TOPIC 1. The Philosophy of life

LESSON 1. Psychology in Everyday life

Classwork: Linkages (A Content-based Integrated Skills Text) High Intermediate U. 2. Ch.4. p.65-87.

Chapter 4 ATTITUDES

PRE-READING DISCUSSION

Getting into the Topic

CONSIDER ATTITUDES TOWARD ANIMALS

• How do you feel about animals? Do you like animals? Do you dislike them? What kinds? Why?

• How does Amy Kirkland feel about cats? Why?

Whenever Amy sees a cat, her first thought is to get away from it. She believes that cats will attack a person for no reason and that they cannot be trusted. When Amy was little, she was scratched by a cat. After that, her mother, who has always had a great fear of cats, would not let her touch one, so she became afraid of them too. Amy has a strong dislike for cats.

• How does Jeff Hall feel about animals? Why?

Jeff has both a dog and a cat and enjoys watching the squirrels and birds busily gathering food or building a nest in his backyard. When he was growing up, his family always had pets, mostly dogs and cats, and his mother always fed the birds outside. Jeff believes that animals and people can get along with each other. He says that an animal will not hurt a person unless something or someone threatens it. If he sees an animal that needs help, his first thought is to try to help it. Jeff really likes all kinds of animals.

These examples show different attitudes toward animals. Now write your own definition of an attitude and compare it with others in the class.

An attitude is

Reading – Attitudes

(1) Probably nothing is more fundamental to what you are and to what you do than your attitudes. An attitude is a readiness to act that involves both thinking and feeling. It is a readiness to act or respond in a particular way to an object, a person, a group, or an idea. A person can hold many attitudes, and these attitudes can be favourable or unfavourable. Even if a person does not care about something, this lack of interest is still an attitude and it is called apathy.

(2) We have a tendency to believe we are more rational, or thinking, than we probably are. In other words, most of us tend to think that we use our minds more than our feelings in responding to other people, situations, and events. However, thinking and feeling are interrelated. What we think affects how we feel, and how we feel affects what we think. An attitude or a reaction may seem to be based on thinking, but it may be based largely on an emotion such as fear or jealousy. In fact, what we feel can become so closely linked to what we think that we may be unable to explain clearly our own reaction to a particular person, event, or thing.

Influences on attitudes

(3) The many attitudes you now have were learned. They were acquired over a period of time, and they were influenced by at least four different factors: your family, your peers, your experience, and your culture.

(4) You did not inherit your attitudes from your parents even though the members of a family often have similar ideas and beliefs. For example, the members of a family may have similar attitudes about exercising or about watching television. This happens because children learn their attitudes from their parents. Of course, parents do not sit the children down and say, "Today we are going to teach you an attitude about television." Instead, attitudes develop in a more gradual and subtle way. Neither the child nor the parents may even be aware that an attitude is being taught. Suppose, for example, that the parents say things like, 'Tm too busy to watch the junk on television. It rots your mind." From these words, their child will learn a different attitude about television than if they say, "I really enjoy .watching television after a hard day. It gives me a break and helps me to relax."

(5) So children learn by watching and imitating. If parents and older children hold strong attitudes about something, a young child is likely to develop similar attitudes. Many attitudes are learned in the home. Your feelings about spending or saving money or about treating older people politely are likely to be influenced by your family. Your family is also particularly influential when it comes to religious and political attitudes.

(6) Although your family will undoubtedly have a lasting effect on how you think and feel about many things, it is seldom the only strong influence on your attitudes. By the time children reach adolescence, other people their own age— their peers—become an important influence on their attitudes and values. Young people during these years are psychologically breaking away from their families. Being accepted by peers becomes extremely important. Thus, the attitudes of most young people are affected at least for a while by friends and acquaintances of their own age.

(7) Another influence on your attitudes is the culture in which you grow up. For example, the Eastern and Western parts of the world have different attitudes toward death. Particular attitudes might also be found in different sections of a country or might

ATTITUDES AND BEHAVIOR

(8) It is valuable to understand attitudes, your own and others, because of their close relationship to behaviour. By understanding attitudes, you can control your own behaviour better. You can also understand the behaviour of others better, and thus can better predict what someone else might do in a particular situation. Finally, by understanding your own attitudes, you can see how others are trying to change your attitudes in order to influence your behaviour.

(9) However, attitudes and behaviour do not always agree. What you say and do may contradict what you think and feel. A phrase as simple as "thank you" can be sincere or can express sarcasm and discontent. Your facial expressions and gestures may emphasize or contradict the actual words you are using. Thus, you may agree to work on your day off, even though you think the request is unfair and you resent it.

POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE ATTITUDES

(10) A common way of classifying attitudes is to think of them as positive or negative. People who habitually show negative attitudes toward their jobs and the world are called pessimists. Those who see the brighter, more positive side of life are optimists. Both types of people may be reacting to the same experience, but they perceive it differently. Thus, a pessimist might consider a job transfer to be an undesirable change that probably would cause disappointments and problems. An optimist, however, would see the situation as a new opportunity and challenge. In both cases, attitudes would affect the person's way of perceiving the situation.

(11) Writer Elwood Chapman in his book, Your Attitude Is Showing, tells us that:

When you are positive you are usually more energetic, highly motivated, productive, and alert. Thinking about negative things too much has a way of draining your energy. Put another way, a positive attitude opens a gate and lets your inner enthusiasm spill out. A negative attitude, on the other hand, will keep the gate closed.

CHANGING ATTITUDES

(12) If we were not able to change or to influence attitudes, we would be much less concerned about them. However, people do change their attitudes, and they change them only after they perceive situations differently. This doesn't ordinarily happen easily or quickly.