Recent Media/The Autism Spectrum

Hello again.

This may not be the most articulate post, because I had my wisdom teeth out so I'm currently on Vicodin. But we'll see how it goes :)

During my drug-induced stupor and boredom, I've been reading articles from the NY Times about the Connecticut shootings. I cry very easily, so I haven't been able to read many about the victims. I did read the eulogy of one of the boys, Noah, out of respect but it just upset me too much. 

However, I did read a lot of the coverage on the aftermath and this included "Fears of Stigmatizing People with Autism." Many individuals have stated that rather than increased gun control, we need reform of the mental health system in the United States. Personally, I believe that our country needs both things, but that's not what I'm going to talk about right now. 

Before this tragedy, the gunman had been diagnosed with Asbergers. The NY Times states: 

"...experts say there is no evidence that they are more likely than any other group to commit violent crimes. 'Aggression in autism spectrum disorders is almost never directed to people outside the family or immediate caregivers, is almost never planned, and almost never involves weapons,' said Dr. Catherine Lord, director for Autism and the Developing Mind at the New York Presbyterian Hospital."

That being said, many individuals are worried that this event will create a stigma for those who are on the autism spectrum. 

This hits particularly close to home for me, because both my brother and sister are on the autism spectrum. My sister does not have the most developed social skills and used to have a much worse habit of stealing things, particularly from members of our family, which has gotten better with therapy and time. Earlier today she was saying how she doesn't want to be popular, she just wants A friend, and it absolutely broke my heart. 

My brother's case is a little more extreme. I recently read a blog entry that has become somewhat viral since the shootings. It is written by the mother of a child who has mental illnesses, including Asbergers. She tells a story of him pulling a knife on her after she suggests that he return his library books. She states later in the post: "I love my son. But he terrifies me."

This is how I feel about my brother some days. He is four years old now, so still not particularly intimidating, since we are all still much larger than him. But that little forty-pound boy can already pack a punch. The blog post talks briefly about "intermittent explosive disorder," which I didn't even know existed as a term before reading about it this week. It describes my brother pretty accurately. 

Jakey often has difficulty making eye contact with strangers, which isn't particularly out of the ordinary for little kids. He has a much stronger reaction to anyone looking at him or referring to him in anyway. This usually involves screaming, flailing, and hitting anyone in reach (usually a member of my family).  At Starbucks recently, he started screaming and crying because a man made some small comment directed at him. 

The same thing happens often at home; Jake throws giant fits and becomes extremely violent at the merest suggestions he do something, such as "maybe you should put on some pants" ( a common suggestion in our household). Most of our kitchen stools are broken from him bowling them over out of anger and I'm frequently having to block my head from shoes or large toys being hurled at me, sometimes for no apparent reason. About a week ago, Jake screamed and cried for about half an hour because I had unknowingly walked in front of the tv for a split second while he was watching it. 

We have also talked about Tourettes as a possibility, since Jake is constantly pulling out his use of vulgar language on people, even though when you talk to him at a calmer time, he claims he can't control himself. He has been known to call strangers that anger him "fucking idiots" to their faces.  

I believe that my parents are extremely well-equipped to deal with Jake's violent outbursts and explosions of anger/yelling. They are constantly reading about things to do to calm him down and how to be careful not to trigger him. We have a mantra of "you are safe, you're okay," constantly running during Jake's meltdowns. 

It's hard not to be afraid that my siblings will never be able to live normal lives. I care about them so much and I want them to be happy and healthy always. I don't believe that my brother will ever be so violent as to commit any acts even close to what has happened in society lately (especially since he is only four years old now) and as I said before, my parents are constantly working to help him and get him help. 

There is still a small inkling of fear that he will hurt someone. It's difficult to read about things like this in the media without relating them somewhat to my own life (which is also difficult, since the children killed were very close to the same age as my brother; I truly can't even imagine). 

I think I just need to continue with my faith in the fact that both my brother and sister were adopted into our family for a reason. I don't think that anyone is given situations in life that they are not prepared to handle, and I think that my family has been blessed.  

Sources:

http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/18/our-sons-are-not-future-killers/?smid=tw-nytimes
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/17/dec-17-updates-on-connecticut-shooting-aftermath/?smid=tw-nytimes#autism
http://gawker.com/5968818/i-am-adam-lanzas-mother

Self-Recognition

I find self recognition and self awareness to be incredibly fascinating aspects of social psychology. In my psych class, we first talked about these phenomenons with babies. The rouge test is a frequently repeated assessment among psychologists to determine a child's ability to recognize a reflection in a mirror as their own. In the experiment, a kind of "dot" of rouge or other material is surreptitiously placed on the child's face by the experimenter. The child is then put in front of a mirror and monitored for the response to the dot on their face. Depending on their development, the child will either view the reflection as a playmate and touch the mirror, or they will view the reflection as themselves and will touch the place on their face where the dot has been placed. 

This is undoubtedly a very interesting aspect of self recognition; I babysit a one year old named Abbey in Denver and it's so fun to watch her develop. When I first started watching her, she was 5 months old and couldn't even sit up. From 6-12 months is when a baby generally views its reflection as a playmate rather than themselves, and this was definitely true of Abbey. When I used to hold up a mirror for her, she would giggle and reach for her reflection in the mirror. It hadn’t occurred to me before taking my psychology class that Abbey was probably seeing her reflection as a different playmate, not as a reflection of herself. Now that she is 18 months old, I can also see her beginning to realize her control over her surroundings and realize that she is a separate being from the rest of her surroundings, because her sense of agency is developing. 

While it is very prevalent in babies, I also think of self recognition as something that still takes place in my life as an almost twenty-year-old. Sometimes I truly look at the dimensions of my face in a mirror and wonder what others see. With mirrors and high definition photographs today, we become so accustomed to seeing our own faces that we hardly even think about it anymore. But what about people who lived in times before photographs? For them, a mirror was usually a polished piece of metal or sometimes glass and in the Middle Ages, mirror production was so inefficient and expensive that few people even owned them. What kind of self recognition or self image did those people have without being able to look at themselves whenever they desired? I think we can become very wrapped up in our own image, especially with the expectations for appearance today. My younger sister Jenni, for example, is constantly looking at herself in the mirror to the dismay of my stepdad Brian. Does she see in the mirror the same face I see as my baby sister? Likely not, but I would love to know what she actually sees. I always find it funny when people claim they look horrible in a certain picture and they really look the same as they look any other time. 

Another aspect of self awareness that I love to think about is the human body. I can remember when I was tiny stopping to stare down at my hands and thinking "I am really here on this Earth. My fingers are moving, my toes are moving, and if I merely think about something I can make it happen." This still happens to me every once in awhile, but less so when I'm completely wrapped up in my highly scheduled days. One time I can really connect to my self awareness is when I'm running. Four or five miles into my workout, the thought will pop into my head "The human body is so amazing. How am I even upright right now, let alone running mile after mile?" I think of all the muscles and bones and nerves all at work to keep me moving forward. The complex balance of hitting my foot to the ground, just for a second. The sharp pain that shoots up my leg the second I hit a rock and turn my ankle the wrong way. It's wild. It would probably do me well to learn more about the human body, so I can truly understand what's going on during an intense workout, rather than just marveling at the mystery of it all working together. 

The Actual Psychology Post: Illusory Correlations

Now that I've given you a brief overview of my life and family, I can begin with the actual purpose of my blog: applying psychology to my everyday life. Get excited! It will be fun, I promise. 

I will start with the illusory correlation, since this is easily one of my favorite parts of psychology. It shows up EVERYWHERE in my life. The formal definition of illusory correlation is the phenomenon of seeing an expected relationship between variables (usually people, events, or behaviors) even when no such relationship exists. Straight out of wikipedia. It's the same definition as in my psych class, so I think it's okay. 

Anyways, this phenomenon is constantly happening. For example:

"I always get sick at the end of the quarter. It's like I just finally let myself get sick because I no longer have so many things to do."

I'm not a scientist, and frankly I don't really like biology or chemistry at all, but I don't think it's possible to let yourself get sick. I've heard tons of people say this statement, including myself and my social psychology teacher. Admittedly, the middle of the quarter basically until finals is incredibly stressful. When you're finally done it feels like such a relief and you're no longer deathly afraid of getting sick. That being said, no one says "I always get sick at the middle of the quarter, because it's so stressful and I have so much to do," yet the same amount of people are sick! 

Another good example of this is Christine and my theory on our car troubles. Throughout high school, she and I would switch off having car problems. First I crashed my car (a very traumatic experience that you will likely hear about later, so hold tight), then one week her car was overheating constantly (funny story, don't try and take of the radiator cap immediately after driving the car. It will explode and you will be covered in antifreeze and possibly lose your radiator cap...), then my fan belt was making incredibly high-pitched screeching noises (everyone LOVED hearing me start my car), then her heater broke and I think you get the point. 

The fact is, we were convinced that if one of us had just had a car problem, the other person would always be next. In reality, we more of switched off noticing that our cars had problems, since both cars had many to begin with. But there's some comfort (and some unease) in knowing that I had just had a car problem, so it was Christine's turn to have one before I would have another. 

Welcome to the Family

Many of my posts are naturally going to be about my family. They are an incredibly important part of my life and I learn things from them constantly. Here is a quick overview of them in case you don't know already:

Brian Coppom: My wonderful Stepdad. One of the most kind and levelheaded people I know. He's a baker, a runner, a writer, and one of my favorite people in the world. Brian is much more soft-spoken than the rest of my family, which is I think why we get along so well. I really admire him and he's one of the few people in my life I can always count on for stability and an inappropriate joke. He and my Mom are constantly saying wildly inappropriate things just to see my reaction. He claims that he had a much crazier adolescence than I did, which makes him more understanding at times, but also more wary of any guy who comes near me. I'm still not entirely sure what he does for his business, but I know it involves a lot of traveling.

Nancy Coppom: My awesome Mom. She is one of the most caring and sweet people I know. She has a big personality and a way of sharing her feelings with others that I sometimes wish I had. And sometimes it really really embarrasses me. She loves to cook, bike, talk and she is also one of my favorite people in the world. She loves me and my siblings so much and this often translates into worrying about us constantly, but it also translates into nice cards and care packages. I aspire to be such a caring and expressive person someday, even though I know it might not happen (especially the expressive part). She used to be a CPA and now just does taxes occasionally and works at home.

Jenni LaTorra: My beautiful little 13 year old sister. Jenni was adopted from South Korea and came to the US when she was 5 months old. She and I have a very interesting relationship and I'm not sure I can fully describe. She's a complete chatterbox at times; she has been known to talk at me endlessly while I have headphones in and am totally preoccupied. She and I wrestle and bicker basically every time we're together, but I can't even describe how much I love her. I'm always smothering her and trying to give her hugs which she doesn't like very much. She's very smart and naturally great at volleyball, which I'm very jealous of. You'll probably hear much more about her later.

Jake Hyo Coppom: My adorable little 4 year old brother. You literally can't look at him without commenting on how cute he is. This changes a bit when he's pinching you or pulling your hair. As my Mom likes to say "he is such a little brother." He is constantly antagonizing someone and makes my house a very stressful place to be at times. He is hilarious and more full of life than anyone else I know.

Christine Nangle: I basically have to put Christine in the family section at this point. She is my best friend in the world and the person I go to with literally all my problems. She doesn't give the best advice in the world ("Fuck them, live your life") and she constantly says things to antagonize me ("When I meet him I'm gonna be like, Oh so you're the one she's gonna marry! The way she talks about you...") but I love her like family and I'm confident that she'll always be in my life.

David LaTorra: My Dad. My feelings are still evolving about him. We didn't really talk for the past year after things that happened at Christmastime (which I will likely mention at some point) but he is newly making an effort to connect with me again and get to know me. So we will see how that goes.

Intro

Hello. If you're on this blog, my guess is that you know me, but I will introduce myself anyways. 

I'm Jaimee. With two E's, weird but I love it. I am a sophomore this year at the University of Denver and I wish I knew what I'd like to do what my life. Maybe this blog will help me get a better idea...? I've gone back and forth between so many things. At any point in time, I've wanted to be a teacher, a social psychologist, and now maybe something involving marketing? Hopefully something to tie in my business and psychology degrees. It could be different at any given moment. I love being at school though (generally) because I feel like I'm learning invaluable information every day. 

I like to think of myself as a compassionate person. I care about others, but I have a hard time showing it at times. If I were to live up to my expectation of myself, I think I would try more to help others, but I have a habit of doing things for selfish reasons. That being said, I love people. I care about people and I truly do my best to not hurt others. I love seeing people happy. Unlike some of the members of my family, I'm not terribly outspoken. This is probably one of the reasons why my favorite book is The Perks of Being a Wallflower. I love to observe people more than anything and just see them interact, rather than inserting myself into every conversation. That being said, I can be incredibly talkative once I really get to know people. That's probably a good way to gauge how comfortable I feel around you. 

I recently went to a guest speaker for my management class who claimed that it was absolutely essential to have an "internet presence." I don't know how much I believe in that, but I do think blogging would be a good use of my time. I do truly love writing and I think I could always use an outlet to get my thoughts out. Plus I could really use to break my Netflix addiction. 

This blog will be devoted to connecting social psychology to my everyday experiences. Psychology is the one thing I'm truly fascinated by. My friends who are studying biology say that they like to see how things work. Well I absolutely love seeing how people work. Social psychology helps me learn so much about myself and why I do the weird things that I do.