Self-assessment of Success in Learning ESP

The first term of learning ESP was quite difficult and unexpected by its tasks and tests. At the beginning of studies, I thought that we would be only learning grammar and some words or phrases related to psychology. However, after few weeks I understood that we are learning psychology in English.

• Writing a summary

At first I found it hard, however, “practice makes perfect”, therefore after my second summary it doesn’t seem difficult to write it. In spite of this, I still have to pay attention to points such as formal/informal language and not retelling the texts.

• Writing comprehension tests on modules in psychology

It is one of the hardest tasks for me, because if you want to get good mark you have to learn some definitions by heart, not just understand the main idea of the material. It takes too much time, energy and efforts. I hope that in the future I will be able to explain specific definitions in my own words and comprehension tests wouldn’t be so difficult for me.

• Making Power Point presentations

This task is one of the most attractive because I found it very interesting to go into the details about the only one topic and think how can I represent it to my group. The task was more interesting because of possibility to use creativity by searching and posting nice pictures connected with the topic. It is good to do what you like because then it doesn’t seem very hard, thus this task was quite easy for me.

• Impromptu speaking in class

Speaking in class isn’t very hard task, however, at the first times I was quite nervous about that. Now it doesn’t seem scary to me. Despite this fact, I would like to improve my speaking better. I understand that I have to try to participate more during discussions and I will try to do this next term.

• Performance in listening practice

Listening isn’t very hard, but not easy as well. Sometimes I understand absolutely everything but sometimes I can’t understand even the task. I’m trying to improve it at home, however, in the future I would like to do more listening practice in class.

• Writing contributions to e-portfolio
This task is the most interesting for me. There you can use all your creativity and usually it’s possible to choose the topic you would like to write about. I also like the fact, that you can write it at home, despite the fact, that it requires a lot of time because of searching information and reading articles.

To sum up, learning ESP this term wasn’t easy, however, I found it quite interesting in some ways and I believe that the next term my results might be better and it depends only on my efforts.

Learning ESP

English for Specific Purposes (ESP) is much harder than learning English at school, because there is no "every day language" that is possible to learn from TV, popular songs, etc.

There are three main aspects of learning ESP. The first one is reading. Because of new words and phrases, reading ESP articles may seem hard and even boring. However, without this it is impossible to learn, thus it is necessary to find the way how to do this. It is good to notice the most common words, write them down on sheets of paper and stick them everywhere. In this way using visual memory it will be easier to remember them and understand later texts.

The second aspect is writing. It requires much more time and efforts than other aspects. It helps improve your knowledge and remember everything you have learned because usually articles are being written about the topic you’ve already discussed about in English class.

The last one aspect is speaking. It is very important not to miss any of opportunities to speak in English, especially in English classes. Talking in foreign language makes you concentrate your minds, think faster, improve pronunciation and find definitions for the forgotten word. It is useful to talk with foreigners or sometimes try to think in English about some topics while going to the University or at home.

To sum up, learning ESP is difficult and long–lasting process, which requires lots of efforts. However, it is very important because a lot of information about popular professions is exactly in English.

Analytical Summary of "Sleep and Dreams"

In the 14th module called "Sleep and Dreams" Robert S. Feldman surveys the stages of sleep, the necessity of it, the function and meaning of dreaming, sleep disturbances, circadian rythms and daydreams.

Firstly, the author explains five stages of sleep and clearly distinguishes REM sleep during which human's heart rate and breathing increases, blood pressure rises and eyes start to move rapidly. Robert S. Feldman claims that it is unknown, why people must sleep, however, some sleep is necessary for human's physical and psychological health.

The second topic, author pays great attention to, is "dreams". It is clear that absolutely all people dream during REM stage of sleep. Many psychologists try to understand what do dreams mean and there are three main theories: unconsious wish fulfillment theory, dream-for-survival theory and activation-synthesis theory.

The next topic is sleep disturbances. According to Robert S. Feldman, there are many people who suffer from sleep problems such as insomnia, sleep apnea, night terrors or narcolepsy. Others have problems because of circadian rythms (biological processes that occur repeatedly on approximately a twenty-four-hour cycle) disorders. The result of all these factors might be fatigue, irritability, etc.

The last issue, that the author explains, is daydreams - fantasies that people construct while awake. Robert S. Feldman claims that fantasy can contribute to the psychological well-being of some people by enhancing their creativity.

To sum up, sleep and dreams are more that just time of tranquillity, and scientists work for a long time to get answers to questions such as why and how long should people sleep, what do dreams mean, etc.

Psychology of Shopping

Shopping is an activity of searching for or buying goods or services. Everyone of us visits shopping malls, supermarkets or groceries at least one-two times a week. The questions is why are we doing this? Are our needs the only one reason for shopping? What do psychologists say about that?

Firstly, it's worth to mention that our physical needs don't play the biggest part in shopping. Nowadays it is some kind of entertainment or even relaxation. Some psychologists claim that there are people who do shopping to cope with everyday stress or believe that somehow it can solve their psychological problems such as worries and doubts about their self-worth, their ability to cope effectively with challenges and their safety in a relatively unpredictable world.

The second factor, which affects us to buy or not to buy something in a supermarket, is "psychological techiques". In order to get the greatest profit from costumers there are some psychological tricks such as pricing at psychologically sensitive points, f. ex., at £29.99, stacking the products with the highest margins at eye-level, as it is known that consumers are more likely to buy products in their line of sight, etc.

In conclusion, shopping in our lives is not the short process just to get something. It is activity strongly related with human's psychology.



References: http://www.bized.co.uk/current/leisure/2004_5/140305.htm;
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=healthres=9B03E4DB123DF934A35751C1A9659C8B63
http://images.google.lt/imgres?imgurl=http://www.mimifroufrou.com/scentedsalamander/images/Shopping%2520Logo%2520TSS.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.shopnanaimo.ca/shopping-festival-experience.php&usg=__S7fjIScID02aqjkOM0T4_Apjpt4=&h=480&w=448&sz=83&hl=lt&start=2&um=1&tbnid=u_Gbena_CHJfRM:&tbnh=129&tbnw=120&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dshopping%26um%3D1%26hl%3Dlt%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:lt:official%26sa%3DN

Psychology of Laughter

Humans are social species. They have feelings, emotions and are able to express them better than any other living creatures. One of the most common expression is a laughter. It expresses such basic emotions as happiness, joy or contentment.

It is possible to separate laughter in different types by it's sound or stimulus. According to stimulus, biologists from Binghamton University in 2005 named two distinct types of laughter: stimulus driven and self - generated and strategic.

Stimulus - driven laughter may be the result of jokes, tickling or drugs. It's a physiological reaction. It's believed that humor and laughter even help people cope or treat a variety of physical and psychological issues, thus there are many therapies such as Humor, Clown, Laughter Therapy, etc.

Self - generated and strategic laughter is very important. It helps represent yourself for other people, clarify your intentions in social interaction and provides an emotional context to conversations.

Laughter is an audible expression. According to it's sound, there are many types of laughter. Shi Hui Lion separates six of them: the blast, the hiss, the giggle, wheezer, cacler and silent laugher. It's believed that human's laughter uncovers his character. F. ex. silent laugher is introverted, gigglers are reliable, loyal and trustworthy, etc.

To sum up, laughter is an audible expression, which can be separated into many types by it's sound or stimulus and expresses not only what does the human feel but what kind of person he is, too.

References: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laughter;
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/11/05/051122184228.htm
www.swapmeetdave.com/Humor/Cats/CatLaugh.jpg

Analytical Summary of "Introduction to Psychology"

Robert S. Feldman is the author of coursebook "Understanding Psychology". In the first chapter called "Introduction to Psychology" the author explains what is the psychology, what fields does it contain, what are roots of this science and what are psychology's key issues and controversies.

In the first module "Psychologists at Work" Feldman maintains that "psychology is the scientific study of behavior and mental processes, encompassing not just what people do but their biological activities, feelings, perceptions, memory, reasoning and thoughts". It contains many subfields such as clinical, experimental, social, cognitive psychology, etc. According to the field psychologists have chosen they can work in different areas like schools, hospitals or counseling centres.

The second module "A Science Evolves: the Past, the Present and the Future" is about the evolution of psychology science. Despite the fact that people were already thinking about psychological problems many years ago, officially the history of psychology starts when Wilhel Wundt sets up the first psychology laboratory. In our days psychologists not only experiment, but try to help people when they have different kinds of problems in their lives.

In the third module Robert S. Feldman names psychology's key issues and controversies. There are questions how much of our behavoir is due to heredity and nature, how much it is a matter of free will, etc. Unquestionably, it is very important to understand that psychologist can not think about the only one field or issue. Psychology "is a unified science" which is always in progress. The author claims that "Psychology will become increasingly specialized and will pay increasing attention to prevention instead of just treatment".

To sum up, psychology is a science which keeps progressing, conatins many subfields and studies a lot of questions connected with human's thoughts, feelings and behavior.

My Future Profession

Once upon a time in a city near long river was living a small girl called Eglė. She was wery friendly and liked communicating with people. When her friends were crying she was listening and then trying to find solutions. She had never thought that she could work as psychologist till... eleventh form at school when she has started to learn basics of psychology. Then she understood that it's the only thing she want to connect her life with...

There're many people interested in psychology. Some of them are reading books, watching broadcasts about it and so on. Other people are going deeper into this subject ant studying it at universities. I'm one of them. However, not all students who are studying psychology are going to work as psychologists in the future. I don't belong to this group :D Actually, I can't imagine myself sitting in the office and working with the computer only. And I wouldn't like to be some kind of a clerk and repeat the same phrases such as "Welcome", "Thank you for calling", "Hace a nice day" all the time. I am always interested in human's personality, feelings and life experience, not only in his status. Thus, I think that the best choice for so curious person like me is the psychologist's career :D