of psychological objectives within educational systems and psychological education as I distinguish here is application of educational objectives in psychological processes. The first focus of using psychology in education is more general and the second approach of using education in psychology is more individualistic. However as far as present study of educational approach to psychology is concerned, there is no difference between individualistic educational psychology and general educational psychology and all interrelationships between psychology and education are considered within the broad discipline of educational psychology.

However a distinction between the more general educational psychology and more specific psychological or individualistic education could help in understanding the nuances of individualistic study and give a subjective dimension to the study of psychology in education. This could also help in making learning systems more student based and according to the needs of culture, society, individual or personal factors. This sort of study with a focus on personal/psychological aspects of learning is not just about social objectives and objectives within educational systems but also about personal goals and objectives and the psychological processes involved in learning. There has to be a clearer demarcation between education in psychology as a general study and individualistic education in psychology as a more specific and subjective discipline.

As of now educational psychology encompasses a wide range of issues and topics including the use of technology and its relation to psychology, learning techniques and instructional design. It also considers the social, cognitive, behavioural dimensions of learning but it would be necessary to make education more personal and individualistic through a special branch with a psychological focus on education so that individual needs are considered. There could be two ways in which this branch of knowledge could evolve – either by strengthening psychological education or individualistic approach to the psychology of education or by having two distinct branches of general educational psychology and individualistic educational psychology.

As in client centered approach to psychology, a psychology of education should also include further research that would highlight the need for individualistic dimensions in learning. Learning psychology is the use of psychological theories for example that of Jean Piaget and Kohler in the study of learning techniques, especially among children. I have already discussed Piaget but briefly Piaget’s theory higlights different stages of learning in children and Kohler suggested that learning occurs by sudden comprehension or understanding, however I will not go further into learning theories here. Whereas the focus of educational psychology is on learning techniques per se and the role of the learner is considered only secondary, a branch of individualistic psychology in education could help in emphasizing the role of the learner considering not just their disabilities or giftedness but also their personality patterns. This focus on personality patterns brings out the central role of understanding psychology in educational systems.

Educational psychology studies both the personal approaches to education as in giftedness, disability, learning theories applied to children and adults, and the more general objective approaches to learning as the role of schools as social or cultural systems.

The psychology of education could include the following branches:

General Educational Psychology

1. Learning Systems – As studied from individualistic learning perspectives and generalized learning perspectives, a discussion of the different theories, practices and systems or techniques of learning is an integral part of educational psychology and especially central to general educational psychology.

2. Social Systems – The use of education in social, cultural and economic systems could be considered within the psychological context and this relates to the role of education in society.

Individualistic Educational Psychology

1. Learning Systems – Learning techniques and systems or methods will have to be in accordance with the needs of the children or adult participants and according to skills of the teachers. Needs vary according to personal traits and abilities and individual needs will have to be considered during the learning process.

2. Social Systems – Individual learning psychology will have to be studied according to specific social and cultural backgrounds of the learners and thus a more subjective study of learning approaches and centralized role of the individual in the learning process considering their social, cultural or intellectual background will have to be considered.

Reflections in Psychology – Part II – Saberi Roy (2010)
http://www.saberiroy.com

Each of us comes to find in time how complex are the factors that are not only involved in our physical health but that total well being requires a comfortable state on every level, physical, psychological and spiritual.

In discovery of the different and sometimes opposing ingredients in the recipe of our unique personality we become aware that to harmonize all these qualities is not going to be as easy as we would like. Yet it is to harmonize and blend them in our personality is our common task if we are to be able to live in tune with our deeper nature or soul.

It would seem that the utilization and expression of the individual elements in our character is directed by our free will and it would be good to believe this simple attitude is all that is involved.

However, we all experience inner conflicts through contrary impulses with one part of our nature pressing for one thing and another driving us in an opposite path. This forces us to make conscious and deliberate choices of free will. But when there are internal motivations that are either of strong subconscious and often self serving properties, for instance, they may overcome any balancing influence of our consciousness that speaks of caution or of consideration of others and may result in selfishness directing our decision or action. If on the other hand our nobler consciousness is inclining us towards selfless action and is extremely strong, it may overcome the lesser and produce a more generous outcome.

We generally recognize when our inner choices are wise when we feel psychological comfort, free of any nagging of our conscience or stress. It could well be considered that the psychological stress that afflicts so many of us is due to our inner conflicts rather than outer circumstances.

But the human life experience involves the exercise of finding solutions to the many energies, abilities, mental attitudes and emotions which are components in the nature of each of us. We need not only discover the properties in our nature but to blend them in such as way as to feel content with our self image in the final result. We all make our personal effort to do this in diverse ways with varying degrees of success.

To many of us the astrological factors in our horoscope help us to identify some of the major latent energy conflicts that are inherent in our nature from the very start of our life. Once identified by our conscious mind it is possible to change or modify our responses within the framework of our personality culture. Although this remains an ongoing life exercise, if we have lived well and wisely we could anticipate that at the conclusion of our life our nature will have become simpler to better reflect the qualities we value most.

We can begin to simplify and integrate our nature now, if we consider the following…

To consciously choose responses, reactions and our manner of expression that is appropriate and in accordance with our vision and purpose

We need a clear vision in our minds – our own desired ’self image’ to inspire us

Best to know the ‘tools’ we have to work with by understanding the prominent astrological components in our nature – the harmonies and the difficulties

There is no recipe for constructing a perfect human nature – there are only principles. If the natural principles and disciplines are followed each of us will feel greater affection, contentment and inner peace. With the blending of all the best within us we are likely to feel more self respect, like ourselves more and have increased understanding and respect for others.

Most importantly, as we know ourselves better and reduce any confusing complexities within ourselves, it becomes easier to feel integrated with the Nature of Life itself to take pleasure in our gradual advance in our understanding of the wondrous cosmic life of which we a part.

Life will begin to be freer of complexities to seem a simpler and more joyful experience as we feel centred at the controls of our personality, in familiar company with our friendly planets, zodiacal signs, sun, moon and the starry heavens that light our way.

Elizabeth S. Adams is known for her published “Forgotten Dreams – a collection of Poetry” with additional interests that extend to Astrology, Astronomy and mystical subjects that help us understand who we are and our place in the Universe.

Visit her site http://www.spirit-of-astrology.com.

The English language has the unique feature of the one single letter “I” (ppI) that represents the writer’s ego.

Words are symbols by which we communicate. Form, too is a language – think of a tall majestic redwood contrasted with a wispy willow. Or, the form of a greyhound suggesting speed contrasted with the heaviness of a bulldog, suggesting power and tenacity. Our body has a language apart from words or form. How we walk, sit, gesture, is body language which mirrors our inner state of being.

Like body language, our strokes are forms in action. Writing is crystallized body language. We are symbol producing beings and through analyzing our symbols, we gain access to our unconscious.

For the ppI to be properly interpreted, it must be looked at in context of writing as a whole. Strictly speaking, it cannot be evaluated alone; like the self, the ego symbol exists and finds its identity in its relation to the environment. Nevertheless, the ppI can offer valuable clues to the inner personality even without such comparison, for basic graphological values and indicators contained in symbolism of zones and space can be reliably applied.

How the ppI is written and where it is placed on the paper reveal the writer’s intimate attitudes about himself and others. The signature – the public image, does not reveal the truth about a person, like the ppI does.

How your form your ppI can offer you a useful tool for assessing your private needs and values. In revealing aspects of the inner self, it has a personal meaning beyond the ordinary fact that it denotes the writer. It can also suggest harmonious or disturbing elements within a person’s life. It can reveal the importance of the male and female authority figures to the writer and how his relationship with these figures affects his present dealings.

Mind and body are not independent units or entities: expressive movements are embedded in the total complex of the personality. Handwriting is so personal a gesture that imitating or forging is difficult to do, and writing speed and pressure cannot be duplicated. Hand-writing is brain-writing.

Form or shape of the ppI provides information about the writers adaptability to the world, his orientations toward future or past, his interest in the spiritual, the material or reality.

Height of the ppI tells about the writer’s self feelings, his degree of self-esteem and the respect he has for himself and his abilities.

Width of the ppI pertains to the writer’s personal value system. It reveals his sense of self worth and the importance he places on himself in relation to other people in his work place and in interpersonal relationships.

Any weakness in the form of the ppI corresponds to a deficiency in the writer’s self-esteem. Findings in the ppI should be corroborated by evidence from letter height and width. If there is disagreement between letter height and height of the ppI, or between letter width and width of the ppI, there exists a personality conflict with subsequent frustration, tension or anxiety. Physically, this creates nervousness while in behavior; it will be expressed as hostility, resistance or rigidity.

Clues to social and emotional inclinations are found in the slant of the ppI, as well as other letters.

If you ever had an interest in learning about handwriting analysis, learning about this single letter gives you the fastest way into understanding the psychology of yourself, and others.

Lisa M. Schuetz invites you to read about graphology, gestures, and personality at http://readinggestures.com/
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Definitional traps and word games in debate; are they just, should they be used in negotiation? Lawyers often debate definitions, and they debate the definition of a law. They do this in the best interests of their clients who pay them money, if that definition doesn’t suit them, they look for case law which does, and then they look at evenly applied enforcement to see if that fits or if there are problems there which they can use in their argument, that is if they can’t win a victory on the other points.

That’s all well and good, because all is fair in love, war, and apparently law.

But this doesn’t necessarily make it correct or right to use word games when debating online, by e-mail, or even with friends at a coffee shop. Not long ago, I was reading the blog of an acquaintance who explained how he used the word games to debate his points of view, in a competitive way against his opponent’s points of view on things such as religion, politics, homosexuality, immigration, asylum law, and other topics that interested him.

His strategy was very pretty cut and dry. What he would do is find ambiguity in the statements made by his opponent, and then he would make his opponent define the words they were using, and as the conversation, dialogue, discussion, and debate progressed, he would simply hold them to those definitions. Interestingly enough, not everyone has complete command of the English language, so often they choose words falsely or perhaps incorrectly for lack of finding a relevant term to use in its place at that particular moment, we all do this I suppose.

For this individual I would ask the following questions, and make a couple comments;

Have you found that as per game theory the very folks that may be worth discussing such topics with may chose to disengage, as you debate using “word games” because it is entirely possible to use seventh grade debating tactics like this, and those who have previously played see the trap in advance of the end of the tic-tac-toe simulation.

Those who through perhaps ego, choose to continue the debate, have only three potential outcomes with the word game strategy – lose or draw, or they can quit and turn over that chess board. In which case their better part of valor (leaving the battlespace or quitting the game in an act of discretion), also serves the “word gamer strategist” in believing they’ve won, when in reality they’ve failed to change anyone’s mind or bring them into the dialogue.

Why, because a person who feels disrespected of course wants revenge, and will seek such, perhaps through angry discourse or hateful verbal attacks. I’ve found that you cannot win an argument or debate, and when you think you have you should remember “a person against their will is of the same opinion still.” Yet, in that case, why waste energy on folks who are not going to listen, and why play word games with those who might? Please consider all this.

Lance Winslow is a retired Founder of a Nationwide Franchise Chain, and now runs the Online Think Tank. Lance Winslow believes it’s hard to write 20,000 articles; http://www.bloggingcontent.net/

Note: All of Lance Winslow’s articles are written by him, not by Automated Software, any Computer Program, or Artificially Intelligent Software. None of his articles are outsourced, PLR Content or written by ghost writers.