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Essay On Situationist Theory

1752 Words8 Pages

In the person-situation debate two sides battle it out to prove that they have the best method of predicting human behavior, the situationists versus the proponents of personality. If the personality perspective is correct then an individual's personality traits should provide a constant guide for their behavior during one or more situations. If the situationists are correct, a person's behavior is entirely dependent on the situation. There are gray areas and questions remain unanswered for both sides of the person-situation argument. Situationists believe that personality traits cannot be used to predict behavior because behavior is largely dependent upon the situation. Since there are limits to how well behavior can be predicted using personality traits, they believe situations are more useful in predicting behavior. Supporters of the situationist approach believe that …show more content…

After all, if evil was entirely up to personality, how do situations like Abu Ghraib and the Stanford Prison Experiment occur? It is very unlikely that the randomly selected students that drew the role of prison guard all had some secret desire to dominate their classmates. It is even less likely that all of the prisoner classmates were weak-minded and submissive. What if Zimbardo is right in that we all have the potential to dominate or submit ourselves to being dominated if the situation and social forces demand it? Would a person who is prone to committing charitable acts and helping others really be able to transform into a ruthless prison guard just because they aren't being held accountable for their actions? The answer seems rather obvious. There's no doubt that individual values and experiences do provide armor against the influence of social forces and stress, but personality traits have to be of relative importance or strength if they fail to persevere in all

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Adriana Umana Psych 356 13 December 2015 Final Exam Much of what we know about human behavior has been known thanks to many psychology theories. Some of these theories have been developed by very well known psychologists such as Carl Rogers, B.F Skinner, Bandura, and Raymond Cattell. Although, some theories have changed over time there are others we still apply today. Carl Rogers was a humanistic psychologist. He was non directed, client centered, and person centered.

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568 Words | 3 Pages

In both Lord of the Flies and the stanford prison experiment, it is demonstrated that people’s more dark and savage side comes out when they are placed in a situation where they are isolated from civilization. In the stanford prison experiment, the college students’ dark sides came out only 36 hours into the experiment: “And finally, about were hostile, arbitrary, and intensive in their forms of prisoner humiliation. These guards appeared to thoroughly enjoy the power they wielded, yet none of our preliminary personality tests were able to predict this behavior,” (SPE 12). The experiment began with average middle class college students who were told to act like prison guards. For the time being, they were isolated to the prison and interacting with the “prisoners” all day.

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843 Words | 4 Pages

Whether working with a co-worker, learning with a classmate or hanging out with a friend, the thought of any of them having the potential to be evil does not cross the mind. Everyday people are not typically evil beings, but if people are not evil beings then why do they commit actions like torture, killing and genocide? Could it be that the certain people committing the acts are just monsters deep inside, or could the actions be mere products of circumstance? In his article "The Genocidal Killer in the Mirror", Crispin Sartwell, a journalist and philosopher, advises his audience to take a look at the heinous acts people have committed throughout history as a way to show us how anyone could commit evil acts, including ourselves. Marianne Szegedy-Maszak,

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639 Words | 3 Pages

Our Personality from Decisions The product of condition does not determine our behaviour; the reaction to a circumstance induces it. This statement is evident on Stephen Covey’s quote, “I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.” John Wyndham

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1574 Words | 7 Pages

Introduction What happens when good people are put in an evil place? Does humanity overpower evil, or does evil triumph over it? When good people are put in an evil place, the triumphing of evil can be explained through a mix of mob mentality and labeling theory. First, I will discuss the events of the Stanford Prison Experiment, and how it turned good people into bad. Second, I will present the events of Abu Ghraib, and how evil triumphed there as well.

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1254 Words | 6 Pages

Situational effects and personality come into conflict when discussing behavior. Personality is someone’s “usual pattern of behavior, feelings, and thoughts” (Twenge, 2017, p.20). It remains constant throughout different situations, but some situations can be stressful enough to make a person act out of character. The transition between a person’s normal personality and behavior to a more evil, sinister behavior fascinates a man named Philip Zimbardo, who conducted the infamous Zimbardo Prison Experiment, or Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE). Zimbardo is an American psychologist at Stanford University and the mastermind behind the 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment (The Story).

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1738 Words | 7 Pages

Al Capone: Balancing Power and an Antisocial Personality Disorder A person’s character is defined by a distinctive set of traits and their behavioral patterns. One’s personality affects their attitudes, beliefs, and the way they perceive the world. People with healthy personalities easily form relationships and find coping methods to handle everyday stresses. Those who struggle with a personality disorder have difficulty interacting with others.

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443 Words | 2 Pages

Some may argue and say that situations and environments can control the individual. On one hand, this is true; however, most individuals can control themselves in the environment in most cases. This evidence supports my counterargument because an individual can control his or herself when it comes to different changes in the situation or environment. This evidence refutes the argument because an individual is in control of the situations and

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865 Words | 4 Pages

The Monitor on Psychology article “What makes good people do bad things?” by Melissa Dittmann analyzes the results of the Stanford Prison Experiment conducted by Stanford psychology professor Phillip Zimbardo in 1971 and discusses what the experiment can tell us about human nature and what causes humans to be evil. In the novel “Lord of the Flies” the author William Golding discusses the effects of the theories mentioned in the article by creating his own fictional experiment with children stranded on an island during a nuclear war. Throughout his novel Golding explores the focus of Dittmann’s article; that environments and situations can bring out the evil that is inside all of us. People can act good or bad depending on their environment, and these actions are not entirely their fault because when people are not held accountable for their actions their more violent natures are revealed.

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818 Words | 4 Pages

The second question with the problem with humans is “what are the innate predispositions of men?” (Becker, 1971, p. 116). The third question with the problem with humans is “what types of personality are most valued” (Becker, 1971, p. 116). The fourth question with the problem with humans is “what are the modes of relating to others” (Becker, 1971, p. 116).

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642 Words | 3 Pages

Wallace argues that actual thinking and education involves gaining a conscious awareness, often that those around us are in reality just as important as we are. So while people are more likely to attribute behavior to another’s personality, especially if it’s negative, this is far from accurate. This is a big piece to Gilbert’s model if people do not use controlled think or thinking that is effortful, conscious, and intentional (textbook, p.65) to see someone’s situational attribution they are misinterpreting information. This occurs automatically and even involuntary, which is why Wallace referred to it as a default setting. However, even if initially people are making attributions to someone’s internal state, they can change this way of thinking and recognize outside situations.

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901 Words | 4 Pages

A psychology professor Phillip Zimbardo once explained "people are seduced into evil by dehumanizing and labeling others. " I believe this is true labeling and dehumanizing others can make it particularly easy to forget all of your moral codes amd forget about the goodness inside you. A lot of this is seen in William Goldings book Lord of the Flies, a story is told about a group of British school boys who are stranded on an island after their plane crashes. The boys are left without adults so one boy named Ralph steps up to power and leads them all. There is a struggle for power when a boy named Jack seeks to be leader, but he has different ways of leading then Ralph.

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614 Words | 3 Pages

Character traits shapes how everyone expresses their feelings and simultaneously build up great values within people who makes effort. However, a crisis may crush their identity instantly. Countless tremendous changes might occur during the process. For example, the loss of control over oneself might hurt someone. During the stage of crisis, human beings tend to rely on trustworthy people or else they are clueless on what to do.

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786 Words | 4 Pages

Although one’s behavior can be the same as others, especially if they are in the same setting, however those who are in two completely different contexts will experience different reactions, just dependent on exactly where they are. Furthermore, this theory demonstrates that once we have been in a specific setting long enough, then that’s when our behaviors will become consistent over time. On the other hand, individuals might experience particular actions because they arrive at a specific setting, with an already preconceived idea of what to expect causing them to alter their behaviors based on their thoughts about the background. Another reason might be that we adjust our responses because we are unsure of how others might view or accept us being in their environments. Either way, individuals might not be aware of it, but once our surroundings change, then our behaviors is changed as

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2149 Words | 9 Pages

Over the years, many theories have been developed to study the human personality. Some of the notable theories are psychoanalytic theory, trait theory, humanistic theory and behavioural theory. In this assignment, we have chosen to compare and contrast the psychoanalytic and humanistic theories. Psychoanalytic Theory

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