Learned Helplessness

One of the more controversial psychology experiments involved the concept of "Learned Helplessness." The experiment involved a dog that was put into a room in which the floor of that room could conduct an electric current and shock the dog. One half of the floors electric current was controlled by one switch and the other was controlled by a completely different switch.

When the experimenters flipped the switch starting an electric current on the side of the dog the dog would immediately (obviously) go to the other side of the room in order to avoid being shocked. The experimenters repeated this process of electrify the floor the dog was standing on and the dog would switch sides to safety.

After a while of repeating this cruel experiment the experimenters decided to flip both switches to the "on" position for a minute. The dog was alerted and like before tried to go to safety on the other side of the room. After realizing that the other side of the room did not provide the safety that it did before the dog laid down and continued being shocked even though the experimenters had turned off the electric current to the other side of the room.

This experiment goes to show what is called learned helplessness. The dog (subject) will continue to seek safety only if the subject thinks that there is a reason and a known payoff in which to seek the safety.

Journals and Epistemology

    The journals I've read are heavy in both humanities and science. Because the journals I've read are psychology journals, this would make sense. The authors of these journals are indeed scientists "looking at" the issue or argument in trying to make sense of it in a logical sense but also they are "looking through" most of the issues as psychology isn't as much of a concrete science and must be interpreted by the observer or author. In terms of structure most journals are very formal and scientific in writing for the most part and through the established niche of scientific evidence. This seems to be more of a thesis; establishing the scientific evidence at hand. After this information is presented the structure changes. Hypotheses  are established in most psychology journals as the authors must speculate what could be established from the evidence given. Depending on the subject, the way in which authors reference is also both humanistic and scientific. In any science you are going to be building on previous information, adding and enhancing already established theories however, if there is a discovery that refutes a previously thought theory or idea the tone turns more humanistic and the author will give their "opinion" or idea juxtaposed to a counter idea. Unless the author has a personal vendetta against someone he is trying to refute or has differing ideology the language is almost always directed toward methods.

Capacity to Lead and Psychology

The article addresses the question of what is it that a person possesses that allows them to exemplify “worthy leadership.” The authors mention that throughout the years in which this subject has been studied researchers have come up with three different “constructs” that define what the criteria of a leader will be. These three constructs are “Capacity to lead”, “commitment to lead”, and finally the “character to lead” mentioned from most to least in research respectively.  The authors also defined 12 factors that go under each of the 3 constructs to develop an entire model of “worthy leadership.”

Capacity to lead is defined as general intelligence, actual skills in leadership, and general personality traits. Commitment to lead is defined as ones actual want or desire to be in a position to be a leader. Character to lead is defined as “what the leaders will do, both positively and negatively across a variety of leadership contexts (368). The first factor under the capacity to lead is “capacity to reason and make good decisions.” The authors found that when it came to general intelligence across most jobs and tasks, general intelligence and complexity of a task were correlated very strongly with each other, however, when it came to general intelligence and leadership roles the correlation dropped.  This suggests that general intelligence is important but good leaders need more than only general intelligence in order to do their duties efficiently. The second factor under capacity to lead is capacity to see and realize the future. In short this dimension suggests that leaders should not only be able to intelligently look to the future but have the ability to look to the future and have a plan for dealing with it.  The third factor is the capacity to communicate and influence. This suggests that a leader should possess the ability to look to the future and have general intelligence but the leader should be able to communicate, and influence his followers to see the big picture. The final two factors are capacity to know and capacity to preserve and adapt, meaning knowing the industry that you are in and being able to cope with changes that may or may not be expected changes.

The second Construct, Commitment to lead includes 4 dimensions. These are commitment to excellence or the want to excel in the position you are put in, commitment to people and relationships; In other words if someone can work well with or through others it can only help their success as a leader, commitment to learning and personal growth or never stopping their pursuit to learn more about what it is they are dealing with and constantly adjusting themselves as a person to adapt to the new knowledge they gain, and finally commitment to stakeholders or caring about the people, not only the success of the company, in which people have stakes in.

The third construct, Character to lead, is described as the least studied and talked about construct in leadership until recently. This is the construct where most individuals fail as leaders. These factors are all about being ethical and keeping up with and enforcing the company’s policies .

Psychology: Well Being and Health in the Work Place

The authors of this article received the information based on their writings on a conference concerning occupational well-being and health. Throughout this article the authors cover various topics that are relevant to a workers well-being in the work place both mental and physically. The main topics covered that relate to workplace well-being are the following: bullying/sexual harassment, sick (physically)-at-work employees, workers who commute to work, disaster responder employees that are untrained, personal communication, Working parents, and Flexible schedules.
The authors reported that bullying, rather than sexual harassment, was a bigger factor in worker-well being, whether or not someone will quit their job, and overall job satisfaction. Although sexual harassment does create a negative working environment, it is much easier to report to a superior that it sexual harassment is taking place rather than bullying. On In the next topic covered, sick-at-work employees, it was found that more than half the time an employee will come into work if they are sick which goes against the usual thought that employees are not as bad off as they let on that take sick days. Concerning employees that commute to work, “erratic commutes” (i.e. unpredictable weather, transit systems, unreliable transportation) were related to the highest rates of “worker strain.” On the contrary employees that had a reliable commutes actually contributed the ride to their well being and less stress at work. Personal communication between employee and employer was also shown to have a positive effect on workplace well-being. Employees that were able to talk to their supervisors about personal goals or personal problems in private, were much more likely to be satisfied with their jobs. Parents in the workplace were more likely to become stressed out when their children were out of school. The women ,however, seemed to worry the same no matter what hours their spouse worked, where as the men’s worrying increased the longer their spouses hours were. Finally, concerning flexible work hours, employees that worked mandatory overtime were higher stressed than employees with flexible work hours. Interestingly it was found that the majority of women that used their flexible work schedules in order to be more productive rather than using their flexibility for family/children management.
This article is important and interesting in that all topics portrayed by the authors give insight into how employers and/or employees can improve their overall work well-being. Any employer or employee that has a more positive attitude in the work place will stay around longer and become more productive as result. I found this article to be applicable and realistic to improving workplace environment and well-being.