Observing Blindness:Choice Blindness
Rebecca Ostrander
Western Nevada College
Choice blindness in sociology has been defined by Petter Johannson as “the finding that participants both often fail to notice mismatches between their decisions and the outcome of their choice and, in addition, endorse the opposite of their chosen alternative” (Hall & Johannson,”Cognition”). Petter Johannson is currently a researcher at one of Europe’s largest and most prestigious colleges, Lund University in Sweden Here Johannson who received his Ph.D. in cognitive science at the University in 2005, runs the Choice Blindness Lab with Lars Hall who also has a Ph.D. in cognitive science from Lund University.(Johannson, "Choice Blindness Experiment Research Paper Questions", 2017) In the lab, the two men have been working to figure out just how common choice blindness is and the effects that it can have. In 2008 one of their choice blindness research experiments, titled, “ From Change Blindness to Choice Blindness” tested subjects on three different versions of a choice blindness experiment, each experiment used a different stimuli in order to test its subjects, and often changed the chosen stimuli in order to see if the subjects could first pick a picture when given two choices and asked which one was more appealing, and then explain why they choice the picture that the did, even when in some cases the picture the subject was asked to explain their
This experiment was conducted by surveying ninety-six people, 48 males and 48 females, to complete a short survey. The survey asked them if they were color blind and whether they were male or female. They were then given five color cards (blue, green, pink, purple and yellow) and ordered the sample colors from their favorite to least favorite on a scale of 1-5.
Dr. William Glasser was a distinguished psychiatrist and author known for his distinctive views about mental illness. Glasser broke away from the traditional model of psychotherapy in the early 1960s to develop his own model of counseling. Dr. Glasser began with the development of therapy before he developed his theoretical stance. Glasser created what is known as Reality Therapy. Glasser first defined Reality Therapy as “a therapy that leads all patients toward reality, towards grappling successfully with tangible and intangible aspects of the real world” (p.6).
Reading is boring, I hate reading. These are two common sentences that you hear before and after ELA class. This is because they are reading a book that is boring to them and they are not interested in that book. They are being forced to read rather than reading something that they will enjoy. This is why choice reading matters. Choice reading allows the student to be able to read what they want. This way reading becomes more of a hobby and less of a boring task to the student. Choice reading not only brings pleasure but it allows you to travel to faraway places, to imagine different world, to learn about different cultures and to learn about some of the top minds of history.
During this project, my class and I learned many examples of choices and consequences made by people throughout every day life. One specific character in the book, Erik Fisher, made choices that not only affected himself, but everyone around him negatively. Fortunately enough, as bad as these choices were; they did cause a few good outcomes.
The notion of choice in an individual’s life is subject to constant questioning. We have what we like to call the freedom of decision-making, but often it simply seems like a facade. Many believe that one’s morals and ethics are solely responsible for the decisions they make, major or minor. Others attribute the external pressures surrounding them and societal factors as the facilitator of choices. Unquestionably, both personal characteristics and societal factors influence the the majority of choices of individuals everywhere. We must consider, however, that one plats more of a role than the other. Pieces of writing such as Christopher Browning’s Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland, Michael Bess’ Choices Under Fire: Moral Dimensions of World War II, and Milton Mayer’s No Time to Think explore the idea of both influential aspects. Nonetheless, more influence can be attributed to societal factors and this idea is supported throughout all of the pieces of writing. Societal factors, for the most part, are composed of a plethora of external pressures that we either actively acquiesce to or subconsciously conform to. Societal factors play a much larger role for the average individual in regards to decision-making and this goes for individuals of all backgrounds and beliefs. This is shown in the lives of the Chambonnais, the Reserve Police Battalion, and the two famous experiments known as the Milgram Experiment and the Stanford Prison
The use of certain tests listed above has some limitations, such as in the change blindness test, we can not say with 100% certainty where the participant have seen changes, and where just click on the keyboard buttons. About this restriction also mentioned Levin, Momen, IV & Simons, they also coined the term "change blindness blindness" which characterizes the misconceptions about the vision due to the fact that some participants in the experiment have given the answer at random trying to guess what was supposed to be the right answer. The motivation to divining the answer may be a desire to look smart and impress yourself and others (2010). In some tests, such as
“There was no big-screen television or voice-controlled computer. Just a math book, a pad of yellow paper.” (p.109) . Justin also wears thick glasses. Justin has an eye problem which couldn’t be healed in a world without free trade. But as Dave tells the reader, Justin is only wearing the glasses because the “people Upstairs” made this happen. Justin normally doesn’t wear glasses at all, he “would have lost his eyesight entirely”.(p.110) The company Merck will only be able to develop the medicine Justin needed in a world of free trade. Otherwise America would be too busy by doing everything for itself and there wouldn’t be “enough people, machines, and land to go around to make everything as cheaply as could be made under free trade.”(p47)
Humans live in a world in which every day they encounter numerous choices. The way they decide and the outcomes of their decisions define their lives. Their day to day life essentially revolves around the choices they make. As a whole, a community benefits or suffers from the outcomes of its choices. Freedom of choice is the grant to an individual or community to make its own choices out of free will and without restrictions (Pereboom,2003). This is essay will discuss that though freedom choice leads to variety in life, it does not necessarily guarantee satisfaction. It will also argue that although some choice is undoubtedly better than none, more is not always better than less. It will then consider the implications of the paradox of
The Myth of Choice: How Junk-Food Marketers Target Our Kids and “Marketing to kids gets more savvy with new technologies” show how children are targets in marketing. They both show the bad points marketers do to get children to buy their product. For example, on Webkinz they have you watch free ads to earn virtual money but they get money every time you click the “free ad” button on the site while in The Myth of Choice: How Junk-Food Marketers Target Our Kids, Anna Lappe from Real Food Media Project mentions that junk food is etched in the kid’s mind. In Myth of of Choice: How Junk-Food Marketers Target Our Kids shows how marketers target kids in the case of junk food while “Marketing to kids gets more savvy with new technologies” shows how
The second is the more choices the more likely that the best choice can be made, and the third assumption is that you should never say no to choice. Iyengard evaluates these three assumptions with various studies where one group is American and the other is another culture. Her studies help understand why and how Americans make choices in comparison to the rest of the world. Without doubt, Iyengard’s studies and analysis on choice is interesting but Schwartz’s was clearer because it easily communicated the message that was more applicable to the public.
When humans make a decision, it often turns out to be “predictably irrational” (Ariely, 2009). They always deviate systematically from expected decision rather show an inclination towards a certain way of thinking. This consistency of behavioral or decision bias can be very helpful to identify consequences or outcomes in a different
Some people believe that no matter what a person does in their life, it will ultimately have no effect on the outcome ofa it. Existentialists find this to be true because they believe that no matter what they ever do, they will always die. Existentialists link the inevitability of death to the idea that there is no higher power. Additionally, existentialists hold the belief that no one should allow society to control how they live their life. Writer Albert Camus uses many existentialist themes his works like The Stranger and “The Guest”. The protagonists in both stories demonstrate existentialist beliefs in their actions. As a result, many existentialist ideas can be seen throughout out both novels. Camus uses the paradox of free will in order to illustrate the inevitability of death for everyone as well as the idea that in order to obtain free will, a person must reject society and face exile.
Casual determinism put simply, is the theory that all things happen for a particular reason and everything is predetermined. It is the idea all the events in one’s life can be explained, and each event has a particular reason for being. If everything is predetermined, then this therefore suggests that the future is fixed which further suggests that we can possibly predict the behavior of things. The theory of determinism ultimately suggests that we don’t the capacity to have free will because all future events are destined to occur, and furthermore we do not posses the knowledge to figure out whether it can be proved true or false (Hoefer). There has been three positions that have developed concerning the theory of causal determinism: hard determinist, compatibilist or soft determinist, and compatibilist.
Throughout life, individuals are often faced with a multitude of moral dilemmas which can be difficult to assess given the factors of the situation and consequences, based on what is right and wrong. In this paper I will be assessing the Trolley Problem in relation to Utilitarianism and Deontology and will conclude which theory is the best way to behave given the situation. In the first paragraph, I will begin by discussing the Trolley Problem followed by the next paragraph’s which will explaining how Utilitarianism and Deontology would approach the situation. Furthermore, I will be discussing which theory I believe is right in regards to the best way to behaving in society, given the possible outcomes of the problem. Since the moral issue of killing and letting die are close in hand, Deontology is the only explainable way to behave because this theory approaches all situations in regard to what is fair and acceptable for all, while Utilitarianism takes an approach that degrades humanity and differs from person to person.
You’re human if you are born from another human. As a human we have choices and it can affect the individual or the world or even both. “In artificial selection, a human being is selecting which organisms will survive with a specific goal in mind. In natural selection, there is no one directing the process and no end goal in mind.” (Quote under “ARTIFICIAL VS NATURAL SELECTION) Humans are creating artificial foods that is found in fast food companies and the list can go on. Today we are also fighting for vegan options and organic food. Especially living in America, there is a difference between here and other countries where people don’t have the supermarket to get their dinner. I want to highlight that during the text, Malthus shocked me when it says “Malthus warned that there was no hope that the world's food supply could keep up.” (Quote under “THE ECOLOGY OF HUMAN LIFE”) In a way, he could be somewhat accurate because we have a lot of people and some point we can’t feed everyone because we haven’t hit a massive catastrophe. And to bring back the supermarket idea, when consumers don’t buy the food, we throw it away and waste food which is the food supply we work hard to build. We are curious about the past and we have dedicated people who find evidence that question our purpose on Earth. “The fossil evidence led him to propose that periodically the Earth went through sudden changes, each of which could wipe out a number of species.” - (Quote under “Georges Cuvier”) I