Psychology: Reflection on Goals and Personal Feelings

This essay presents a student's reflection on their goals in pursuing a psychology career, their initial apprehensions about joining the university, and their experiences in a multicultural environment. It discusses interesting topics learned in class, such as Erik Erikson’s theory of psychosocial development, different types of therapies (cognitive behavioral therapy, interpersonal therapy, psychodynamic therapy), and social cognition. The student also reflects on their personal feelings throughout the semester, including initial excitement and occasional feelings of being overburdened, and provides advice to future students, emphasizing the importance of staying up-to-date with current affairs, linking theories with daily experiences, balancing coursework with research, and actively participating in study groups. The essay highlights the student's journey of learning and personal growth within the psychology program and their preparation for a future career as a counselor. Desklib provides access to similar solved assignments and resources for students.

Running head: PSYCHOLOGY
PSYCHOLOGY
Name of the student:
Name of the university:
Author note:

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Part A:
Reflection on goals:
I wanted to pursue a career in the domain of psychology, as it had been my favorite
subject from my high school days. My aim in joining the university is to achieve degrees in the
subject and gain enough knowledge and skills so that I can become a counselor in my future. In
the present days, mental health of people are considered to be very important for ensuring better
quality lives besides their physical health. With the lives becoming complex, and ambitions and
expectations of human beings rising higher, people are losing their mental and emotional
stabilities (Belfrage et al., 2018). Therefore, I aim to support such people in their crisis period
with the knowledge and skills of the theories of psychology and help them cope with their issues
in daily lives. I had set up a goal to score well in my subject so that I can get good opportunities
as a counselor in esteemed organizations and help people to live better quality lives.
Initially I was quite apprehensive about my acceptance by people present in the
university. I am from a different country and hence I was fearful that I might face racism and
stigmatization in the university. However, my zeal to study psychology from one of the best
universities in the nation could not stop me. However, I was quite mesmerized by the love and
affection showered on me by people in the university. The entire campus was totally against
racism, stigmatization and discrimination and discouraged ragging. Professors of the university
were helpful and went out of their way to help students solve their queries and develop high
amount of knowledge. They constantly encouraged teamwork among the students. My
classmates were friendly and never made me feel as a person not belonging to their background.

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Before joining the university, I had no idea about the multicultural environment encouraged by
the university. It helped me overcome my inner fears and enjoy my classes a lot.
Topics taught in class:
One of the most interesting topics taught in class is Erik Erikson’s theory of
psychosocial development. This theory shows the ways by which different
psychosocial factors from the time of birth to that of the old age can influence social
experiences throughout the lifespan of individuals (Myers et al., 2015). Therefore,
when any client would visit me with estranged emotional and mental health
conditions, this theory would help me by acting as tool. It would help me to identify
the stage where the client belongs to and even understand the ways psychosocial
factors have affected him in any of the particular stages. This would help me in
developing interventions that would help me to teach him coping strategies to
overcome his issues.
Another interesting concept that I had learned is the different types of therapies
that can be applied to clients when they come with their issues. The different therapies
that I have developed knowledge are the cognitive behavioral therapy, interpersonal
therapy, family entered therapy, psychodynamic therapy and many others 9Maree,
2018). CBT therapies mainly help in modifying the though procedures of humans and
thereby replacing negative thoughts with positive ones. Interpersonal therapies mainly
emphasize on indentifying issues as well as problem in interpersonal relationships and

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thereby help individuals to address and improve them. Again, psychodynamic
therapies help in exploring the experiences of the individuals and helps in identifying
the aspects of the unconscious mind through intense, open-ended exploration of
feelings of individuals. Therefore, when patients seek for help, I can appropriately
apply the therapies along with the proper procedures and steps that need to be
maintained in each of the therapy. By this way, I will be successfully handling their
issues and helping them to overcome their problems.
Another important concept that also interested me is the social cognition. This
concept mainly focuses on how people process, store and thereby apply information
about other people and even social situations. This mainly focuses on the role that
cognitive processes play in social interactions (Cherry, 2017). This topic would be
helpful for me in handling clients who come with issues if conflict resolutions where
they face problems in interacting with society, grounds, employers, personal
relationship and many others. Thereby, I would be able to help them with knowledge
of social cognition.
Part B:
Personal feelings:
The journey of completing the semester had been quite overwhelming as well
as exciting. The professors took extra initiative to make their lectures interesting as
well as thrilling to the students. They never followed the pen and paper mode of

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studies and in place always encouraged to work in groups and conduct different
activities that required application of the knowledge embedded by them. Therefore, I
never felt strenuous and in place enjoyed to complete the project and home chores.
Moreover, the course also provided many opportunities of application of the
knowledge and skills learnt in classes and therefore, we can evaluate our weakness
and strength in the topics. However, I often felt overburdened with the huge number
of projects and often faced issues with time managements. This used to make me
frustrated sometimes. However, I learnt to manage tie effectively with experiences
and successes in completing assignments properly.
Advices to students:
One of the most important advice is that every students need to stay up-to-date
with the current affairs. Psychology is a continually evolving subject and therefore, in
order to be aware of the new ideas as well as perspectives emerging in the domain on
the daily basis, students should be learning about blogs, journals, magazines, ted-
talks, podcasts and many others (Kay et al., 2015). Another important advice is to
link the theories, concepts and models learnt in the classroom with that of the various
experiences gained on a daily basis. Applying the theories learn in analyzing an
interaction with a friend, a stranger, a character on the TV shows and many others
would help to understand how well one can apply the gained knowledge on real life
scenarios (Stotz, 2014).

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Another important advice is to provide equal importance to both coursework
as well as research projects. Graduate courses in psychology often provide an
interesting mixture of advanced classes as well as independent or collaborative
research projects. While the research work is an important part that students mostly
care about, they should never neglect their coursework (Mcdougal,2015). They should
attend the classes as they help students to develop skills as well as important
information on the content of the fields. Another important advice is to form study
groups and participate in them actively. Study groups are particularly beneficial for
the psychology students and help to tackle tough courses in the research as well as
statistic methods (Landy et al., 2016). This can be considered a greater opportunity for
reviewing materials before examinations, getting feedbacks on ideas for a paper as
well as discus readings and assignments.

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References:
Belfrage, A. S. V., Grotmol, K. S., Tyssen, R., Moum, T., Finset, A., Rø, K. I., & Lien, L.
(2018). Factors influencing doctors’ counselling on patients’ lifestyle habits: a cohort
study. BJGP Open, 2(3), bjgpopen18X101607.
Cherry, K. (2017). Erik Erikson's Stages of Psychosocial Development. Psychology.
Psychosocial Theories. Päivitetty, 14, 2017.
Kay, A. C., Sullivan, D., & Landau, M. J. (2015). Psychological importance of beliefs in control
and order: Historical and contemporary perspectives in social and personality
psychology.
Landy, F. J., & Conte, J. M. (2016). Work in the 21st century, Binder ready version: An
introduction to Industrial and Organizational Psychology. John Wiley & Sons.
Maree, J. G. (2018). Perspective: promoting career development in the early years of people’s
lives through self-and career construction counselling to promote their career resilience
and career adaptability.
McDougall, W. (2015). An introduction to social psychology. Psychology Press.
Myers, B. (2015). Counselling in practice: Counselling patients on antipsychotic
medicines. Australian Pharmacist, 34(6), 42.
Stotz, K. (2014). Extended evolutionary psychology: the importance of transgenerational
developmental plasticity. Frontiers in psychology, 5, 908.

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