The Concept of Sustainability and Its Importance in Today's Global Economy - Assignment Example

ical and Operant Conditioning Your First Your Submitted Define and discuss the majorcharacteristics of culture. Provide examples from your personal life and experiences to illustrate your discussions. The major characteristics of culture include the aspects of the daily life of people who are a part of that culture. This may include the clothing, eating habits and religious traditions of that culture. Clothing would include the garments that people wear, to protect themselves from the climatic conditions of the place that they live in. For instance, wearing a pullover or a jacket for me would be a cultural response in a place that would be colder than the place I belong to. My religious beliefs too would be influenced by the place that I belong to and thus, plays a large part in determining my identity as a human being. The eating habits of a culture would refer to the manner of eating food and what it consist of. 2. Define, compare, and contrast race and ethnicity. Discuss the origin and history of each term, and discuss its social implications today. Where the word race originated from is unclear; however, there are speculations that it may have its roots in the term ‘razza’, an old Italian word that refers to the lineage of a person (American Heritage Dictionary). It is used today to distinguish between people who have similar gene pools and have certain physical features in common. Ethnicity, on the other hand, refers to the place of a person’s origin and is derived from the Greek word ‘ethnikos’, a word that means ‘people’ or ‘nation’ (The Free Dictionary). It therefore refers to a collective that is created as a result of political motives. Even today, the word is used to refer to the origins of a person. People belonging to the same ethnicity may thus, differ racially. Race is however, a biological grouping and may constitute a single ethnicity. 3. - Compare and contrast the three modes of food production strategies. Discuss the relationship between the natural environment and food production strategies. The agricultural mode of food production is the most common mode of producing food in the world. Hunting is another form, while gathering food can be another. While the agricultural mode of food production is reliable and ensures a constant supply of food, the same cannot be said about other forms of food production strategies. Hunting and gathering are modes of producing food that are largely dependent upon chance. Agricultural forms of the production of food enable women to take a part in work outside the homes while the others, in most cultures, do not. All these strategies have the common factor of the natural environment from which food id procured. The amount of game that is present and the fertility of the soil of a particular place decide the strategy employed there. 4. Compare arranged marriages to love marriages. What purpose does each serve in a culture? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each? Illustrate your discussions with specific examples. Arranged marriages refer to marriages that are conducted according to the will of the parents of the couple, while love marriages are conducted according to the will of the persons who get married. Arranged marriages are a means of procreation for a line without the person involved having to make any effort on his or her own. Love marriages, on the other hand, require effort on the part of both members of a couple. Love marriages are often used as a means of joining two large fortunes to create an even larger fortune. Love marriages often defy the conventional arrangement of the society and the divisions of class and ethnicity. While arranged marriages ensure the survival of the line, love marriages ensure that the two people involved are comfortable with each other. 5. Define the concept of sustainability and discuss its importance in todays global economy. Use specific examples to illustrate your discussion. Sustainability of resources is one of the most important questions that policymakers of today have to deal with. With a depletion in the resources that are available for the use of people, sustainable resources in terms of fuel, food, water and space are important issues for governments of today. Sources of energy are in many cases, non-renewable as is the case with fossil fuels. Petroleum resources that are present in the world shall not be able to satisfy the needs of people for much longer. Apart from this, there is also the scarcity of food that arises out of the lack of sustainability. The lack of sustainable water resources means that there are diplomatic wars fought over the rights to the water of certain rivers. Classical and Operant Conditioning Two daily activities that this paper shall discuss for the purpose of the elucidation of Classical and Operant Conditioning are studying and eating habits. These two activities can be used to explain these two forms of conditioning and their effects. The causes of many of the actions that one performs while eating and studying are related to these two forms of conditioning. This paper shall also discuss the components of both these forms of conditioning that shall help one understand the workings of the human mind in a better manner. Before the process of ingestion begins, one would be able to smell the food that is placed on one’s table. Apart from this, one would also be able to hear the sound of the cutlery that would be brought to the table. These sounds may initiate the process of salivation without the actual process of ingestion having started. This can be said to be a process that is a good example of classical conditioning. In this case, the conditioning involves the interaction with the environment that would then produce effects on the person who is conditioned in this manner. In this case, the smell of the food is something that is naturally associated with the food and thus, can be said to be an unconditional response. The salivation that is a response to such a stimulus can be termed an unconditional response since it is the natural response that has been brought about by exposure to certain stimuli that are naturally produced as well. The sound of the cutlery, however, has nothing to do with the food per se. On sustained exposure to this sound along with the consumption of food, the person is conditioned to salivate at the mere sound of cutlery. This would be called a conditioned stimuli and the salivation that would happen in the person as a response to this stimulus would be referred to as a conditioned response since it is in response to something that is a condition of the environment but is not a naturally occurring phenomenon (Cherry). The other activity that was mentioned, studying, on the other hand, is influenced to a great extent by operant conditioning. The incentive to study, that is, the rewards that are to be received at the end of the study, both internally and externally conditions the activity of study. When a system of rewards and punishments are set up for the purpose of conditioning a certain kind of response or set of responses from a certain person, then that system of conditioning is referred to as operant conditioning as it depends on the operation of certain instruments upon the human mind for the purpose of attaining certain ends (Cherry). While studying, a present that is given at the end of studying or the removal of a restriction after studying for a certain period of time would enable better studying. The present is an example of a positive reinforce while the removal of the restriction is an example of a negative reinforce. A physical pain may function as a deterrent to distraction (primary punishment) while the removal of heating facilities or coffee at study may spur the person to work harder (secondary punishment) (Glossary). At the same time, a parent may give the child a present after a certain target of study has been achieved. This would be termed a primary reinforcer, since it makes a simple and natural connection between a present, for example, a chocolate and good behavior. Secondary reinforcers would involve an indirect present which would enable the child to make associations with the primary present (Primary Reinforcement). The association between the two would be forged through a long process of conditioning. For instance, after giving the child a chocolate after every day of study, the parent can then make a record of the child’s behavior in a book. After doing so for a long time, the parent can do away with giving the child a chocolate by merely making a similar record of the child’s behavior every day. The child would take this as a secondary reinforcer. A lot of the actions that are performed by human beings are a result of classical and operant conditioning and this may be due to the social and cultural influences that operate upon a person. There may be the influences of class, caste and other social factors upon a person. Cultural beliefs can also be an important factor in the determination of a person’s behavior at any particular point in time. References Cherry, Kendra. (2012). “What Is Secondary Reinforcement?”. About.com. Retrieved February 15th, 2012, from http://psychology.about.com/od/operantconditioning/f/secondary- reinforcement.htm Cherry, Kendra. (2012). “Introduction to Classical Conditioning”. About.com. Retrieved February 15th, 2012, from http://psychology.about.com/od/behavioralpsychology/a/classcond.htm Cherry, Kendra. (2012). “Introduction to Operant Conditioning”. About.com. Retrieved February 15th, 2012, from http://psychology.about.com/od/behavioralpsychology/a/introopcond.htm “Primary Reinforcement”. Psychology Glossary. Retrieved February 15th, 2012, from http://www.alleydog.com/glossary/definition.php?term=Primary%20Reinforcement “American Heritage Dictionary”. Answers.com. Retrieved February 15th, 2012, from http://www.answers.com/topic/race-1 The Free Dictionary. Retrieved February 15th, 2012, from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/ethnic Glossary. Retrieved February 15th, 2012, from http://www.wadsworth.com/cgi- wadsworth/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M35&product_isbn_issn=053459994X&&altna me=Glossary&&resource_id=10&chapter_number=0 Read More