The Monster Study Summary

Imagine a kid having their father leave them, their mother dying when they are three years old, having a speech problem, and being a highschool dropout at the age of seventeen. Who would ever come over all of this to become successful in the real world? Walter Dean Myers would to shape himself into someone for African-American children to look up to, to show there is a way out. Writing more than one hundred books about African-Americans and Juveniles helped him be shown as an author that speaks out on equality for African Americans. His own life impacted what he wrote about and his message is there is a way out for young African-Americans. With his speech difficulties and troubles growing up, Walter Dean Myers brought his way into African-American and Juvenile literature to show the possibilities that exist for younger

In the book “Opening Skinner’s Box”, Lauren Slater discusses many complicated ideas relating to certain experiments of recent times. In every chapter, she focuses on one specific experiment and poses many controversial thoughts. One of the chapters I found most interesting was the second chapter titled “Obscura”. In it she walks readers through the experiments of Stanley Milgram and questions the purpose, results, usefulness, and morality of the experiments.

Our world is full of monsters, some imaginary, but most are legitimate and terrifying. In his text “Monster Culture (Seven Theses)”, Jeffery Jerome Cohen examines the use of monsters in literate and cinema. Cohen makes the claim that the use of monsters, historically and presently, in forms of entertainment symbolizes more than just the fear they instill in audiences. A monster is no longer just a monster. Cohen suggests that every monster, villain, antagonist, or scary thing in a piece of writing, represents some major cultural issue that the world is facing at that time. Monsters are used to present the cultural problem as something that can be solved. Each of Cohen’s seven theses

Steven Harmon, he is the protagonist of Monster. The novel starts off with Steve writing about the best time to cry and all of this stuff he is experiencing. He is a 16 year old African-American on trial for the murder of a drug store owner. He acts nervous in the courtroom when the antagonist of the novel, Bobo King gives him a dirty look. King is the other young man who is accused of taking part of the crime. He is accused of taking the money from the register in the drugstore and of also taking the carton of cigarettes. King is dressed the same as Steve, tuxedo . I do not know how old he is yet. My predictions for Steve is that he is found guilty based on my knowledge of how society is today and the unfairness in the court of law. I believe

Perceptions from others can be cruel. Criminals are often thought of negatively by themselves and are also disrespected by others in society. The novel Monster presents the impressions people have about Steve Harmon, an accused criminal on trial for robbery and murder. Furthermore, the text explains Steve’s views of himself during and after time in prison from first person point-of-view. The novel Monster by Walter Dean Myers highlights the various perceptions that exist about an accused criminal.

Opening Skinner’s Box by Lauren Slater tells of experiments conducted by a physiologist named B.F. Skinner and controversies that surrounded them. Since some people did not agree with Skinner and his experiments, legends were created regarding him. One of these legends being that, “He built a baby box in which he kept his daughter Deborah for two full years in order to train her, tracking her progress on a grid.” (Slater 7) Skinner strived to shape the behavior of people, so while he did build his daughter, Deborah, a baby box to test out theories and experiments, she did not spend a full 2 years of her life in this “baby box” as the legend says. However, since there was some controversies surrounding Skinner’s experiments legends such as these

Before reading the book Monster by Walter Dean Myers, I disagreed with the statement “Lying to save yourself from being convicted of a crime is an okay thing do.” Reading this book has made me slightly change my mind.

The motives of a mob are never easy to determine: each person could want something else entirely or they could all want the exact same thing. Whatever their motives both the characters from Rod Serling’s “Monsters Are Due on Maple Street”, an insightful teleplay on the true nature of monsters, and the men from the 1923 Rosewood massacre, a bloodbath caused by a woman, a mindset, and a color— detailed in Michael Buchanan’s blog— formed mobs for very similar reasons. In fact both mobs formed for the exact same reasons. The quote from age twenty-one of Serling’s teleplay showcases the reasons that caused the formation of both mobs; these reasons can be organized into three main categories that pertain to both cases: fear, prejudice, and honor.

"The Power of Situations”, by Lee Ross and Richard E. Nisbett, explains to the reader that the way humans respond to a situation is looked at wrong by most individuals. The authors tell how most people look at the wrong side of situations. On most occasions people look to see who the situation is happening to, instead of focusing on the situation itself and the proper responses that one would expect to see. The information in this passage would be most relevant to a student pursuing a psychology degree. Although, it could be read with purpose by anyone with interests in psychology. The authors provide accurate and significant information, while giving a great interpretation for the reader to understand.

While arguably one of the defining psychological studies of the 20th Century, the research was not without flaws. Almost immediately the study became a subject for debate amongst psychologists who argued that the research was both ethically flawed and its lack of diversity meant it could not be generalized.

Frankenstein and his monster begin with opposite lives: Frankenstein has everything and the monster has nothing. However, in creating the monster, Frankenstein’s life and feelings begin to parallel that of the monster’s life. Frankenstein is incredibly intelligent with a fascination for science, but ultimately his thirst for knowledge leads to his undoing. Similarly the monster is determined to understand the society around him. But once he does, he understands that he will never be able to find companionship, which leads him to pain and anger. Following this both characters feel sorrow and regret in their own ways, the monster through guilt for the people he hurt and Frankenstein because his family were hurt by the being he created. By the

Situational effects and personality come into conflict when discussing behavior. Personality is someone’s “usual pattern of behavior, feelings, and thoughts” (Twenge, 2017, p.20). It remains constant throughout different situations, but some situations can be stressful enough to make a person act out of character. The transition between a person’s normal personality and behavior to a more evil, sinister behavior fascinates a man named Philip Zimbardo, who conducted the infamous Zimbardo Prison Experiment, or Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE). Zimbardo is an American psychologist at Stanford University and the mastermind behind the 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment (The Story). From the results of his study, Zimbardo explains the Lucifer Effect and how morally righteous people can do malicious things. The effect of both the one’s current

“For while I destroyed his hopes, I did not satisfy my own desires. They were forever ardent and craving; I still desired love and fellowship, and I was still spurned. Was there no injustice in this? Am I to be thought the only criminal, when all human kind sinned against me?” (Chapter 24, 240) In the novel, Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, readers follow the life of scientist Victor Frankenstein and his creation. The accomplishment of creating life is quickly overshadowed by Victor’s lack of responsibility regarding the monster’s needs. Victor doesn’t give it respect or love. Society’s rejection of the monster is responsible for his evil tendencies. Through her story, Mary Shelley makes the point that humankind

One of the most infamous experiments conducted in the history of psychology was the Stanford Prison Experiment. The main objective of this experiment was to see what effects would occur when a psychological experiment into human nature was performed. As I read through the material provided, I noticed that my thoughts on the matter were similar to many; that it was a complete failure as a scientific research project. However, his findings did provide us with something much more important that is still being talked about today; insight into human psychology and social behavior.

The aim of Watson and Rayner was to condition a phobia in an emotionally stable child.[1] For this study they chose a nine-month old infant from a hospital referred to as "Albert" for the experiment.[2] Watson followed the procedures which Pavlov had used in his experiments with dogs.[3]