1. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
JOURNAL
MOHAMMAD DANIEL BIN MAZLAN
0321409
9.00-11.00 A.M, MONDAY
PSY30203
FNBE 8/14
2. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
27th
APRIL 2015
JOURNAL 1
23/4/2015,4.00 P.M
ENTRY 1: SOCIAL LOAFING
Social loafing frequently occurs in groups because certain individuals impose less effort than
the others and this can create an unhelpful group dynamic and individual response. Social
loafing is the tendency of a person in a group to be lazy, uncooperative and perform poorly in
group work if their contribution cannot be seen. For example, one will be lazy and perform not
that decent towards a role play.
I have experienced this myself with this such behavior quite often since I’ve entered university
life. I realized that their contribution would be unidentified in the final outcome, would slack
and do work poorly, exploiting the hard work of their more diligent teammates. Last week,
while doing a second project for Culture and Civilization, there was three people who would
always missing in action, often giving invalid reasons for their disappearance. They knew that
their contributions would not be seen in the final outcome. So, they took this opportunity to
disappeared, leaving their hardworking teammates to handle all the works. In the end, those
that did not disappear would do their job poorly ,role play was hazy and the costume making
with poor workmanship due to lacked of hands.
3. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
12/4/2015,1.00 A.M.
ENTRY 2: Confirmation Bias
“A men sees what he wants to see and disregarded the rest” Paul Simon once said. If you are like most
people, you probably like to believe that your beliefs are the result of years of experience and objective
analysis of the information you have available. The reality is that all of us are susceptible to a tricky
problem known as a confirmation bias. Confirmation biases impact how people gather information, but
they also influence how people interpret and recall information. For example, people who support or
oppose a particular issue will not only seek information that supports their beliefs, they will also
interpret news stories in a way that upholds their existing ideas and remember things in a way that also
reinforces these attitudes.
Every week, a person will always have their own supporting football team to watch on every weekend.
On 12/4/2015, there was a Derby match between Manchester United and Manchester City. My friends
and I decided to watch the match together but half of us have different supporting teams. Meanwhile,
Manchester United had won 4-2 against Manchester City but it seems that they’ve won unfairly as two
of the goals were clearly offside to let City down according to Non- Manchester United supporters.
Unfortunately, according to Manchester United fans opinion, they said that it was fair and the best team
had won. Even though, the offside goals was repeated and spread all over the social media that it is
undeserved, Manchester United supporters denies it and seek information that supports their beliefs
and interpret news stories in a way that upholds their existing ideas.
Conclusion, certain people that has their own beliefs and opinion is a result of confirmation bias.
4. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
JOURNAL 2
25/4/2013, 4.00 P.M
ENTRY 1: False Consensus Effect
A false consensus effect is actually the tendency to believe that other people share our opinion and
believes that is we tend to overestimate how common our belief and opinions is actually are. The false
consensus is more likely to think our belief are normal or common. At the same, we are unlikely to think
false consensus having unusual or strange opinion. This refers to people who are close-minded, never
improving and having a narrow view of the world.For example, a person that have wealthy lifestyle will
be able to perform better in sports and believe that there are far more people who share that same
than there really is.
Now, what make us ignorant? through my observation during a football training, this could be seen by
most commonly through commercial videos, where a person believe that they share the same view as
the majority of the teammates, when in fact it Is direct opposite. For example, one of my teammates
believe that expensive boots and attire would let you perform better and win a match, and the whole
team started to think as he do. This narrow minded belief that the whole teammates believe as he do
and agree with the statement. However, this could not be further from the truth, the total number of
my teammates who agree with his statement is far less that he would believe it. In fact, those with
cheap boots and attire perform way better that those with the expensive ones. The false consensus
could be seen clearly here.
5. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
1/12/2015, 2.00 P.M.
ENTRY 2 : INTRINSIC AND EXTRINSIC MOTIVATION
I am very bless to be raise by a supportive and open-minded parents instead of being raise by those
strict typical Asian parents who seek their children to score in every of their academics. My parents
support what I ever I do as long as I have the determination to achieve my career and be responsible.
This couldn’t be more different that the strict parents, forcing their children to take extra classes and
punished when they to achieve whatever standard they have set for their children. However, when
comes to my Semester 1 results day, my results are exactly the same the same with results of their
children’s.
One other hand, my motivation for obtaining good results were entirely intrinsic. I enjoyed learning
architecture that was taught in university, and I had genuine curiosity for the unknown. I was fully
prepared in class, keep asking questions to lecturers, doing my own research for extra knowledge and
submitted every project that given by the lecturers. On the other hand, my classmate who was born by
those strict Asian parents were extrinsically motivated, he was forced to do architecture when I asked
him, he was force to perform well and forced to do extra work. He even showed no joy during learning
in class, and the fear of failure was evident in their behavior. For an example, he picked only the ones
who is creative and have skills in drawing to be in his group in every project given by the lecturers. He
was entirely obligated what he had to do, and when the results came in, he was not happy at all, only
relief.
6. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
Journal 3
ENTRY 1: Optimistic Bias
“Optimism bias, is the tendency of individuals to underestimate the likelihood they will
experience adverse events, such as skin cancer or car accidents. As a consequence of this bias,
some individuals might disregard precautions that might curb these risks. They might not, for
example, wear seatbelts” Weinstein. Optimistic Bias is actually a belief that bad things will
never happen to us. We never expect that we will get involve In car accident, get diabetes even
though the statistics of people getting in car accident or diabetes happened all the time. From
my point of view, the reasons why is because I am not yet facing with the actual occurrence of
the event, but rather imagining the promise it shall bring. Optimistic Bias taught us to always
look on bright side and keep moving forward.
This happened to me on last week Friday, at the parking area in Taylors. So, I was involved in a
car accident. There was an empty space to parked my car, I took my time slowly as the space
are quite narrow until a lunatic taxi driver drove at high speed and hit my car from the back.
Both of our car damaged badly but I believed it was not entirely my fault and that it was the
situation at time where the taxi driver should drove carefully and patiently wait until I get into
the parking space as it one way road that caused the accident. The fact of the matter is that I
truly believed that my own judgement and control superior to that of others.
7. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
25/10/2013, 12.00 A.M
ENTRY 2 : STREOTYPING
Stereotyping. We often here this word everywhere. That’s probably happened to us at all times
nowadays.
We often stereotype before even know what actually is. People that belief based on their
membership in a particular group are known as stereotyping. Stereotypes can be positive,
negative, or neutral. Stereotypes based on gender, ethnicity, or occupation are common in
many societies. By stereotyping we infer that a person has a whole range of characteristics and
abilities that we assume all members of that group have. Stereotypes lead to social
categorization, which is one of the reasons for prejudice attitudes. Most stereotypes probably
tend to convey a negative impression and far more common. For example, a female teacher,
who actually did not tolerate with Males and because of this, she evaluate every works that the
Males did was poor and no workmanship without any valid reasons.
This happened a year ago. I had a teacher whom did not really tolerate with me and the rest of
the guys just because the girls are well behave, produce neat work and submitted assignments
on time in class. Meanwhile, during my upcoming exam, my friends and I had some difficulties
with our studies. So, we decided to ask our teacher to helped out with few questions that will
came out during exam but she ignored and cared less about our performance.
It’s is cleared that my teacher was being inconsiderate with male students. This shows that my
teacher was stereotyping based on gender
8. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
JOURNAL 4
25/5/2014, 3.00 P.M
ENTRY 1: HALO EFFECT
Halo effect touches each one of us in some way or the other. Much of the impression we make
about a person’s ability and character is influenced by our likeliness for that person. Some
desirable qualities in a person make us believe firmly in his or her ability to perform a specific
task as compared to a person who seems less appealing to us.
From what I’ve experienced before, a friend of mine told me he was looking for a job in One
Utama mall but somehow got rejected because there this guy came after him dressed
professionally with tie and good looking get the job instead. This is because based on the
manager, the guy are more appealing to him and likely suit for the job. Through many times, we
do understand that the potential of a person should not be judged by the way he looks or
presents himself but still we fall prey to this psychological tendency to judge people based on
our fondness for hem which often results in selecting wrong candidates for the wrong jobs
Sad isn’t it?
9. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
15/2/2015, 1.00 P.M
ENTRY 2: AUTOMETIC PROCESSING
Automatic processing is what Psychologists call processing of information that guides behavior,
but without conscious awareness, and without interfering with other conscious activity that
may be going on at the same time. Automatic Processing is sort of like muscle memory. When
you start to do something that you have done many times, and you can complete it successfully
without giving it any thought, that's automatic processing. It can actually be disruptive to begin
to think about the process once it has started automatically.
For example, I drove to Taylors everyday, my memory know where to go without looking for a
specific address, I know when and where to stop or turn. I travel without giving any thought.
This shows automatic processing. Here’s another example that I experienced. I’ve been playing
Guitars for years, and I know how my hands seem to move on their own while my mind goes
somewhere else.
10. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
JOURNAL 5
22/4/2015, 6.00 P.M
ENTRY 1 : OPERANT CONDITIONING
Operant Conditioning is a process that attempts to modify behavior through, the use of positive
and negative reinforcement. Through operant conditioning, an individual makes an association
between a particular behavior and a consequence. I believe everyone experience this before.
For example, if your Mom gives you RM 10 to clean up the house and you are more likely to
repeat this behavior in the future, this is positive reinforcement. In terms of negative
reinforcement, if you do not complete your homework, you will give your teacher RM 10 and
you are more likely to complete your homework to avoid paying RM 10. Positive reinforcement
in the form of money and negative reinforcement in the form of avoiding to pay.
Last week, I saw my brother was fooling around lazy to complete his homework. So, my mom
had no other choice but to reward him with new toys every time he completed his homework.
Since then, my brother never missed out his homework. This experienced was positive
punishment : reward him and he will complete his homework.
Furthermore, as you can see that smartphone and teenagers cannot be separated nowadays.
My sister often with her smartphone, wasting time by socializing with her friend and watched
videos in Youtube until she doesn’t even bother about her studies. So, my parents decided to
take away her smartphone until she focus on her studies. Since then, she started to take her
11. Daniel Mazlan FNBE0814 PSY30203
studies seriously to avoid her smartphone taken away by our parents. This experiences was
negative punishment : avoid the parents to take her smartphone and she will focus on her
studies.
2/3/2015, 7.00 P.M
ENTRY 2 : COGNITIVE DISSONANCE
So, last month I’ve a gotten a new Perodua Myvi. I never like Perodua, and I think that the
company should stop producing crappy car. I think that their design is not worth the price, and
the handling of the car was awful . But still I bought one anyway. It is quite interesting that my
behavior’s contradict my attitude towards Perodua. It shown that I have a dissonant
relationship.
Cognitive dissonance is where when someone’s behavior do not match with their attitude. In
this case, I really do not like Perodua, but still I went ahead and bought one anyway. When this
happens, you would either change the attitude, explain yourself or care less about that
attitude. In this case, I bought Perodua Myvi because they provide better gas mileage. I get a
car that provide fuel efficiency for only RM 45K! That is considered cheap in Malaysia no matter
if it’s design was poor. A few weeks later, I started to like Perodua and now I just can’t care less
about whether or not brand preference is important.
