Tag: behaviour

Posted in Life & Happiness

Awkward

Posted on by Jinavie

When do we feel awkward? We feel awkward when we don’t know how to act in a certain social situation. For example, some people find it awkward interacting with new people at a party, while others find it awkward to be in the same room as an ex-partner. This is because we cannot predict how the other person will react to how we act, what we say and who we are. Almost everyone is socially awkward to some degree, because we are social animals who fear rejection from the group.

But like anything in life, we can overcome awkwardness. Let us look at two different situations we feel awkward in and how we might remedy this.

With strangers, we feel awkward because we do not know them well enough to predict their perception of and reaction to us. It is hard to tell if our joke would offend them in some way, or if they would judge us for a certain personality quirk. We worry that they will scoff or laugh at us, and that we will be social outcasts.

The solution is simple: don’t care. Don’t care about how a stranger judges you, when they barely know the intricate blend of life experience, personality traits, thoughts and feelings that make up who you are. The only opinion you should care about is what you think of yourself (and maybe of one or two people you trust most in the world to know you best). When you lose your sense of shame and take pride in who you are, you will feel more confident and less awkward.

What about someone you know well, but with whom you have gone through an awkward situation, such as a break-up or a fight? The awkwardness here stems from the fact that you do not know how that situation has changed your relationship. You no longer know if the same rules of engagement apply as before. Is it okay to hug them? Is it okay to talk about the past? What do they think of us now? All of these neurotic questions make us anxious, and to avoid them, we avoid the person altogether. But because the other person feels just as awkward, the relationship wilts away until it cannot be repaired.

Here, the solution is simple, but takes a lot of work: communication. It is impossible to know what the other person is thinking and vice versa. To clear up the awkwardness, we need to talk about our feelings and clear up misunderstandings. This does not necessarily have to be through a face-to-face talk with words. We can show this through our actions, by showing our willingness to rebuild the connection and that we still care about the other person. If either person did not care about the other person at all, then there is no awkwardness because there is a clear answer. Awkwardness is a sign that both sides wants to fix this situation, but they don’t know how.

Awkwardness is a form of anxiety that stems from our concerns of what others think of us. Remember: it’s not awkward unless we let it be awkward.

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

Emotional Intelligence

Posted on by Jinavie

Out of all the traits and skills we value, admire and teach to our children, one of the most neglected seems to be that of emotional intelligence. Most people are not even aware what emotional intelligence really means.

Emotional intelligence can be summarised as the ability to recognise, analyse and control the emotions of yourself and others around you. It begins with recognising the presence of an emotion, either through mindfulness or empathy. Once the emotion has been identified, analyse that emotion: where it came from, what effect it is having on the current situation and what the subtext may be. Lastly, use this information to prevent yourself from overreacting, or to understand why someone may be reacting so defensively or aggressively and how to defuse the situation.

Harnessing the power of emotions is a very useful skill. We like to think of ourselves as highly advanced, intelligent beings, but we are still ruled by basic instincts and emotions embedded deep in our brains. Emotional intelligence works to give us more control over our behaviour and unlocking the power to live a happier life. More importantly, it lets us improve the lives of those around us as we are less likely to do or say hurtful things, while being a more kind, supportive human being.

Let us take an example. You are frustrated at your partner because she has not texted back for over a day. Using emotional intelligence, you recognise that you are feeling angry, but also disappointment and rejection. Further analysis shows that these stem from a subconscious expectation that if she cared about you, she would have texted you. The real reason that you are angry at your partner stems from your insecurities, possibly even past trust or abandonment issues. You also remember that she has been very stressed with a project recently, so she may not be in the mood to talk. The end result is that instead of sending passive-aggressive signals at your partner and creating a rift in your relationship, you bring some chocolate ice cream to cheer your partner up.

Like any other kind of intelligence, emotional intelligence must be learned through education and practice. We cannot rein in our emotions if we have never thought about how our past affects us or what motivates or scares us. We cannot possibly understand why the other person is reacting a certain way, if we never trained the ability to see things from their perspective. We cannot help others process emotions such as depression and anxiety, if we cannot understand our own emotions.

We can teach ourselves to be more emotionally intelligent. Meditation and self-reflection allows us to catalogue and interpret your range of emotions. Reading books helps us understand that other people may have a different way of seeing the world. Having deep and meaningful conversations with your loved ones lets you clear up misunderstandings and better learn why people react a certain way in given situations.

We can then apply this knowledge to constantly hone our skills. It may sound exhausting, but every time you feel a strong emotion – whether it is negative or positive – try to analyse it with your rational mind. The more you practise, the more you will be in touch with your own emotions.

Emotional intelligence is an invaluable tool on the journey of life. With increasing levels of emotional intelligence, you quickly realise why things are the way they are. We are all scared little children in the playground, pulling someone’s hair because we cannot tell them that we love them, or punching someone in the face because we cannot withstand the inexplicable surges of insecurity and self-doubt.

Now look back on yourself: how have emotions affected your life and your relationships? What fights and sufferings could have been avoided had you stopped to interpret the emotions and simply talked things out?
The emotional side of you is an integral part of your identity. Why make it your worst enemy when it can be your best ally?

Posted in Philosophy

The Minds Of Others

Posted on by Jinavie

How do we know that the world we perceive is the same as other people? How do we know that what I call “red” looks the same to another person? How do we know that other people are hearing the same music, smelling the same scent or even feeling the same emotions that we do? We infer from other people’s behaviours that fundamentally, we are all the “same”. We see other people enjoy the same things as us or think along the same lines as us, then we empathise.

However, as human beings, we are unable to read other people’s minds. All we can do is interpret people’s speech and behaviour to try gauge what they are thinking. This means that technically speaking, we can never truly know that other people have minds of their own. For all you know, the person in front of you could be an automaton that is programmed to respond to their environment in a manner similar to you.

As discussed above, we subjectively know (or assume) that other people have minds of their own, given what we observe. But then what of animals, artificial intelligence or even comatose people? How can we know that they have a conscious mind? The short answer is that there is no black-or-white answer, but it sure is an interesting philosophical discussion to ponder – one which has been pondered for millennia. This is the problem of other minds.

We cannot objectively “see” or read into another conscious mind. However, we can approximate what that mind is like from the person’s behaviour – their words and their actions. This is almost like sketching an animal that you have never seen just by listening to someone giving you an account of it. Therefore, if you want to get to know someone – to understand their mind, their essence, their soul – all you can do is talk with them, sketching out the finer details as the conversations get deeper and deeper.

Posted in Science & Nature

Honeybee Dance

Posted on by Jinavie

How do honeybees share the location of a food source, such as a flower, to other bees of their colony? An Austrian biologist named Karl Von Frisch devised an experiment to learn how the honeybees communicated with each other. He set up two different food sources and tagged every bee that came to pot A green and bees that came to pot B red. He then studied the behaviour of these bees back at the hive. What he discovered was fascinating.

For millennia, beekeepers have noticed that some honeybees have a tendency of moving in a peculiar yet methodical way once they returned to their hive after foraging for flowers. The bees would move in a straight line while waggling their bottom (moving side-to-side), then walk in a semicircle back to where they started. They would then waggle in the same direction, then move in a semicircle on the opposite side, completing a figure-eight path. This is called a waggle dance.

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Frisch noticed that bees with green spots and the bees with red spots both did the waggle dance once they returned to the hive, but in different directions. All bees with green spots danced so that the straight line pointed a certain direction, while the bees with red spots danced the same dance except pointing another direction. Amazingly, the angle between these two directions was exactly the same as the angle separating pot A and B (with the hive as a point of origin). Frisch deduced that the waggle dance was the language of honeybees.

Through further experimentation, Frisch was able to tease out the details of this “language”.

  • Honeybees’ eyes can see ultraviolet and polarised light, which allows them to see where the sun is in the sky at all times. This is because sunlight polarises so that it points towards the sun and honeybees can see this direction. Therefore, the bee’s eyes act as a solar compass that tracks the exact location of the sun in real-time.
  • Bees have a finely-tuned internal clock that allows them to predict exactly where the sun should be depending on time, season and latitude, as the sun moves through the sky.
  • Another point of reference that is used in the bees’ language is gravity. Gravity is a constant that does not change, meaning all bees know which direction is “up” and which is “down”. This also means they can use a vertical, perpendicular line as a standard zero-point.

By pairing the two global constants, gravity and the location of the sun, the bees can accurately signal to other bees the direction they should fly in to find the food source. If a bee does a waggle dance that points 60° right from the vertical “up” direction (as defined by gravity), it signals that the bees should fly 60° right from the direction of the sun. If the angle is 0°, the bees should fly directly towards the sun, and if the angle is 180°, the bees should fly directly away from the sun. The bees use their internal clock to calibrate the direction depending on the time of the day.

The straight line “waggle” part of the dance gives the information of distance. The longer the duration of the straight line, the further away the flower is. As a general rule of thumb, the duration of the straight line increases by 1 second for every 1 kilometre. When the food is within about 60m of the hive, the 8-shape waggle dance turns into an O-shape round dance. The bee deduces the distance by the energy required to fly to the location.

By encoding the two variables “direction” and “distance”, a bee can effectively use the waggle dance to accurately pinpoint the location of a food source. It is amazing to see that animals that we consider “primitive” such as bees have such an intricate method of communication.

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(Image source: http://aireona93.deviantart.com/art/YAY-Waggle-Dance-146361214?q=boost%3Apopular%20waggle%20dance&qo=1)

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

Reaction

Posted on by Jinavie

If you were walking along the street and found a bird lying on the ground, how would you react? You would probably poke the bird to see if it is alive. We have a peculiar habit since we are children of poking living things that we see for the first time. Through poking, we discover whether it is alive or dead, soft or hard, slimy or furry, docile or aggressive.

Prompting a reaction and observing the reaction is a surprisingly useful way of learning. In chemistry, we react an unknown substance with other chemicals to discover its identity. In medicine, we stimulate parts of the brain with electricity to discover what each part does. In physics, we build giant accelerator to crash particles together to find out their constituents and properties. If you fell into a cave so dark you cannot see even one foot ahead of you, the best way to find out if there is a wall or a hole or water ahead of you is throwing a rock in that direction.

This principle can be applied to psychology. To learn how people around you behave, provoke them. Human beings are extremely sensitive to stimuli and even when they consciously try to hide it, they will subconsciously react. If you keep (subtly) poking the person, you will soon be able to predict how they will react to something, what actions they will take, and you may even discover what is on their mind.

We cannot see the wind, but we can infer that it exists because the leaves blow. The best way to prove something that you cannot see inducing and looking for reactions.

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

Overpopulation

Posted on by Jinavie

In 1972, John B. Calhoun designed a very specific mice cage called Universe 25, also known as the Mortality-Inhibiting Environment for Mice. Universe 25 was designed as a practical utopia for mice. It was constantly replenished with food and water, each wall had an intricate grid of nesting boxes connected by mesh tunnels and stairwells (like an apartment) and the cage was cleaned periodically. There were no predators, the temperature was set at a comfortable level and all mice resident were disease-free. In all ways, Universe 25 was an idyllic home for the mice.

Calhoun’s aim of this experiment was the same as the countless experiments before Universe 25: to see the effects of abundance on a population, and the consequences of that. Biologically speaking, a population only grows to the point that the environment can sustain it and then plateaus. So if the environment is completely abundant, the population will grow and grow without limitations (other than space). Thus, Calhoun’s main focus was overpopulation in societies. What did he find?

At the start of the experiment, four breeding pairs of mice were introduced to Universe 25. They began reproducing after 104 days of familiarisation and the population increased exponentially. The mice flourished in the prosperous environment. Around day 315, population growth slowed. By this stage, the mice population had grown to over 600, which made Universe 25 very crowded. Although there were still plenty of resources, the problem of overpopulation still remained. As the population grew and space became limited, male mice found it too difficult to defend their territory and eventually gave up doing so. The mice began losing their ability to form social bonds and these mice (“failures”) began congregating at the centre of the cage. This group of mice gave up on all normal social behaviour, leading to constant violence. The violence soon spread throughout the cage, with the mice society descending into chaos. The females, stressed and confused by the violence, attacked and cannibalised their own young, after which they retreated to the highest nest boxes where they isolated themselves. Certain males (termed “the beautiful ones” by Calhoun) did not show violence or any interest in females, choosing only to eat, sleep and groom themselves, wrapped in narcissistic introspection. Because of these two isolated groups, procreation slumped and population growth slowed. Elsewhere, in the “inner city” group at the middle of the cage, cannibalism, pansexualism and violence became common. The entire society had collapsed.

On day 560, the population ceased to grow at a peak population of 2200. After this, the number of pregnancies dwindled to nothing and no young survived past infancy. Adult mice were also affected, with mortality rates skyrocketing at all ages and increased rates of diseases. It was clear that the population was headed towards extinction. Even after the population dwindled down to a much more sustainable number, the mice were incapable of (or chose not to) reproducing to regenerate the population. Not only did mice society die, but the mice themselves met a grim fate as well.

This result was repeated in all of Calhoun’s experiments, conclusively showing that overpopulation leads to the demise of a society. Calhoun described this as “crowding into the behavioural sink”. He explained that the mice served as a warning to what human societies are headed towards if we do not solve the problem of overpopulation. We can already see the effect overpopulation has on societies. It is a known fact that people living in the inner areas of a city are more prone to poverty, crime, violence and a lower quality of life. However, Calhoun was not a nihilist. Instead of saying “humanity is doomed”, he explored different ways of resolving the problem. The most effective idea he came up with was space colonisation.

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

Tit For Tat

Posted on by Jinavie

In human society, there are many ways for a person to interact with others when in a group setting. Some may choose to be selfish and only be out for their best interests, while others may choose altruism and cooperate with each other. The mathematical model that tries to predict human behaviour and outcome in these settings is the Prisoner’s Dilemma – the core of game theory. Tit for tat is one strategy that can be employed in such a setting.

The basis of tit for tat is equivalent exchange. A tit for tat player always chooses to cooperate unless provoked. As seen in the Prisoner’s Dilemma, if both players cooperate, both benefit (let us say 3 points each); if one player defects, that person gains more than from cooperation (5 points) while the tit for tat player gains 0 points.
If a tit for tat player is provoked, that player will retaliate. However, the player is also quick to forgive. Ergo, if the other player chose to cooperate, the tit for tat player (following the principle of equivalent exchange), will also cooperate. If the other player defected, the tit for tat player loses the first round and then chooses to defect from then on.
Note that tit for tat strategy only works when there is more than one game so that the player has a chance to retaliate.

Let us use an example to illustrate why tit for tat strategy works. In this scenario, two tit for tat players and two defectors all play six games each, using the above point system (if both defect, they each receive 1 point). The results are as follows:
  • Tit for tat vs defector: Tit for tat loses first round, both defect for next 5 rounds (5 vs 10)
  • Tit for tat vs tit for tat: Both cooperate on every round (18 vs 18)
  • Defector vs defector: Both defect on every round (6 vs 6)

When the points are added up, a tit for tat player gains 28 points (5 + 5 + 18) while a defector only gains 26 points (6 + 10 + 10). This is a surprising turn of events, as the defectors never lost a round and tit for tat players never “won” a round. This goes to show how cooperation leads to better long-term results while selfishness prevails.

There are shortcomings of this strategy. If there is a failure in communication and one tit for tat player mistakes the other’s actions as an “attack”, they will retaliate. The other player then retaliates to this and a vicious cycle is formed. This is the basis of many conflicts ranging from schoolyard fights to wars (although interestingly, tit for tat strategy is also found during wars in the form of “live and let live”). One way to prevent this is tit for tat with forgiveness, where one player randomly cooperates to try break the cycle (a defector would respond negatively while a tit for tat player will accept the cooperation), or the tit for two tats, where the tit for tat player waits a turn before retaliating, giving the opponent a chance to “make up for their mistake”.

Computer simulations have all proven that tit for tat strategy (especially the other two types mentioned just before) are extremely effective in games. In fact, it is considered one of the most optimal strategies in overcoming the Prisoner’s Dilemma.

In human societies, there is usually a mix of “nice people” and “selfish people”. By cooperating and trusting each other, we can produce a much greater gain over time compared to being selfish. And since society still unfortunately has “defectors”, you can retaliate to those who refuse to cooperate by defecting on them also. Ergo, a good approach to life is to initially reach out your hand to whoever you meet and treat them from there on according to how they respond. If they take your hand and want to cooperate, treat them with altruism and help them out. If they swat your hand away and try to use you for their selfish gain, it is fine to shun them and not help them out.

Through cooperation, understanding and connection, we can build a far more productive and efficient society, just like the ants.

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

OCEAN

Posted on by Jinavie

A major challenge in psychology has been the question: “how do we categorise personalities?”. There have been many different approaches, one famous model being the Big Five model. This model describes five traits, summarised as OCEAN:

  • Openness: Describes a person who is creative, imaginative, abstract and curious. People with high openness scores are often skilled in the arts and inventing. They always seek new experiences. The perfect example for Openness is Leonardo da Vinci. This trait can be subdivided into the subcategories: Imagination, Artistic interests, Sensitivity, Adventurous, Curiosity and Tolerance for diversity.
  • Conscientiousness: Describes a person who is reliable, trustworthy, hardworking, plans ahead, goal-oriented, efficient, responsible and moral. The perfect example for Conscientiousness is Robocop. The subcategories are: Sense of competence, Orderliness, Responsibility, Achievement-striving, Self-discipline and Deliberateness.
  • Extraversion: Describes a person who is chatty, energetic, passionate, stubborn, social, easily makes friends and opinionated. The perfect example for Extraversion is Eddie Murphy. The subcategories are: Friendliness, Gregariousness, Assertiveness, Activeness, Excitement-seeking and Positive.
  • Agreeableness: Describes a person who likes to help others, is compassionate, friendly, forgiving, trusting, cooperative and empathetic. It is more about humanism rather than describing a spineless person. The perfect example for Agreeableness is Mother Teresa. The subcategories are: Trusting, Sincerity, Altruism, Compliance, Modesty and Sympathy.
  • Neuroticism: Describes a person who is unstable, easily depressed or worried, dark and susceptible to negative emotions. It is not the same as “neurotic”, which describes a mental disorder. The perfect example for Neuroticism is Woody Allen. The subcategories are: Anxiety, Self-consciousness, Hostility, Self-indulgence, Moodiness and Sensitivity to stress.

When the model is applied to a person, the person gets a score as a percentage for each trait. By using the Big Five score, one can compare different personalities and predict what kind of behaviour they would show in different situations.

Posted in Psychology & Medicine

Birthday Cake

Posted on by Jinavie

The ritual of blowing out candles on one’s birthday is interesting as it shows the characteristics of human beings very well. This ritual shows that the person can make fire while reminding themselves they can extinguish it with one breath. It is a ritual that helps a baby develop into a responsible, social being that is capable of controlling fire. On the other hand, an old person being so breathless that they cannot even blow out a candle signifies that it is time for them to be socially excluded by the active population.

Posted in Science & Nature

Bat

Posted on by Jinavie

The most famous characteristics of a bat is its behaviour of hanging upside down. This strange behaviour actually greatly benefits a bat’s survival.  Because a bat’s wing is structurally different to a bird’s, it cannot generate enough flight to lift a bat off the ground directly. Therefore, bats leap off a high location to fly, so hanging from a high place allows them to fly off at any given moment. Also, living in a high place provides protection from predators.

A bat’s anatomy has heavily adapted to accommodate this behaviour. Thanks to its unique anatomical structure, a bat expends no energy while hanging. This is because they have talons that are designed to clench naturally when pulled by gravity, as the tendons tense. Thus, when hanging upside down, a bat can rest peacefully, and can even sleep in that posture as it requires no muscle action (all muscles relax in REM sleep).

As it is the norm to live upside down, a bat does everything in that manner. As stated above, a bat sleeps upside down, eats upside down, mate upside down, and even stay like that after death. There is only one time a bat stands upright: when it excretes waste. Even behaviour cannot overcome the power of gravity.