Help academic writing showcase 11 14

HELP ACADEMIC WRITING SHOWCASE

Volume 1 ~ Issue 1 ~ Fall I 2014

In the Fall I Term of HELP 141W – Academic Writing, students learned how to write an academic research paper.

This inaugural issue of the HELP Academic Writing Showcase spotlights the wonderful work of these students.

The topics they chose were based on the reading they had done on human behavior.

Hyunjung Gu The Problems of Adolescents in Relationships………………. 2 Adolescents may have conflicts with their family, siblings, girlfriends or boyfriends and peers. This paper discusses the various problems of adolescents in their relationships.

Anna Kakimoto “What Makes People Motivated?”………………….………… 13 This paper discusses how people motivate themselves. In my opinion, there are many ways to become motivated. However, the important thing is that people should find a motivation method that suits them.

Younghee Lim “The Things People Can Do Better When They Know Themselves”…………………………………………………..… 23 This paper discusses how people could be improved in their behaviour when they know and change their psychological factors.

Karen Takada “What Is Happiness”………………………………………………34 This paper discusses the what the happiness is. The discussion begins by examining values of happiness for adolescents and adults.

Moeka Yamada “Methods of dealing with their environment for adolescents” …………………………………………….…….…. 44 This paper discusses the various issues surrounding adolescents. Many teenagers are having many issues; for example, issues that are caused from stress, struggled, risktaking, and social relationship.

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The Problems of Adolescents in Relationships

The Problems of Adolescents in Relationships Hyunjung Gu University of Hawai‘i at Manoa

Final Essay Assignment HELP 441W Fall 1, 2014

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Introduction Adolescence is a period of life characterised by dramatic changes and difficulties. Teens’ bodies experience physical changes. Also, they are given more expectations by society. Adolescents are expected to behave like adults, not children. However, some adolescents are frustrated by these changes because they think that they are still children. By various changes, they usually get confusion and have some problems in their lives. In particular, teenagers have problems when they form relationships with other people. Adolescents may have conflicts with their family, siblings, girlfriends or boyfriends and peers. This paper discusses the various problems of adolescents in their relationships.

The discussion begins by examining what adolescence is.

What is Adolescence?

In general, adolescence is the middle period between adult and child life. All teenagers go through a period of change from childhood to adulthood. There is no one definition of adolescence.

There are various perspectives in the world. According to Seal (2012), knowing accurately when adolescence starts or finishes is hard. For Korea’s general law, adolescence is applied to the children under 19 years of age. However, the exact age of adolescence is as variant as there are types of law.

Adolescence can also mean the period from 7th grade to 12th grade, from middle school students to high school students. By this definition, elementary school students are not included. Educational psychologists define adolescence as related to physical development and mental maturity (Ormrod, 2011). Although there are various definitions, this paper uses the definition of adolescence most often used by developmental psychology.

Various Perspectives on Adolescents

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There are many perspectives on adolescence. Some people don’t see teenagers positively.

They think that teenagers are trouble­makers. According to their opinions, adolescents are rebellious and defiant to adults. Also, they are antagonistic and tend to be hostile regarding society’s rules.

Unlike negative perspectives on adolescence, some people regard teenagers positively.

Adolescents have a lot of power and energy. They possess unlimited potential to fulfill their dreams. In addition, they have many chances to experience various things. If they want to try something new, they are not reluctant most of the time.

These perspectives are derived from an adult’s viewpoint. They sometimes misjudge their children. If they don’t like teenagers’ life styles, their way of thinking and their culture, adults tend to think that teenagers have problems. However, most teenager don’t think that they cause problems. They behave as they do. Their behavior is natural. Teenagers may insist that adults exaggerate their minor errors. Some matters that adults regard as dangerous might not be risky. Some adolescents may say that although adults don’t know teenager’s culture or trend well, they pretend to know them very well.

For example, a few years ago, a reporter said that teenagers are addicted to playing games and it makes them aggressive. He demonstrated this hypothesis through an experiment. He suddenly shut off the power supply to turn off the computers being used by teenagers playing online games. At that moment, teenagers were so upset. Some of them kicked their chair and sweared. The report said to viewers that because of video games, teenagers are addicted and show their aggression. Actually, it could be because someone suddenly powered off their computer without any notice that teenagers expressed their anger. It was not caused only by video games. Also, this appears to be an overgeneralization to define all adolescents without knowing enough about them. Therefore, some teenagers don’t trust adults. They believe that adults always think that adolescents cause problems.

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Problems to Make Relationships With Parents When we watch TV dramas, we can see frequently the scene that shows the conflict between parents and their children. Most adolescents have an attitude of defiance. Maybe, the most rebellious phase during life is adolescence. There is one reason for it. In this phase, the adolescents want to be independent from their parents. They think of themselves as adults. Unlike them, parents don’t regard their children as adults. For some parents, they think of teenagers as babies even though their son and daughter are over 18 years old.

Also, parents tend to overprotect their children. If a 16 year old girl wants to go camping and wants to have a good time with her friends, she might not be allowed to go. When she tells her parents that she will go camping with her friends, her parents reply to her: “You must not go.” As she listens to their words, she becomes defiant of them. She thinks that her parents don’t understand her. Even more, she might insist that they hate her because they don’t grant her wish. But it is not true. On the contrary, they probably love her very much. So, they don’t want her to be hurt by dangerous things. Her parents hope that she stays safe, but she doesn’t comprehend their intentions. She doesn’t care about potential danger elements that might hurt her. She only focuses on whether she can go camping or not. This example illustrates a conflict between parents and their teenage children.

These conflicts may be caused by “personal fables”. According to Elkind, “personal fables” are imaginary stories. It indicates that adolescents tend to think they will be safe from hazard. Teenagers regard themselves as lucky characters based on unreasonable thought (Seal, 2012). If they try to smoke at first, they don’t think that they will be addicted. Rather they imagine that they will manage the problem. Also they think that they can drive their car well even after drinking. Addiction to smoking and

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car accidents by drunk­driving are common, but teenagers think that it is not related to them because they make their own “personal fables.”

Adults are aware of danger more than teenagers. When teenagers are undergoing a period of wanting to do something unconventional and risky, adults have already undergone the stage. Although they had not been in peril directly, they have had indirect experiences since they were adolescents too.

For example, some people haven’t become addicted to the use of narcotics. But they know its side effects very well. Therefore, they don’t permit their children’s wishwhen it is related to danger.

With Siblings Sibling relationships are various depending upon their ages. Some young children don’t like their younger sibling because younger brothers or sisters spend more time with their parents and get more attention (Sears, 2013). They feel envious and jealous to their young siblings. If it gets worse, these feelings change from light emotion to resentment. They might think that their siblings take their parents from them. So they may express their emotion by hitting their siblings. Although the teenagers are older than their siblings, they want to be loved and get attention from their parents.

However, some adolescents have a serious difficulty in sibling relationship. It is caused by the difference between siblings’ age and sex. First, they suffer changes about their view toward their sibling.

Oswalt (n. d.) mentioned that as people get older, their interests change. If the difference between sibling’s ages is slight before entering elementary school, their interests are similar. They might like playing with toys or playing video games. For girls, they like playing with dolls or putting make­up on each other’s faces. But, as the older sister or brother grow up, they become interested in new things.

Oswalt (n. d.) stresses that older siblings tend to feel that they are different from young siblings. Also, they may feel that younger sisters and brothers are childish. They don’t want to get along with them

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anymore. During that period, most adolescents want to spend time with their friends not their sibling.

Younger siblings want to play with their older siblings, but older siblings ignore them.

In addition, adolescents need their private space, a space like a room that nobody can enter except them. It helps adolescents think about themselves and identify their egos. So, they don’t like it to be invaded by someone, not even their family. Some teenagers go home, and upon arrival, they go straight to their room. They hardly ever leave the room because they enjoy their private time. So, when their younger sibling comes to their room to play with them, they tend to easily become upset because their precious time is interrupted. However, younger siblings don’t understand them. Rather, they think that their older sisters and brothers hate them. This misunderstanding makes their relationship become worse.

With Girlfriends and Boyfriends Above this, adolescents may experience problems with their girlfriends or boyfriends. Generally, teenagers become aware of the opposite sex and take an interest in it as they mature. They want to have a girlfriend or boyfriend. Why do the teenagers have this desire? One reason is that when they meet their lover, their self­esteems may be higher than before. In some countries, having a partner is valued highly because it demonstrates that the person is loved by someone. A pair of lovers shows that they are important and precious people by each other. Both of them feel happiness and a sense of stability. They can prove that their partner is a good person enough to get along with. While they go out with the opposite sex, they can feel superiority to other teenagers who are single.

However, there are a lot of problems with teenagers getting along with their girlfriend or boyfriend. They don’t know about the opposite sex very well. All people are selfish and they have their own perspective (Carnegie, 1936). Adolescents are egoistical. They behave as they want and judge

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other people. Therefore, adolescents may lack understanding of the opposite sex’s personality and thought. It causes problems between girlfriends and boyfriends. For example, there is a young girl who has a problem with her friend. She wants to share this problem with her boyfriend. What she wants from the boyfriend is for him to listen to her complain and express sympathy for her. Unlike her wish, her boyfriend starts to analyze her situation. He distinguishes between who is right and who is wrong.

Furthermore, he may judge that his girlfriend caused the discord between her and her friend. Then, her feeling is hurt more severely than before, because she believed that her boyfriend would side with her.

She is disappointed at him and gets angry. After this, she may not want to talk with him anymore. But he don’t understand why her attitude changed. He had intended to figure out what the problem between her and her friend was and giving a solution to her to get along with her friend again. So, these misunderstandings to each other worsen their relationship.

Likewise, females might be significantly different from males. According to Rosseta Stone’s Fit Brains Blog (2014), there are big differences between the brain of women and men. They said that men’s brains are 8% bigger than women’s. Although women’s brains are smaller than men’s, they have more interconnections than men. Women tend to be good at thinking related to “bigger picture” situations (Rosseta Stone, 2014). In contrast, men perform better at mathematical and spatial thinking because in their brain, there is an area called the “Inferior­Parietal Lobule” (IPL). This area controls the mathematical field. Men have a larger IPL than women. Also, they stated that women usually get pain more strongly than men. The part of the brain called the Inferior­Parietal Lobule, which controls mathematical thought, is larger in men than women, resulting in better mathematical and special thinking in men. The amygdala which is the brain part stimulated when a person feels pain is activated differently depending on gender. For women, the left amygdala is activated more. The left side of the amygdala is

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more connected with emotional work. On the contrary to this, the right side is better at logical work.

So, women seem easily hurt by emotional problems and need more healing for pain in comparison to men.

Also, women have a bigger limbic system than men. The limbic system’s major function is to make people in touch with and express their emotions more. Generally women are really good at being sympathetic with other people. However, men tend to concentrate on what is the main issue and ignore trivial background information.

As above, the difference between women and men is considerable. To make a good relationship with the opposite sex, recognizing the difference is necessary. For adolescents, it is difficult because they think they are the same since they have grown up together regardless of gender. They assume that other people’s thinking is the same as theirs and behaviors are similar to theirs because teenagers are egocentric thinkers. Their immature thoughts cause the problems with their girlfriend or boyfriend.

With Peers When people talk about adolescents, they can’t help but mention their peers. During adolescence, friends have the greatest impact. Friends are very important for adolescents because they help them establish their identities. Grose (n.d.), a parenting expert, mentioned that peers are people who accompany each other from childhood to adulthood. They may share various experiences. Also, they provide a sense of belonging, security and high self­confidence. Teenagers can motivate and help each other when someone is in a hard situation. They support their friends in their own way, which is different from the support a family can provide.

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However, when teenagers make friends, some problems appear. First of all, adolescents want to have friends that are similar to themselves or popular among them. They don’t want to associate with teenagers who are regarded as “nerd” or “freak.” A lot of teenagers stay away from such people. The teenagers who are discriminated against by most teenagers become “outcasts.” Peers reject them and leave them out in the cold. Oswalt (n.d.c) pointed out that by these rejections, outcast students suffer a painful life and distressing memories.

If the peer rejection get worse, some teenagers commit violent acts. Oswalt (n.d.c) said that bullying to other people makes attackers and victims unhappy. It brings about serious long­lasting side effects. For example, there is a bully who always teased and annoyed his friends. He teased them even in front of many other students. Eventually, his friends didn’t endure his bullying, and they quit the school. The bully didn’t know that his friends would quit because a bully usually doesn’t know how painful the bullying is to a victim. After that, the bully would have to live with a bad memory of him making his friends quit the school. Like in this example, committing violence can be a serious problem for teenagers.

Adolescents can be influenced by negative effects of peer pressure. Many adolescents want to belong in their peer group. Generally, adolescents think that if they behave as their friends do, they will be accepted by them. Oak (2012) suggested that there are three negative effects. First, teenager’s decisions would be wrong because they tend to comply with their peers’ decisions without their own thinking. Second, adolescents might acquire bad habits. Peer pressure can lead them to take risks like smoking or doing drugs. If a boy has many friends who are smoking, he has great likelihood to smoke.

To spend much time with his friend, smoking might be necessary for him. Third, peer pressure may cause people to lose their own characteristics. To get along with their peers, many teenagers adopt or

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follow their friends’ tastes, regardless of their own preferences. If his or her friends like something, even though he or she doesn’t like it, teens usually pretend to like it too.

Conclusion This paper has discussed the problems of adolescents in various relationships. Many adolescents have difficulties when they have relationships with other people. This discussion has uncovered what makes teenagers get relationship problems and how teengers react to the problems. It is not clear how adolescents solve their problems with family or friends, but it can be understood why adolescents behave that way. Through this discussion people may understand that teenagers are somewhat different from other age groups. It provides some information to understand them more than before. For humans, adolescence is a very important period. It is necessary to analyze adolescents’ problems more and more and consider solutions about it.

Reference Carnegie, D. (1936). How to win friends and influence people. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster.

Coleman, C. (n.d.). Kids who hate their siblings. Globalpost. Retreived from http://everydaylife.globalpost.com/kids­hate­siblings­9994.html Grey, S. (2013). Positive effects of dating for teenagers. Livestrong. Retreived from http://www.livestrong.com/article/154840­positive­effects­of­dating­for­teenagers/ Grose, M. (n.d.). The importance of teen friendships. Body+Soul Mums. Retreived from http://mums.bodyandsoul.com.au/pregnancy+parenting/parenting+tips/the+importance+of+teen +friendships,7797

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Kristine, T. (n.d.). Good things about teens dating. Globalpost. Retreived from http://everydaylife.globalpost.com/good­things­teens­dating­7390.html Niu, A. (2014). Gender & the brain: Differences between women & men. Retreived from http://www.fitbrains.com/blog/women­men­brains/ Oak, M. (2012). Negative and positive effects of peer pressure. Buzzle. Retreived from http://www.buzzle.com/articles/negative­and­positive­effects­of­peer­pressure.html Ormrod, J. (2011). Educational psychology: developing learners. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

Oswalt, A. (n.d.a). Teens and family relationships: Parents. Resources. Retreived from http://www.sevencounties.org/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=41169&cn=1310 Oswalt, A. (n.d.b). Teens and family relationships: Siblings. Resources. Retreived from http://www.sevencounties.org/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=41170&cn=1310 Oswalt, A. (n.d.c). Teens and peer relationships. Resources. Retreived from http://www.sevencounties.org/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=41168&cn=1310 Seal, B. (2012). Academic encounters. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

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What Makes People Motivated?

Anna Kakimoto University of Hawai‘i at Manoa

Essay Assignment HELP 441W Fall 1, 2014

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Introduction When people do something, they need motivation. For example, foreign students need motivation for studying languages. However, sometimes they do not have motivation or lose their motivation and it is difficult for them to maintain motivation. Not only are foreign students struggling with motivation, but also other people are worried about how to stay motivated. This paper discusses how people motivate themselves. In my opinion, there are many ways to become motivated. However, the important thing is that people should find a motivation method that suits them. The discussion begins by examining the motivation method for olympic athletes.

Motivational factors in different situations In case of olympic athletes, they need to maintain motivation to participate in Olympics every four years. In the article “How olympians stay motivated”, Khazan (2014) writes practicing self­talk can improve sports performance. For instance, one of the Olympic gymnast medalists Karen Cockburn, motivates herself using this method. Before starting the game, she always practices self talk like “You got this, Karen. You can do this.” She generates motivation through self talk. On the other hand, when Derek Sivers (2010) gave his presentation source about keeping your goals to yourself, he claimed that if people tell their friends their goals, they will lose their motivation because they feel satisfied after talked about it. He emphasized we could resist the temptation to announce our goal. Furthermore, Nixon (2012) writes that an optimistic personality is related to success at the Olympics. For instance, it is impossible to win all matches all the time. Athletes sometimes lose matches. If they fall into a slump, they cannot come out of their slump easily. At that time, optimistic athletes can overcome discouragement.

However, thinking positively is more effective. For example, if athletes try to think about losing matches optimistically, it is difficult for them to improve their skills. What I mean by “optimistic” is being both

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overly optimistic and lenient in thinking or attitude. Some athletes have an optimistic philosophy of their game. Athletes may become accustomed to lose matches. They need to reflect and consider why they lost matches. When Athletes lose a game, they need to think positively like “The match was taught me my weak point.” For example, an athlete could focus on the lessons learned from the loss and think about future games. Athletes might not dwell on losses and instead they could learn through that experience and make improvements for the next match.

When people study English, they need motivation. For example, English learners suffer from studying English because it takes a long time to improve their English proficiency. In addition, learners cannot know how much they can improve English by themselves. Therefore, some students lose their motivation and give up to studying English halfway. There are many ways to stay motivated to study English. For instance, Soren (2014) said that meeting with native speakers helps English learners to maintain motivation to study English. For example, when students want to improve their English, they definitely need to use English a lot. When they first talk with native English speakers, they may get nervous and worry about their mistakes. However, the more they talk, the more they improve their English. In addition, when they can communicate with native speakers smoothly, it makes them get self­confidence and their motivation. Therefore, talking with native speakers increases motivation for learners. On the other hand, some Japanese people said that it is difficult to find native speakers in Japan. They also said that even though they want to increase their motivation for studying English, they do not have a chance to use English sources. Therefore, it makes them lose their motivation. For instance, people tend to think English is not easy to master in Japan. So, they go to study abroad for learning English. However, some people said that not being able to find native English speakers to study English in Japan is a challenge that can be overcome. If people really want to improve their English, they

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do not matter these obstacles. Learners can think positively like they can meet native speakers because they can speak English. Learners can use English in their workplace because they can speak English.

Learners can get an American boy friend because they can speak English.

For instance, a Japanese woman writes blog about how to stay motivated to study English source. She is a high­school­graduate and has never gone to study abroad. However, she acquired English by her own method and got a good TOEIC score. She said that learners can study English without going to study abroad. She enjoyed learning English by trial and error. She reads English out loud and her favorite English books in her daily life. She also said writing blog gives her motivation. It is definitely true that studying English by oneself is really hard and tough. That is why, many people go to English school to give them motivation. Some people think that they can get motivation from classmates.

Studying English together can be a stimulus for students because students try to study hard. However, students sometimes lose their motivation because of classmates. For example, if other students speak English better than them, it will make them lose their motivation. Therefore, it is important to compete with same­level classmates.

New employees are difficult to stay motivated. Most new employees just graduated from their school and first time to work. Unlike university students, new employees need to take responsibility for everything they do. They are also required to make a good relationship with their boss. When they start working, they often make mistakes and get scolded by their boss. Thus, their motivation go down.

Many people tend to quit their company within one or two years because they cannot maintain their motivation. In the article, “What people want from work:motivation”, Heathfield (n.d.) writes most people work for getting money. For example, if people work hard, they can get a salary and buy something they want to buy. Salary provides motivation. In addition, paid vacation makes people

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motivated as well. If new employees can take a vacation, they can work looking forward to vacation.

Furthermore, after they went on a trip, they can feel refreshed and get rid of stress. They can have motivation to do for their job. On the other hand, some new employees can get motivation from their colleagues because they work at same place and knows the situation well enough . They can share the experience and understand well. Therefore, they sometimes spend their holidays hanging out with their colleagues.

Romantic relationships are required motivation. Carnegie (1963) said that people should avoid argument because they are not be able to solve problems through arguing. Opera tenor Jan Peerce said that “When two people yell, there is no communication, just noise and bad vibrations” (p. 115).

However, some people think that couples need to argue with their partner. For instance, if couples do not argue with a partner, it is difficult to understand each other’s feeling. Especially, many women tend not to speak with their partner directly even they feel dissatisfied. They try to put up with it. Then, when they reach the extent of their patience, they explode their feelings or try to break up with their partner.

Nevertheless, most men cannot recognize their partner’s feeling without words. If they argue with their partner more frequently, they can avoid these situations. It is difficult to understand each person’s feelings without words. They can get to know each other better through talking. Therefore, some people think that sometimes arguing is helpful for couples to maintain their relationship.

Studying at graduate school requires a lot of motivation. For example, graduate students not only take their classes but also research what they are interested in. Many people tend to think that graduate school is similar to undergraduate study. However, it is totally different. Most graduate students need to write a thesis when they want to graduate. Researching and writing a thesis are really tough and require a lot of motivation. Especially, doctoral students study and research for five or six

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years. If they do not have motivation, it is really hard to continue for so long. According to the Psych Central, Mohana (2013) said that it is really important to find a topic that students are passionate about. If they are not interested in their topic, it is really hard to write it. For example, when graduate students is concerned about their thesis topic, their advisor may suggest some topics. Even though their advisor gave them topics, students would struggle with writing their thesis because the topic was given by their advisor. If students choose their topic by themselves, they can have motivation and passion about their research. In addition, some students said that it is really important to talk with motivated people such as doctoral students. For example, when master students are struggling with their research, they sometimes ask doctoral students for advice because doctoral students had lots of experiences.

Doctoral students can share their experience with master students. Master students can get through their problems and get motivation from doctoral students.

Sometimes, people feel lazy. If they have to do something, they tend to procrastinate it. For example, when a teacher gives students an assignment on Friday, many students may do the assignment on Sunday. Students think that they have enough time and postpone their assignment. However, they sometimes cannot get motivated or do not feel like doing their assignment. Gerber (n.d.) said that it is important to allow yourself time to relax and do the things that make you happy. When people have to do something, it helps to think of something that you want to do after the assignment is finished. Some students have a plan to hang out with their friends. Even if people do not hang out with friends, treating themselves is still important. Before doing assignment, students usually think about after finished the assignment. When their English teacher gives me an essay, students usually procrastinate it. It takes a long time to get motivation when students start writing an essay in English. At that time, students usually think about reward. For example, if students finished their writing, students can eat sweets or drink a

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delicious beer. When students are writing their essay, these kind of things motivate students. students can try to work hard. In addition, exercising is also important to get motivation. For example, many men workers work out at a gym. Many people said that they can feel positive whenever they exercise.

According to the article, people can get more energy and be more motivated through 30 minutes of daily exercise.(Radding, n.d.) Some women do not like exercise and they do yoga instead of going to gym. People sometimes do not have motivation during the morning. Some yoga poses give people motivation. Yoga is useful for enhancing efficiency for work. It is said doing yoga is effective in the morning in India. Many Japanese women do yoga before go to work.

However, sometimes people lost their motivation when they made a mistake or failed. At that time, it is really difficult to have motivation even they exercise. Some people said that talking with close friends helps us to get motivation. When people talk about their problems with their friends, they can feel better and think positively. If they do not talk with someone and stay at their home alone, they tend to think about it negatively by themselves. If they talk to some friends about their problems, they can feel better and know other opinions. Furthermore, people need to set goals. Sometimes, people can achieve their goal quickly, sometimes not. Some goals need a lot of time. For example, many foreign students try to go to universities in the U.S. However, they need to get a high English score when they apply for the university. Some students can get a good score easily. Some students take a long time to get the necessary score. In this case, students need to set long term goals. In addition, self­improvement literature can help people when we do not have the motivation. For example, when people read the book, they can know author’s experience and philosophy through reading the book. People can realize how authors succeed their life. Even though some authors had a difficult time, they were success and achieved their goals. Their successful story makes people get motivated. In addition, going to their

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conference gives people motivation. They can listen their speech directly. It is more powerful than reading their books. They can get a lot of energy and motivation through the seminar. If people can not attend the seminar, they can have a session using skype. For example, there is a coaching session source. She is a Japanese and advise people how to raise motivation. She lives in Paris so she cannot hold her session frequently in Japan. However, she has a session using skype. Many people got motivation from her. Even though it is expensive to attend a session, they can raise motivation.

Even though people need to maintain their motivation to achieve their goal, sometimes they give other people’s motivation. Carnegie (1936) gave an example about it. One woman and his son tried to pull a calf into the barn but, the calf could not move. After careful thought, she let the calf suck milk and the calf was able to move. Therefore, when people want to make other people raise motivation, they need to know what other people want. According to the Intervention Central (n.d.), praise is a strong ways to give other people’s motivation. For example, if teachers praise student’s hard warks, student’s eagerness grow. Teachers can raise student’s motivation through complementing students. Carnegie (1936) also mentioned to praise and encouragement can change people’s life. On the other hand, some people said that too much praise will turn student’s head. Students let themselves get too relax. They tend not to study hard because they lack a sense of crisis. Then, some teachers are strict and rarely praise their students to convey a crisis mentality. Furthermore, some people think that expecting can increase people’s motivation. In 1968, Robert Rosenthal and Lenore Jacobson’s study showed that students grade can improve through teacher’s expecting. There is a pygmalion effect. Not only students, but it also works subordinate. For instance, when boss wants to raise subordinate’s motivation towards work. Subordinate think “I have my superiors confidence.” Subordinate works hard and his motivation towards work goes up. However, some people think that boss’s expectation makes subordinate’s feel

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pressure. Some subordinates work hard because they try not to let boss down. But, they sometimes feel themselves to be under pressure because their boss expect their work.

Conclusion In conclusion, this paper has discussed many ways to keep up motivation in different situations.

Some people accept this motivating tool but some people do not accept it. There are different ways from individual to individual. Therefore, people need to find a motivation that suits them. However, they have something in common. That is passion. Passion inspires motivation in people. Even though rewarding themselves provide motivation, people can maintain their motivation all the way to the end through passion. Having passion helps people to achieve their goal. Sometimes people cannot find something they really want to do. It is a good place to start to think about themselves and what they are passionate about. If people can find something they really want to do, they can stick to it.

References Carnegie, D. (1936). How to win friends and influence people. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster.

Gerber, C. (n.d.). 5 ways to get energized and motivated when you feel lazy. Tiny buddha. Retrieved from http://tinybuddha.com/blog/5­ways­get­energized­motivated­feel­lazy/ Heathfield, M. S. (n.d.). What people want from work: Motivation. About money. Retrieved from http://humanresources.about.com/od/rewardrecognition/a/needs_work.htm Khazan, O. (2014, February). How olympians stay motivated. The Atlantic. Retrieved from http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/02/how­olympians­stay­motivated/283643/

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Mohana, M. (2013). The motivated mind: Where our passion and creativity comes from. Psych central. Retrieved from http://psychcentral.com/lib/the­motivated­mind­where­our­passion­creativity­comes­from/0001 7359 Nixon, R. (2012, July). Going for gold! 7 olympic secrets to success. Live science. Retrieved from http://www.livescience.com/21903­olympic­games­success­tips.html Radding, B. (n.d.). Moderate exercise increases motivation. Men’s fitness. Retrieved from http://www.mensfitness.com/training/cardio/moderate­exercise­increases­motivation Soren (2014, May). 10 ways to keep yourself motivated learning English. Itaki. Retrieved from http://www.italki.com/article/103/10­ways­to­keep­yourself­motivated­learning­english#.VDO KMil5NQY Sivers, D. (2010, July). “Keep your goals to yourself.” [TED Talks]. Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/talks/derek_sivers_keep_your_goals_to_yourself Teacher praise: an efficient tool to motivate students. (n.d.). Intervention central. Retrieved from http://www.interventioncentral.org/behavioral­interventions/motivation/teacher­praise­efficient­t ool­motivate­students

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The things people can do better when they know themselves

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The Things People can Do Better When They Know Themselves

Younghee Lim

University of Hawai’i at Manoa

Essay Assignment

HELP 441W

Fall 1, 2014

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Introduction Human behaviour is connected with various psychological factors. Thier reaction would not be the same as usual when they feel stress or risk. Also every individual person would react in different way even in the same stressful or risky situations. When do people feel stress or risks? Not only the conditions related to the process of growing psychologically and physically, but also the environmental conditions surrounding humans could be the factors of risk or stress. Therefore, people could hardly expect to live without those problems in their routine. However, is there any method that people can improve themselves in psychology and cope with these risks and stress more effectively? This paper discusses how people could be improved in their behaviour when they know and change their psychological factors.

The Psychological Issues of People Who are Living in a Rapid Changing World People are living in a changing world. It has changed a lot, it is changing in this moment, and it will change again and again. People could have hardly imagined about new technology they are using everyday now in their routines, such as tablets, notebooks, or google drive, a few decades ago. People who had lived in the nineteenth century hardly could imagine it would take them only about ten hours to travel across the Pacific Ocean by airplane in the fast future. Also it is said that the world is changing so much faster now than any other times before. According to Sweat (n.d.), many historians, sociologists, and journalists are worried about the speed of change. People often can have a fear and problem to handle the change, because the speed is too fast.

In this rapidly changing world, the problems people needed to cope with are getting various and sophisticated. It is assumed that people take more risks, get stressed more, suffer more in growing

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up, procrastinate more, or have more troubles in relationship with others. How can people cope with these difficult problems? It is clear nobody can lessen these problems by changing the world. Is it possible , however, to change themselves to deal with these difficult problems in better ways? Can people change themselves? If people can change their attitude or the way they think, would it bring a different, better effect on their behaviour? How can they make themselves think with a different perspective? People would know how to improve in a better way if they know why they are the way they are and if they know what makes them think and act in specific ways.

Taking risks When people face change, they are likely to take risks. It seems there is a connection between adoption of change and taking risks. The things have been known and have been accustomed to are easier to deal with than new things and new trials. Accepting new things is often taking risks. For example, when people, who only had been traveling by cars and by ships before the airplane was invented, decided on travelling by flying, they would have felt a big risk of falling from the sky with this new travel technology. People could have a fear about travelling by flying in modern society with much developed technology of course, however the flying would have been even more adventurous when they started to accept that people could travel by flying. When Columbus took a risk of dying in the middle of ocean during a long sailing, he could find the new continent, America.

Without taking risk there is no changing for development. Humans have taken risk for progress in history. However, does everyone take risks in same way? Does everyone take risks?

Probably not, because people are different. People take different types of risks and have different attitudes towards risks. Some are willing to take risks for progress, others are willing to give up their

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chances to achieve more. Why do people want to avoid risks even on the occasion they know the advantage?

Barth (2013) tells that different character factors, like genes, culture, and experience influence risk taking. People tend to imagine, in exaggerating ways, the results from the failure or the possibility of failure, or underestimate themselves about their ability to handle risk (Warrell, 2013). That is to say, some people are not willing to take risks because of imaginary failure and excessive fear of the failure.

Imagine there is a boy who loves to sing but never does it in front of other people despite having a gifted voice. It might be nothing to worry to some people even who sing awfully, they might think that singing is just for enjoying so that it is not a difficult, important thing to them. What chances is the boy losing, then?

He might be losing the chance to be loved more by friends, to be a big hit singer in the future, or at least a chance to enjoy music more.What makes the boy refrain from singing in front of others? It is the fear that he might not be able to sing well or the fear that friends might despise his singing. In this case, it is not a physical, functional problem with his voice, but a psychological, imaginary problem. What if he does not mind others’ criticism or he focuses more on the fact that he is not going to die even though he might sing awfully or others might not like his song? A little change of thinking might release him to sing confidently. People who want to take risks in order to get chances more are possibly finding solutions when they observe why they do not take risks which represent good opportunities.

Stress Certainly, taking risks are stressful whether the risks are taken in an ideal way or not. What other problems make people feel stress? What is the result of stress? Can people reduce the negative effect of stress? It is said that stress causes a variety of illnesses from colds to cancer because of the effect of stress on the immune system, it weakens the function of it (Seal, 2012). Are there any

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individual differences in relation to stress, like in the case of taking risk? Do most people feel stress in same way and deal with it in same way?

Even though the stress disturbs the function of the immune system, when people react in an active way, the effect on immune system is smaller compared to the time people react in helpless and depressed ways (Seal, 2012). According to research (“How do you cope,”2014), there are two ways of coping with stress, one is the active way, which means being aware of stress and reacting to reduce the negative effect from the stress. The other is avoiding which means ignoring and denying the stress through sleeping, drinking, or isolating. Even cancer can be coped with well by a fighting active spirit rather than by the feeling of depression and emotional reactions (Seal, 2012).

How could people react in active ways against stress? Why can some people deal with stress more actively? Let’s think about first, why they are the way they are. Kim (2013) recommends accepting everything. She said when people accept all the facts about who they are, they can move on.

Accepting does not mean having a favorable feeling here. It is more like to say that facing the problems as they exist without denying or ignoring helps solving the stressful problems. As she recommended when somebody accepts who they are, what they are able to do with the problems, they might start to find a better suitable solution. An attemption to accept themselves and stressful situations with the attitude of facing it as the way they are without denying could be one of active reactions against the stress. As an example, people might be depressed, and want to deny the truth if they are diagnosed with cancer. They might be angry asking why they got the cancer what they have done wrong. Those feelings might lead them to bigger depression which is taking off the fighting spirit against the cancer. What if they could accept their state without depression, denial, or resentment? They could move on so that

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they can focus on coping with the cancer in placid mind, and this attitude might be much more helpful than depression to fight with the cancer.

Procrastination What other psychological issues could be stressful and could be improved when we know about our mind and understand reaction? There is procrastination which means people delay to do things they have to do. What makes them delay? Moore, Baker, and Packer (1997) explained the reasons for procrastinations; fear or worry about the result, perfectionism, lack of motivation ,and difficulty to find the way, she also mentioned how to overcome procrastination. She suggested that preparing well when the worry is the problem, and concentrating your own work rather than comparing with others when the perfectionism cause procrastination, and think again what makes you want to do some things when motivations are problems. Lastly, she suggested finding another’s help when you need when you simply don’t know how to do it. If people follow her suggestions, can everybody work well immediately without delay? If people just spend their time till the due date with worry or without worry,could it be procrastination? When people could think they are lazy?What is the difference between procrastination and laziness? Some people often put off the things they have to do. What makes them not start immediately when they are able to do so, if their problem has nothing to do with procrastination? Isn’t there any time people just want to be lazy without reason? For example, there are people who arrive late very often to their school or working place. There is no clear reason to be late, but if someone wakes up late, prepares to go out slowly, thinks five minutes are not big problem, then they might be lazy. Some people might just want to take a rest first when they know that they can finish in time after all, or even if they know when they start earlier they would have a better result, they

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sometimes do not mind about “better”. Do we need to distinguish procrastination and laziness? Can we separate them clearly? Can we start right now if we know the reason to be late?

Whatever the reason of being late is, procrastination or laziness, if people know what makes them work immediately, and if they want to do it, thinking and finding the reasons would be helpful not to be late.

Adolescence What could be different in adolescence? Adolescence is the state between being a child and an adult. It is often regarded as a hard time for people and their family. Teenagers who are in this period cause some trouble with their parents when they attempt to experiment with different things. Also, they tend to think they are the center of everything, so they cannot consider other people’s viewpoints well.

Those problems cause trouble in their family, however if their parents’ style is not authoritarian or permissive but democratic which means letting the teens make their own decision but involving in the process of decision making, the teenagers and family might suffer less troubles (Seal, 2012). It shows the uncomfortable features that everyone might have during the growing process could be less negative.

Even though it is less likely to find out a perfect ideal way to pass this unstable and confusing time to young people and their family without any changing or suffering, it seems there is a better way people withdraw more positive opportunity other than the image of conflict relationship and unstableness. How could figure out it? All adults passed through their adolescence. When they look back on their own adolescence they could understand why their sons and daughters act in that ways and could help to be an ideal supporter for their precious child. Also, if the teenagers study about their mental, social, and physical changing in positive ways, it might be less confusing and less troublesome.

What Carnegie Suggested

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People might change themselves when they study their psychology. Furthermore, Carnegie (1936) suggested how to influence other peoples’ minds. That is to say, people could change others mind as well as their own with proper methods. He suggested six ways to make people like you, which are mostly about putting others in the center with sincere ways. He gave many successful examples and explanations about human nature and the method to move the minds of others and to achieve what people want. He empathized that human nature is supposed to like being important and understood by others.When people imagine the person they want to be a friend with, many of them would agree with Carnegie book. The person who could listen others’ interest and empathize sincerely would be loved more than the person who usually talk their own interest only.

Carnegie (1936) also suggested not to order to others directly about what they have to do, but to ask questions others their opinion and ideas regarding the issues. How could Carnegie’s suggestion be adopted in our real life? It might be better to ask teenagers which environment they prefer between neat, clean room and uncomfortable,untidy room, rather than to order them directly to clean their room. Whilst the direct order might give the teens the chance of disobey their parents, the question about their feeling or opinion might be the chance to think the states of their untidy room by themselves without big resistance. Does Carnegie’s suggestion work to only others? Could it be applied to people’s own mind? What if people ask themselves in soft voice why they delay something, why they feel stress in some situations, what they could get more with procrastination or feeling stress, instead they push themselves hard and order themselves to deal with the things they delay or the stress they feel? The reasonable soft questions about their own psychological state might make themselves act in better way.

Even though in all cases people face, they could not be successful like in Carnegie's examples, it seems there is little harm when people follow his suggestions.

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Conclusion We have discussed how could people change themselves in better way. When people take risks, suffer from adolescence, have procrastination problems, or feel stress, they could find out a better way to cope with them if they know about their psychological features. Some research and examples in this paper explain that human behaviour could be conducted in an improved way when they change their perspective . There are many other studies and materials with more to say about human psychology.

Some of them might show different perspectives and understanding about stress, taking risks, procrastination, etc. Therefore, it would be helpful to find more various materials for understanding human psychological aspects, when people want to deal with those kinds of problems in better way.

This paper focused mainly on the possibility of changing behaviour through observing the inside of people to support the idea that people living in the rapid changing world would need to change and adapt rapidly too. Even though it seems not to be easy to change their habits, their values, or the way they think, being self­aware would be one of solutions for people who want to change for better fitting in the environment which is being developed constantly and providing new technology everyday, as well as for coping with difficulty from rapid change. If someone wants to know their psychological features, it would be helpful not only think and study by themselves, but also ask the others who know them such as family, friends, and colleagues. It might also be recommendable to find and see a professional when they have a larger problem. It is not certain, however, if someone could change themselves in better way even they find out the various reasons that define and influence their thinking and reactions. It is possible to think that people are supposed to think and act according to the way their genes formed, regardless of what they have learned or how they were educated. There might be little things we know clearly, regarding human beings’ psychological aspects. However, most people would want to know the way

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they could be better if it exists. Hopefully, this paper could help people find their own way to improve and find happiness. People have changed the world and have written new history. People might be more satisfied and improved in the way they change themselves even if they cannot change the world they are living in as they want.

References Barth, F. D. (2013). Afraid to take a chance? Psychology today. Retrieved from

http://www.ucg.org/entertainment/how­can­we­cope­world­rapid­change/

Carnegie, D. (1936). How to win friends and influence people. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster.

How do you cope? (2014). UCLA dual diagnosis program. Retrieved October, 13, 2014 from

http://www.semel.ucla.edu/dual­diagnosis­program/News_and_Resources/How_

Do_You_Cope

Kim, J. (2013). Why we are the way we are. Psychology Today. Retrieved from

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/valley­girl­brain/201307/why­we­are­the­

way­we­are

Moore, R., Baker, B., and Packer, A. (1997). Building a paper: Explore. In N. E. Dollahite and

J. Haun (Eds.), Sourcework (20­22). Boston, MA: National Geographic Learning.

Seal, B. (2012). Academic encounters. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Sweat, B. (n.d.). How can we cope in a world of rapid change? The Good News. Retrieved from

http://www.ucg.org/entertainment/how­can­we­cope­world­rapid­change/

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Warrell, M. (2013). Take a risk: The odds are better than you think. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/margiewarrell/2013/06/18/take­a­risk­the­odds­are­ better­than­you­think/

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What is Happiness 1

What is Happiness Karen Takada University of Hawai‘i at Manoa

Final Essay Assignment HELP 441W Fall 1, 2014

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Introduction Most people think being happy is the best thing for their lives. However, there are people who have different perspectives about the nature of happiness. Is happiness for self­satisfaction? Most of people sacrifice something for their happiness. No doubt, it is different depends on every people. This paper discusses the what the happiness is. The discussion begins by examining values of happiness for adolescents and adults.

Difference between Adolescents and Adults Adolescents and adults have different perspectives about happiness. Both adolescents and adults tend to take risks for their satisfaction. According to Price­Mitchell, adolescents can be happy because they can develop curiosity, courageous, self­confidence, and persistence through taking risks. Adolescents take a lot of risks because they prefer behaving physically and emotionally against the society. Generally, adolescents enjoy taking risks when participating in various kinds of social activities. For example, they prefer to break the law on impulse such as under age drinking, drunk driving and smoking cigarettes. Moreover, they tend to be influenced by peers. They take risks to identify themselves because it helps their self­esteem and self­confidence which are related to success because these can lead them to be happy. On the other hand, it can be said that most of adults take risks for different reasons.. Most of them challenge themselves at their work because they want to be happy. For example, they work hard at the workplace, because more they want to be promoted, improve job security and increase salary. It means that taking risks at work lead to success. Taking risks can make them feel achievement and fulfilment of their lives, but if people were asked that they are happy or not, their answers are different depends on person because it is hard to define what the happiness is.

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The Elderly people In general, older people are happier than younger generations (Tanner, n.d.). They are less likely to feel anxious and depressed compared to younger people. For example, Japanese life expectancy is 83 years old on average which is the highest in the world (“Life Expectancy,” n.d.).

Especially, there are many elderly people who live in Okinawa prefecture in Japan, and most of them live longer than other places in Japan. According to Clear (2014), there is a reason why they live longer because they find a purpose of living and follow the advice of “ikigai”. “ikigai” means to set a goal, or find enjoyment and reasons in life. It is necessary for people to find their purpose of living when people get old because some elderly who don’t have a purpose usually feel lonely and anxious about their future, particularly concerning death. For instance, when people get old, people would face situations, in which their close friends pass away, which is not a joyous occasion. Consequently, it is not clear that all the elderly people are happy.

Being loved by people According to Brilaki (n.d.), happiest people have common which they have a good relationships with others. Being loved by people is also part of happiness. People might endure or sacrifice themselves, if they want to be loved by others. There are various kinds of people who have a different characters, so it is crucial to know how to deal with people too. Carnegie (1936), stated that showing interests to the others, giving a smile, remembering people’s names, being a good conversationalist, thinking about the others with interests, and behaving sincerely and smiling to the others, remembering people’s name, and being a good listener are important if people desire to be happy. For example, he told about a man who had never been remembered his name by others because his name was too long to remember, so people usually call him in his nick name. However, when Carnegie called him by full

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name, tears sprung to his eyes because he was impressed. Some people might not like to be called their full names, but most people feel happy when they are called by their full names.

Moreover, smiling is one important element of happiness. Smiling can decrease stress, even if people make a fake smile at first, it can build good relationships later. Carnegie (1936), suggested that William B. Steunhardt changed his life with smiling. He rarely smiled, but once he realized to change his attitude by smiling and greeting, his life also changed as well. Smiling makes people happy, and even the person who gives a smile also can be happy. According to Buscaglia (1924), "Too often, we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around." It is rather happier than not be liked by people because being loved by people is beneficial.

Which people can be happy, marriage or single?

Some people say that marriage is necessary and important to be happy, but others don’t agree with this idea. According to Scheonborn (2004), both women and men who are married have health benefits and well­being which are related to happiness. They don’t smoke or drink too much compared to unmarried people. Also, it is said that they are less likely to get diseases such as cancer because they have support from their spouses which has a positive impact on their health. Spouses can help each other, so it would decrease their stress. For example, if a husband is working, and he is stressed about his work, a wife could listen to his complaints. A spouse could play a role not only as a partner, but also a friend and adviser. However, it is said that their happiness lasts only a moment, then they gradually lose happiness because they are used to live with spouse or when they get a child, so their ways of living would change at the same time (happify DAILY, n.d.). For example, both husband and wife have their

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common hobbies such as doing outdoor sports, but once they get a child, it would be hard for them to enjoy their hobbies because they would devote their time to look after a child. Meanwhile, some people might say that it is unnecessary to get married for their lives, because most single people are satisfied with their lives without a partner. They can work by own, earn money, and focus on what they want to.

However, it is said that especially unmarried women can’t lead happier lives than married women.

According to Neal (2011), unmarried women are looked down upon by society. She also mentioned that single people are hard to be approved by society. According to Stavrova (n.d.), some countries recognize that women have to work as a wife, not a worker, so if they break this stereotype, they would more likely to be exposed to social disapproval. It is evident that it is hard for unmarried women to be accepted by society because of these reasons.

Introvert and Extrovert Extroverts are generally prefer going out and meeting new people. They talk a lot, and are outgoing, so they tend to be more involved in social relationships which make them to be success in their lives. For example, when they go abroad to learn English, they are curious about new environment, so they tend to talk to people without a feeling of shyness. Secondly, introverts prefer being alone, enjoying themselves, and considering carefully. They are not outgoing, so it might hard to say that most of them have a lot of friends, but it could be said that they try to understand friends more deeply. For instance, if Japanese people and Westerns are classified into introverts and extroverts, Japanese could be introverts, because if they are having a meeting at school or workplace, they tend to keep themselves in their mind even if they think something. On the other hand,Westerns could be extroverts, because most of them are assert themselves. While Westerns insist, Japanese just listen them because they are lack of assertiveness. Even though Japanese don’t state a lot, they just keep their opinions in their minds. It

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seems like expressing their own opinions are necessary to be happy, so extroverts are less likely to be successful and beneficial for their lives, but it is not clear because it can be said that both extroverts and introverts make great efforts in order to be happy. In conclusion, both extroverts and introverts can get happiness, so it is hard to explain which characteristics are better.

Positive and Negative How do positive and negative feelings impact people’s lives? Are these emotions related to happiness? Firstly, it is said that thinking positively and positive attitudes can motivate themselves because it helps them to bring optimism. If a student studied very hard for a university exam, his result wasn’t good, he might be upset himself, and lose his motivation toward studying. Even though he got disappointed once, if he is a positive man, he can gets over his disappointment as soon as possible, and it would help him to go to next step. Also, if a woman is working at the company, and scolded by her boss because of her mistake at work. Even though positive people make a mistake, they can consider themselves a positive light, so it can be said their attitude can lead them to be success. However, if their attitude is always positive, another problem would occur because they might not be able to improve themselves when they are wrong because they regard themselves as always right and correct.

Procrastinators Procrastinators seem to be satisfied with themselves to procrastinate things. For instance, if a university student who is a procrastinator gets an assignment from his school. He would hang out with his friends, and spend his time for working at the part­time job as if he didn’t have any assignments.

When he notices the deadline is near at hand, he begins to start his assignment. This type of person is likely to lose their chances, but he is actually never regret to procrastinate because procrastinating is a

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part of habits. However, according to Treleaven (2012), procrastination and happiness are related because when people procrastinate, it influences their happiness. Treleaven showed that procrastinating sometimes has a negative effect on people’s health because procrastinators usually put off everything, and tend to finish what they have to do later, which leads to a lack of sleep.

Moreover, some people might think that procrastinators would regret because they put things off until the deadlines come which would affect their lives.

Can money buy Happiness?

Many people might think that wealthy people are happier than poor people. Rich people generally buy whatever they want. According to Stevenson and Wolfers (2008), rich people are usually happier. For example, if they want to buy a car and a house, they can buy them as soon as possible.

Moreover, they can buy their own happiness because they can ship and travel. Also they can purchase other people’s happiness because if they contribute to people who are in developing country, they can provide them with food, medicines, vaccines, and schools. Wealthier people cannot only buy their own happiness but also they can contribute happiness to the others too. However, it can be said that they are not always happy because they might have a some financial problems. In contrast, there are some who believes people in poorer countries are happier, but poorer people aren’t necessarily happiness.

According to Jayant Bhandari (2014), most people in developed countries have a mistaken image about people who live in developing countries. She mentioned, “Some people living in big cities cherish a romantic notion about rural places within their own area. Romantic, and mistaken: it is often a huge error to presume that rural people believe in simple living, have a higher sense of community, are closer to nature, are friendlier and more compassionate, and are physically more active and healthier. “ She also said that poorer people are less stressed compared to richer people, because they don’t have time

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to feel depression. They always try their best in order to live everyday lives. For example, in a developing country such as South Africa, children in South Africa aren’t well­to­do, and they don’t have opportunities to get education no matter how much desire they have to go to school for learning.

But if a school is bulit for children, they would appreciate that opportunity and be happy to be learn.

Being poor or rich is not a good predictor of happiness because it is completely different.

Studying Abroad If people have enough money to study, many people decide to go abroad to study languages these days. Some people go to the U.S. to learn English, and some people go to China to learn Chinese. It depends on people which nation they stay, but why do they go abroad expressly? Do they study abroad to achieve something? Or, do they decide to go because some people influence to study abroad? There are both advantages and disadvantages to study abroad. Firstly, most people go abroad while they are high school students or university students. This can lead them to be happy in the future because studying abroad makes it possible to learn new things. According to Brian (2014), people can learn new things through meeting new people and experiencing new cultures such as food or customs which they’ve never experienced before. He also stated that studying abroad is the best investment because when people who study abroad experience different cultures and languages which are new discovery for them. On the other hand, there are some people who go abroad to escape from their lives in their own country. Some people think that they can find a purpose for the future, but people who have those ideas usually fail when they go abroad. They would struggle, but they could discover how difficult it is to live alone without any supporters such as parents and friends. They can realize how they are living comfortable lives when they are in own country.

Conclusion

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This paper discussed that it is hard to define what is the real happiness is. Adolescents generally take risks, but adults also do same things as well for their happiness. The elderly are said to be happy, but they also have a fear of death. It is evident that happiness essentially contains success, self­satisfaction, and self­esteem, but it is difficult to determine what the happiness is, because each people have different lives and characters, so it can be understood that it depends on each individual how they feel about happiness. Even if people are satisfied with themselves once, they might lose their satisfaction later, and have to search for another happiness. It is not clear that people are happy, but if people desire happiness, it is effective to focus on feeling happiness and to be in an environment which they can feel comfortable. People will always want to figure out the exact nature of happiness because they always want more.

References Bhandari, J. (2014). Are poor people happier? Liberty. Retrieved from http://www.libertyunbound.com/node/1276 Brilaki, M. (n.d.). 7 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be the Happiest Person on Earth. Lifehack.

Retrieved from http://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/7­scientifically­proven­ways­the­happiest­perso n­earth.html Buscaglia, L.(1924). LOVE. United States: Balantine books.

Carnegie, D. (1936). How to win friends & influence people. New York, NY: Gallery books.

Clear, J. (n.d.). Live Longer: What You Can Learn from Elite Athletes and Why the Japanese Never Die. James clear. Retrieved from http://jamesclear.com/live­longer

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Greenem, B. (2014). How to buy happiness. The Investment Of Travel. Retrieved from http://www.goabroad.com/articles/study­abroad/how­to­buy­happiness­the­investment­of­trav el Price­Mitchell, M. (n.d.). Why Risk­Taking May Increase Teen Happiness. Roots of action.

Retrieved from http://www.rootsofaction.com/why­risk­taking­may­increase­teens­happiness/ Stavrova, O. (n.d). Society's disapproval is reason for unhappiness of cohabiting women. British Sociological Association Annual Conference.

Schoenborn, C. A. (2004). Marital status and health: United States, 1999­2002. Advance Data.

Retrieved from http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/ad/ad351.pdf Stevenson, B., & Wolfers, J. (2008). Economic growth and subjective well­being: Ressessing the paradox. Retrieved from http://www.nber.org/papers/w14282.pdf Treleaven, S. (2012). Is procrastination making you unhappy? Chateline. Retrieved from http://www.chatelaine.com/health/is­procrastination­making­you­unhappy/ Tanner, L. (n.d.). Older adults are happiest Americans. USA Today. Retrieved from http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=4688191 Neal, M. (2011). Who's Happier: Single Or Married Women? Huffpost women. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/20/single­married­happier_n_972397.html

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Methods of dealing with their environment for adolescents 1

Methods of dealing with their environment for adolescents Moeka Yamada University of Hawai‘i at Manoa

Essay Assignment HELP 441W Fall 1, 2014

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Methods of dealing with their environment for adolescents 2

Introduction Adolescents are people who are age ten to nineteen years old, going through stresses and struggles. This period of life is filled with difficulties and unique situations that are the starting point for growth into adulthood. Adolescents have a hard a time because of the things that surround them. It could be because of bullies at school, about getting good grades, or pressures from their parents. This paper discusses the various issues surrounding adolescents. Many teenagers are having many issues; for example, issues that are caused from stress, struggled, risk­taking, and social relationship.

Adolescent's Identity There are issues about adolescent's identity, which are part of ‘identity crisis.’ It is a very common issue among adolescents. ‘Identity crisis’ is a feeling of confusion, which is created by being unsure about what kind of personality you have. According to Seal, adolescents begin to care about how they look and what others see or think about yourself (2012). Also during adolescence, people usually begin to redefine who they are. While people are going through their life, there are several crisis of stages (Erikson, 2012). When an adolescent tries to discover who they are, they would likely to be fit into the classic image of the rebellious teenagers. The development of individuality. It is usually different from what their parents has or expect. For the solution of taking off the stresses and struggles, the action of parents could be a key point. The action which parents refuse to talk about when they were teenager or how they grew up to behave, believe and be an adult. One other issue that adolescents struggles with could only be the situation of identity crisis, but when they are not able to find in themselves of unnatural way making decisions. Identifying is also hard for adults but not only adolescents.

Adolescent’s Taking Risk

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Methods of dealing with their environment for adolescents 3

Adolescents are most likely to have an image of risk taker. Risk taking combines curiosity, challenge, excitement and denial (Pickhardt, 2014). The four factors makes adolescent want to take a risk which also makes growth. Parenting is one of the reason, adolescents deals with taking risk. By taking risk, adolescents could feel that it may cause a stressful situation, because of their parent’s eye or frustrations about why he or she is taking risk. Adolescents are usually affected by their curiosity which is made by their environments. The curiosity makes them learn about their surroundings and experiment.

Parents mostly notice in the adolescents. It could be something that relate to disorganization and negative attitude for their school. Most parents of teenagers know mood swings, hormonal changes and physical changes. They might also notice a lot of risk­taking behaviors in their children. However, by taking risk, adolescents could learn skills to reduce impulsive and potentially life threaten behavior when they go through learning techniques that promote their healthy body and lifestyle (Pickhardt, 2014). In some cases, an adolescents who take more risks are experimenting, which is a necessary part of how each of them grows. A study at the University of California, Los Angeles showed, adolescents who went through a stress reducing program, which is called “YES! For Schools” had decreased impulsive behaviors. The program teaches adolescents about health, making good decisions in their life, and how to get relief from stresses. It also teaches techniques of yoga and deep breathing. The program helped impulsive adolescents who are more likely to engage with risky activities that control their behavior (Cassada, 2013). From this research, adolescent's behavior is definitely hard to understand sometimes.

In some cases, people sometimes need to take risks and this is the same for adolescents too. For example, these days studying abroad for students who are in universities or colleges is popular in some countries. For students who want to study abroad, there are risks such as, being away from their home country for long time, which could cause home­sickness, facing with a huge ‘wall of language’, and

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culture differences. However, some students still want to go, because of they believe in their possibility and talent. Most adolescents who takes risk seem like they have courage, which means that even if they take risks, they seem like they will overcome challenges. University College London showed the study, which is about risk­taking behavior appears during adolescence and that adolescents are “programmed” to take risks (Donovan, 2011). Adolescents take risks because they like to feel thrill. Risk­taking is adventure for adolescents. It is very exciting however at the same time it is very scary. There are positive and negative effects of taking risks while adolescence. Some people define that taking risk is only affecting them negativity, however there are some ‘positive risk­taking’, which is necessary for adolescents to fulfill their need for developing identity, and testing authority. Positive risk­taking could be activities such as team sports and volunteers activities. On the other side, negative risk­taking could be some activities such as smoking, drugs, alcohol use, stealing, and eating disorders. While adolescence, many adolescents seems like they have experiences such ‘negative risk­taking’, because they want to feel thrill of risk­taking. “Learning how to win and lose as well as how to take risks to help others are important social milestones that every teen must learn to conquer.” said Donovan (2011). Depression in Adolescence Depression is one way to express differently in children and adolescents than it does in adults.

The depression which appears in adolescence is more variable than depression in adult life, however both have related symptoms. Many adolescents complain about depression that they get from not getting along with friends or not wanting to go to school, said Neuman (2013). There might be many ways that makes them depressed, especially when the depression is clinical. Every depressed people doesn’t complain of being sad but, depression could show themselves simply in a failure to live

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successfully or to accomplish something. The behavior that are not sociable, such as stealing, or abuses from drugs and alcohol could be manifestations of depression sometimes. The depression from those things requires medical treatment. According to Neuman (2013), the adolescent is likely to become sullen, irritable, and withdrawn and seems like lazy and rebellious rather and depressed. Some parents are have questions like “Why do my kids (adolescent) get more easily upset than others?” It may be because of a stressful time for the child, like crossing an experiential minefield with emotions, which is mostly hidden in them (Pickhardt 2014). There are some factors that cause adolescents to be upset or outburst: self­consciousness, sadness, anger, and loneliness. Self­consciousness happen for most young people, begins around early adolescence and during late elementary school, when mostly happen young woman or manhood begins. It may be because of the hormone, however it cause them to feel like they are out of control and that could make their self­consciousness. Secondly, sadness could bring adolescence some stresses. When adolescents are deeply suffering with loss, it may be make them want to grow up faster.Third, the anger could be one of them. More adolescence try to be independently and one one’s own terms causes, it makes confusion which related to the identity. Lastly, loneliness is one of the factor that makes adolescents upset. When the occasion, separating from their parents, which make them, put in the situation more pressure. Many adolescents go through the situation like when broken friendship and it feels like they are left out by their friends. More loneliness, both at home and school, makes them have stress. Sometimes depression causes a situation when adolescents are not doing great at school and parents are thinking that they are not doing their best. However adolescents are sometimes trying their best, which most likely cause pressure. Adults sometimes experience depression because of something that happens to them, but the power of depression on adults and adolescents is

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different because of adolescents having depression. At the same time they have physical changes, which makes waves of emotion.

Disorganization on Adolescence As the above paragraph mentioned, that there are some disorganizations that are happening between adults and adolescents. (Pickhardt, 2014) “Adolescence is disorganizing.” It is when individual complexity and social complexity are growing. Those two factors are dealing with people, mostly adolescents. In the age of disorganizing, there is a temptation for concerned parents to seek to help for their child. Medication could be one method for this issue. However without any education is wasted opportunity, because no one is daily helping the young person learn to organized and self­manage effectively. Pickhardt (2014) mentions one way on how parents can help their organization; it is to consider disorganization as a time management problem. Many young people are not ready to be master of independence, because it requires knowledge and experiences. In addition, adolescents might be surrounded by stress that comes from a multiplicity of new demands, breaking commitments.

Procrastination on Adolescents A procrastinator is a person who postpones work. It is very likely to see them among the students at high school. For example, homework is not done by due dates. This is one of the common procrastinations for many people, even for an adult it could happen for their work. Adolescents are more self­determined age (Piackhardt, 2014), and parental demands cause passive resistance, which can cause procrastination to assert more independence. Procrastination is one of the strategies for preserving the freedom of choice. When adolescents are not getting parental constantly as long as

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possible, it keeps social freedom open as long as possible. Because it seems like procrastination can easily become a troubling self­management for adolescents and also adults, it is generally well for parents to encourage their teenager to cooperate with their work and confronting problems of reality.

Procrastination may occur because of the delay the shorten time to get the done, due dates pressure increase stress to finish work on time. Adolescents are active and passive resistance to parental authority. Procrastination is one part of root in adolescents. There is a one of the common situation when parents tell their son or daughter to do homework, however their answer is “Not right now” or “I will do it later”. This kind of conversation makes adolescents frustrated but also parents too. For many people, the goal of procrastination is to escape the immediate necessity of demand or work, but it makes it even harder when procrastination is adds pressure to original demands.

Psychology Effects on Adolescents Positive psychology is “the scientific study of optimal human functioning” which could provide practical tools and it might be one solution that could make adolescents life little easier. The processes that adolescents get through the stresses and struggles are important (Nicholas, 2009), because when adolescents grow up, they would deal with people who are called “adult”, which mean they are satisfied as people who already became independent and who are able to stand on one’s own feet. In “adult” world, it may not be longer easier to deal with people like when they were in kindergarten. One reason is because it seems like adults are living in a place, that has “reality” more than “wonders” like adolescents has. According to Goeglein, many teenagers are having many issues, which mostly is fear of failing. Fear of failure is a lack of concerns that adolescents have such as things that may lead to problems that deal with their confidence and motivation (2014). Some adolescents believe in everything

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has to be perfect which leads to having such impossibly high expectations in their mind and it may lead to believing one is worthless or a failure when they are not able to be successful according to these set standards. When people try to concentrate on one thing, one another thing is distracting, that would not work well. For example, when people try to focus on studying about certain one specific material, then suddenly new discovery might appear which could cause to be interested in.

Physical Change on Adolescents Physical changes could be another fact that could've been effecting on adolescent’s body and also emotions. It is likely to see emotion’s wave that many of adolescents have when they are struggling with friendships or relationships. It is very common that people get emotion of waves especially adolescents. In some case, friendship is one of the main things that makes waves of emotion strong, because of the adolescents are mostly spending their time at school, which means they are spending time with their friends. However it could be very hard to time deal with their friends because every adolescents are having physical changes and the not only the outside but inside of them changing as hormone’s change. They are in the situation where they could control them but it is harder than when they grew up to young adult.

Conclusion This paper has discussed that many adolescents have issues and problems, mostly because of the stresses and struggles that they have. Adolescence is one of the important times to get through. All the stresses and struggles that they get through make their future path smoother. Adolescents are getting through the time of structuring personality and finding identity. Sometimes it could be a hard time for them because of procrastination, physical changes, and emotions that they have inside. Not only

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adolescents but also adults could consider this more. Every person can relate to the experiences of adolescents.

References Cassada, R. (2013, July 21). Yes! program reduces teens' impulsive behavior. Psychology Today.

Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/teen­angst/201307/yes­program­reduces­teens­impulsiv e­behavio Donovan, E. (2011, June 11). Risky business: Why teens need risk to thrive and grow. Psychology Today. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/youth­and­tell/201107/risky­business­why­teens­need­r isk­thrive­and­grow Neuman, F. (2013, June 13). Depression in childhood and adolescence. Psychology Today.

Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fighting­fear/201306/depression­in­childhood­and­adol escence Pickhardt, C. (2014, January 27). Adolescence and individuality. Psychology Today. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/surviving­your­childs­adolescence/201401/adolescence ­and­individuality

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Pickhardt, C. (2014, July 30). Adolescence and risk­taking. Psychology Today. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/surviving­your­childs­adolescence/201407/adolescence ­and­risk­taking Pickhardt, C. (2014, May 5). Parents and adolescent disorganization. Psychology Today. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/surviving­your­childs­adolescence/201405/parents­and­ adolescent­disorganization Seal, B. (2012). Academic Encounters. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Whitebourne, S. (2012,March 3). Are you having an identity crisis? Psychology Today. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fulfillment­any­age/201203/are­you­having­identity­crisi s Zirpoli, T. (2014, April 30). Adolescence: physical changes. Education. Retrieved from http://www.education.com/reference/article/adolescence­physical­changes/

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