Then and Now

For this post I talked to my parents and grandparents to get their input on the topic. They both basically had the same thing to say. Not much was different in their responses. Back then the young adults were expected to at least graduate from high school and to get good jobs that lasted for twenty years and then to retire. Girls were expected to marry in their 20's and to make being mothers and home makers their primary focus, while careers were allowable if they did not interfere with the womanly duties. Boys were expected to work and to provide for their families. Having a stable lifestyle was a big thing they emphasized. They said it was inappropriate and irresponsible to not have a job back then at that age.  Now, 20 year olds like me are expected to have some college, to delay marriage and childbirth, and to have solid skills that can move with them as jobs come and go. 

Johari Window

For chapter two i decided to talk about the Johari window. This subject was very appealing to me for some reason. The window was created be Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham as a model of different sorts of knowledge that affect self-development. Johari is a combination of both of their first names. A four paned "window," divides personal awareness into four different types, as represented by its four quadrants: open, hidden, blind, and unknown. The open quadrant represents things that both I know about myself, and that you know about me. Examples of this are your name, height, and major. The blind quadrant represents things that you know about me, but that I am unaware of. For example others may see that we are insecure even though we think we’ve hidden it well. The hidden quadrant represents things that I know about myself, which you do not know. An example of this is not telling people about your vulnerabilities because it’s considered private. The unknown quadrant represents things that neither I know about myself, nor you know about me. Examples include untried talents and unused resources. Those are all of the four windows and their descriptions. The end.

Race

Race is a classification system used to categorize humans into large and distinct populations or groups by heritable characteristics, geographic ancestry, physical appearance, and ethnicity. It is considered a primary aspect of personal identity. In my eyes race is an appropriate way to classify people just not in a negative way. Race is useful for telling people apart from their cultures to their specific region in the world. I believe it can be used as a learning tool for individuals. Those who stereotype certain races are incorrigible in the way that they think. Everyone is different and their own individual just because they may be the same race as someone doing a certain thing doesn’t mean that they will follow. I do believe that the Census Bureau should allow people to check multiple races to define themselves because not everyone is just one race. Americans especially are made up of multiple races not just a single one. Citizens have the right to express themselves through their race.

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

I decided to discuss Maslow’s hierarchy of needs for this portion on the reading because it was really interesting to me. It is a Hierarchy of five human motivational needs arranged by ascending order of importance, developed by Abraham Maslow. The five ascending needs are (1) physiological, (2) safety, (3) belonging, (4) self-esteem, and (5) self-actualization. Only unsatisfied needs are motivators. Once a need is satisfied, the next level emerges as a motivator. Then you continue so on and so forth. Physiological needs include the most basic needs that are vital to survival, such as the need for water, air, food and sleep. Safety needs include needs for safety and security. Belonging needs include friendship, love, and affection. Self-esteem needs include the need for things that reflect on self-esteem, personal worth, social recognition and accomplishment. Finally self-actualization needs, the highest on the hierarchy, people are self-aware, concerned with personal growth, less concerned with the opinions of others and are more interested fulfilling their potential. Below is the hierarchy:

Personal Relationship

I would have to say the relationship with my girlfriend is a relationship that has become closer over time. In the earliest stage of our relationship we were still trying to figure each other out even though we had known each other for quite a while before. There were certain things we did not know about each other. A lot of flirting was going on between us. At the beginning I guess our relationship would be closer to a I-You relationship even though I believe we communicated more than that.  During that stage we talked about school, friends, and other random stuff; Nothing really too personal at the time. We avoided talks about family, past relationships, and gossip about things. Those subjects were for our best friends at the time. In our relationships current state we talk about each and everything there is to talk about. I mean after three years together there really are no secrets between each other. There is not one thing we don’t talk about. We have become one another’s best friend after everything we have experienced together throughout our relationship. I can definitely identify differences in experiences but that is not likely since we have experienced basically everything together.

Linear and Interactive Models of Communication

Linear communication was the first model of interpersonal communication. Linear, meaning one way, is the process in which a person acts upon another person. It is a verbal model that consisted of five questions describing a sequence of acts that make up communication. The sequence goes as follows: who? Says what? In what channel? to whom? and with what effect? An example of linear communication would be to attend a lecture from a university professor because there is no interaction what so ever.  This model of communication flows in only one direction from a sender to a passive receiver. Interactive models portray communication as a process in which listeners give feedback in response to a certain message. In this model one person is the sender and one is the receiver there is no actual conversation it’s just a response to a message. An example of this model would be a professor asking a question to a student in class and the student responding. The major difference between the two is that in linear communication only one person is participating and in interactive two parties are speaking.

Introductory Post

Greetings my name is "Petey" and I have enrolled in your communication and human relationship class to fulfill some elective class requirements and to also learn a little something. I am from southern California and I used to live in a small town called Redlands. My current age happens to be nineteen and my birth month is March. I am the eldest out of two sisters and one brother. I have a beautiful girlfriend whom I live with here in San Jose. We have been with each other for almost three years now. I attended Redlands East Valley High School for all of my four years and played varsity football for three. Now I attend San Jose State University on a athletic scholarship and I lived on the dorms on campus for my whole freshman year. Currently I am a sophomore at this institute; last semester I believe I experienced my best college semester. The college life is cool and all but with football it can be frustrating. I ended up having a decent GPA with it being over a 3.0, but still it was difficult to pull off. This semester I hope to exceed some expectations of me and get a 4.0. I definitely am going to work my tail off to succeed. I am excited to take this class this semester and I hope I get a lot out of it!