A) Why is this a hot button topic? Why does it matter to you?
Cyberbullying is a colossal hot button issue! It has led to devastating ramifications that have
significantly affected individuals, families, and entire communities. And yet, there are those
that feel that their disgusting online behaviour is justifiable, deserved, or meaningless ranting,
and these mentally unintelligent people continue to tear down others with zero guilt and to no
end.
This hot button topic is meaningful to me for two main reasons:
I have both experience in receiving and dishing out emotionally damaging cyberbullying and
ignorance.
Throughout all nations and within my own community I have beheld a rise in suicides
resulting from cyberbullying, harassment, and threats; and that is entirely unacceptable!
B) How does this hot button topic affect individuals?
Cyberbullying assists in tearing down the minds and self-esteem of the victims. The victim
does not even have to be mentally unhealthy either; even the strongest minds can succumb to
certain evils faced online. The conditions resulting from such negative online behaviour can
range from severe depression, anxiety, fear, lowered self-esteem, a decrease in physical
health, or even a build-up of negative emotion so strong and unchecked that it leads to murder,
mass murder, and suicide. For these horrific outcomes to be manifested due to cyberbullying,
there is no excuse good enough.
C) How does this hot button topic affect society?
The two most mortifying results of cyberbullying that I have witnessed have been murder or
suicide, particularly among our youth. These grisly outcomes can leave life-long devastating
imprints within the communities of the victims and can even expand the heartache nationwide!
The loss of innocent lives can have a negative impact within schools, businesses, families, and
entire neighbourhoods. These horrors breed sadness, fear, and more in those who are affected
by them, and sometimes the damage never heals.
D) How would you use some of the psychological concepts from this course to understand
these issues?
We can analyse this crisis through any of psychology's perspectives. Personally, I see the
neuroscience, psychodynamic, and social-cultural perspectives as the most enlightening.
Through neuroscience I understand that the brain chemistry of both the bully and the victim
are completely different and unrelated. Thus, the individuals' understandings and handlings of
a situation can differ greatly.
Through psychodynamics I understand that each separate individual has different life
experience, have been taught differently, and has had differing influences of many other kinds
that have helped to shape their separate personalities over time. So, something that seems
meaningless to one person, could be something that the other person feels passionately about,
and without proper empathy, consideration, and communication emotional disaster can strike.
Through the social-cultural perspective I understand that an individual's social influences play
a big part in shaping or determining the behaviours of an individual while on social media. For
the cyberbully if they have voiced support from others of their bad behavior, they will
naturally continue the behavior or even advance the bad behavior to violence and terror. If the
cyberbully is criticized by most of their peers online, they may or may not choose to cease the
behavior and move on. The same can be said for a victim. If they receive support from others,
they may be able to brush off the hatred and move forward with little acknowledgment of the
meanness received, but if they are hounded by others negatively with zero support, this could
compel the victim to clap-back and make a bad conversation worse or become overwhelmed
with negative emotion about themselves or their situations.
E) How does this hot button topic apply to any of the following programmatic course themes?
As usual you could relate this topic to any of the course themes if you did the research. For this
discussion I chose ethics and emotional intelligence as most closely related. Having strong
moral fibre and knowing and accepting the differences between right and wrong (ethics) is
imperative for manifesting a positive mindset and positive behaviours. You must also possess
the awareness of and strength to enforce control over your own emotions. It is also your duty
to exercise caution to the emotional wellbeing of others, and you must be able to determine if
a point you wish to make will be positively enhancing or negatively detrimental (emotional
intelligence). In essence, you MUST have the power-of-self and make the judgment to do
what is RIGHT, even if that means "walking away" from a situation you disagree with in
silence.
Hot button topic is wellness and the discussion, I am doing is based on non-pharmacological
approaches to reduce stress. The reason this is a hot button topic for me is because I am
dealing with these matters now as we speak. Many people are battling many different matters
and we all cope differently. The situations that occurred in my life in the past 2 years have
definitely been life challenging. I have a 15-year-old daughter that was diagnosed with
leukaemia. That alone drove me insane and the reason I will say I really lost it is because I
feared that deeply. I was afraid of what may occur and as a mother I was determined to be a
supermom. I was trapped in a mindset that I will save my baby from whatever even it was the
risk of me losing my own life. I was not able to take this from her and I obtained severe
anxiety. I played my role as calm and collected around her and with her med team. Deep down
inside I was not ok. My close family members and friends noticed the change in my behavior,
and they also realized I was going into depression. I never would want to leave the hospital for
the first 2 weeks during her diagnoses. I was crying hysterically when I was alone, and I
started to become very angry with people that had great and pure intentions. As time
progressed, I began to see the change in me, so I was referred to a family therapist. My
daughter had obtained anxiety and it was a separation anxiety she formed because I was
always there and waited on her hand and foot besides her med team. It affects individuals
because when someone is connected to you and wants you to be the best person all around it
shows them that you are needing help and a form of validation that everything is going to be
okay. I see that it effects society because when you hear, "your child has cancer" the next thing
you will feel is, will this be it? Can she fight this battle and why her? I see that society was
very supportive the love and connections and relationships that are built during this trying time
are so essential and pure. I found the most help and support from parents just like myself that
were battling this same fight with their children, and we became like family. While going to
therapy I seen that my doctor was referring me to take various medications. I do not like
medication. I am holistic and I am big on self-healing and natural remedies to everything. I felt
like well why not? c I tried the medications, and I noticed a huge change in my behavior and the
energy that I needed was vanishing and fast. I was afraid of a lot of the effects, and I took
myself off the medications. I than resulted to marijuana. I am open minded and honest. I found
that marijuana use helped me much more than the medications that the doctors prescribed to
me. I know that a lot of states are illegal, but I am honest about it, it is very harmful and has
helped me think very clearly and calmed me down and reduced my anxiety and tremendously.
I would use some of the psychological concepts from this course to understand that there is a
chance to be in legal trouble. If you are doing it moderation and it is beneficial versus harmful,
I find it ok. This is not the average discussion post, but I find it very helpful, and the main
concept is the self-care course theme to help me in this matter. But when you look at the
statistics in those who become addicted to medications that are prescribed to help, they do
more damage than they do help. I have not found yet where someone was in a marijuana
addiction or has done bad harm to self or others while using marijuana.
The hot button topic I chose is the impact of excessive screen time. This is a hot button topic
because screen time is getting longer and viewed as normal more and more every day. This
topic is important to me because I have three children in three different age groups that
sometimes struggle with excessive screen time. My seventeen-year-old has his phone in his
hand constantly and it is completely normal for him and his peers. My nine-year-old would
waste days away staring at a screen if I let her. She gets frustrated most of the time when I limit
her screen time. My three-year-old looks up to the older two so she also enjoys screen time.
My husband and I can even get caught up in our phones from time to time.
This topic effects individuals in a few different ways. Excessive screen time can contribute to
an individual avoiding physical activity, isolating, and getting distracted from other important
tasks. Screen time has benefits too, it is not bad. When the time an individual spends staring at
a screen becomes excessive many problems arise. This topic influences society as well.
Obesity in this country is at an all-time high. Laziness, lack of motivation, and distractions all
contribute to this. Excessive screen time has become normal. When most of society is staring
at their phones, posting on social media, and watching entertaining videos, they are not
engaging in physical activity. All these things can lead to lower self-esteem and even
depression.
This hot button topic applies to the programmatic theme of emotional intelligence. The
presence of excessive screen time can cause the absence of face-to-face human interaction.
Emotional intelligence can be lowered by this. It is also emotional intelligence that is a
psychological concept I would use to understand this issue. Emotional intelligence consists of
self-awareness, self-regulation, social skills, empathy, and motivation. All these categories
can be used to understand the impact of excessive screen time
Why is this a hot-button topic? Why does it matter to you?
While searching for the hot-button topic, I found one interesting topic in the technology
category, i.e., the social effects of video games. It is quite interesting for me as my brother is a
gamer and taught me some of it. I found that the social effects of video games can raise a
debate on their positive and negative impacts. Many researchers find the negative sides of this
topic, but I personally feel this topic has many positive effects on social aspects, and it requires
to be improved in different ways. This topic is significant for me because it makes me
comfortable to spend some time with my brother by sitting in a relaxing pose. However, I find
myself less advanced in video games, but my brother teaches me how to play the game and
how to jump to the next level.
How does this hot-button topic affect individuals? c
I found that the social effects of video gaming have both positive and negative impacts on an
individual. There are many people who think that playing video games is for lazy people and
children, but it’s not true, as playing videogame can strengthen the cognitive skills of an
individual, including memory, reasoning, spatial navigation, and perception. The author
Bowen has found that the violent nature of shooter video games, which shows an individual
can improve their thinking capacity regarding things in 3-D, what will happen if the same skill
is brought out during the academic courses (American Psychological Association, 2014).
Moreover, video games can be helpful to enhance children’s creativity level and help to
develop their problem-solving skills. Sometimes playing a video game can improve an
individual’s mood by getting rid of anxiety, giving relaxation, can bring emotional support to
a person, and bringing happiness.
How does this hot-button topic affect society?
Many people say that playing video games can increase aggressive behavior, decrease
inhibitions, and cause emotional outbursts in many people. I personally think the social effects
of playing video games have both pros and cons. These video games can affect every
individual differently, as everyone has different mindsets.
How would you use some of the psychological concepts from this course to understand these
issues?
The social effects of video games can be better understood by using psychological concepts
like emotional intelligence, social learning theory, cognitive behavior etc.
How does this hot-button topic apply to any of the following programmatic course themes?
Emotional intelligence:
According to authors Claudia Carissoli and Daniela Villani, video games can promote
emotional intelligence in adolescents at school with the integration of assisted framework and
proper guidance (Carissoli & Villani, 2019).
I have picked social stigmas against the LGBTQ+ community as my hot-button issue. This is
an important issue to me, as I am a part of that community, so stigmas against it directly affect
me. In the past, I have been insulted, discriminated against, and threatened with death, all
because I am a gay man.
LGBTQ+ individuals are suffering and discriminated against in many parts of the country.
Being marginalized and told that you are abnormal, a deviant, and worse, can negatively
impact a person's mental health. In some parts of the country, it is acceptable to discriminate
against LGBTQ+ people in hiring practices and housing. Some laws prevent trans women
from playing on teams with other women, which not only devalues the trans women but also
upholds sexist ideology that harms women by claiming a person born a man is better at sports
than one born a woman. Facing discrimination like these daily harms the mental and economic
health of the marginalized. Finding a job or housing can be difficult when people harbour bias
against your group.
These issues negatively affect society; cultivating a culture of hate and ignorance is not a
sustainable way to live. Large amounts of money are lost when people cannot work because
they are too stressed from living with hatred. Unfortunately, some people turn to negative
routes to deal with their stress, such as drugs or alcohol, which leads to increased crime and
drug-related accidents.
I would use my emotional intelligence to better understand these issues, with social justice and
ethics at the forefront. Trying to compassionately understand the viewpoint of the bigots in
society that discriminate could lead to answers on how to better deal with their fears and
hatred.
This topic resonates well with the social justice and ethics themes. Social justice is the fair and
equal treatment of all people regardless of differences. The LGBTQ+ community has not been
treated equally or fairly throughout history. Unfortunately, the American Psychological
Association has been an enemy of the community in the past, classifying the community as
mentally ill or sexually deviant until the early 70s. Now with a greater focus on ethics, I hope
the APA can be an ally of the LGBTQ+ community.
For my hot button topic, I chose PTSD among veterans. This is something I witnessed
firsthand when my dad returned from Desert Storm, where he earned the Bronze Star Medal.
For those that do not know, the Bronze Star is the fourth highest medal for heroism that a
service member can earn. My pops will not talk about his experiences, but I learned later that
he earned the medal for rescuing downed combatants. Just another reason in the long list of
why he is my hero.
Ptsd affects not only individuals that suffer from it, but everyone around them also. The
affected may suffer flashbacks, anxiety, and mood swings to name a few that we saw
firsthand. For us, it changed our lives. Outings were cancelled due to unpredictability. Strained
relationships, often because friends didn't understand what was happening. Thankfully we
never had to deal with the ultimate consequence of ptsd, as my father never took his own life.
With family support and therapy, he leads what many would consider a normal life where he
gets to dote on his grandkids, even when he must take out his hearing aids because it is too
darn loud!
Some of the effects on society can be increased healthcare costs, marital instability, and
elevated unemployment (Kessler, 2000). Thankfully PTSD is widely recognized today and
those affected have a variety of resources to help them learn to cope with the disease and better
integrate into society.
In module four we learned about coping behaviours, stress, and emotion regulation. Learning
the body's physical reaction to stressors can help in understanding PTSD and why someone
reacts the way they do. If you know a person's coping style you can assist them during the
harder times because you will able to recognize what is happening faster and take steps to help.
I will tie PTSD to self-care. The disease still carries a stigma that forces many to deny there is
an issue. This can lead them to delay or refuse treatment, lower quality of life and sometimes
ending in suicide. Friends and family of those suffering from PTSD should also be aware of
their self-care. It can be very easy to neglect one's own physical and mental health when trying
to help a loved one cope. It is very important for everyone associated with PTSD to be aware
of their own state and seek assistance when needed. You cannot take care of someone else if
you are unable to take care of yourself.
The stigma within The LGBTQ community is a c c hot bottom topic because a fair number their
e agrees with our lifestyle. It matters to me because I am a part of this community. Their
community is their home, which is also what makes them who they are. Individuals may
change their minds asked about the influence of others' punctuations could be used to further
explain why things appear and happen the way they do. Social justice applies to the fact that
everything is fair. I imagine then he still individual would feel extremely uncomfortable and
alone. However, being introverted might hope this situation. These individuals may like being
left alone because they may feel very anxious having been in a group. Endless someone from
the LGBTQ plus comes Along. Society today still struggles with this issue they might call it.
Some people in society these days might judge Community. Really about the issue or they
might be very mean to the LGBT community. I would have to self-regulate my feelings and
that people are entitled to their own opinion just as I must know that we understand. I was
hoping they would use a bit of ethical judgment against people who are different from them
wh when they are making choices about it even after they have used a moral judge y, they
could better understand why people or who m they are and stop judging them in a mean and
treat them in a kinder better fashion.
Reference
Kessler, R. C. (2000). Posttraumatic stress disorder: the burden to the individual and to
society. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 61, 4-14
American Psychological Association. (2014, February). Video game play may provide
learning, health, social benefits, review finds. Monitor on Psychology. Retrieved October 11,
2022, from https://www.apa.org/monitor/2014/02/video-game
Carissoli, C., & Villani, D. (2019). Can videogames be used to promote emotional intelligence
in teenagers? Results from EmotivaMente, a school program. Games for health journal, 8(6),
407-413.
