'A Class Divided Personnel and Industrial Psychology\r'

'In the phaseic shoot down, â€Å"A Class sh ared”, schoolteacher Mrs. Jane Elliot devised and conducted a lesson plan to show her students just how signifier comes about. Outraged by what she saw occurring in the nation, Mrs. Elliot conducted this lesson with a class of third graders the day underwork forcetioned the assassination of Martin Luther King.Mrs. Elliot set the stage for differentiating mingled with luscious eyed and em cook-eyed children. Her goal was to train her students experience what it snarl like to be discriminated against. She had previously discussed the issue of discrimination with her students and thought the seemed to understand and was in f figure broken by Dr. King’s death; they did non recognize the discrimination in her class employ until it was over and pointed out to them.Mrs. Elliott’s lesson divided her class by eye color. She had two groups, the brown look students and the inconsolable eyed students. She told the students at the start of the day, that the blue eyes group was comprised of the smarter and nice students. She gave them special privileges as a result of their favored designation.The students in the brown eyed group were treated poorly, with negative comments and foul rules. She was surprised to see how the children accommodated these roles. The brown eyed students unawares did poorer on footraces and acted differently. The blue eyes group took on a posture of favorable position and was mean to the brown eyed students.In class she purposely commented on the superiority of blue-eyed children in order to set them against the brown-eyed students. She consequently reversed her statement the haping day. When she revered her sermon of the students, the student’s behavior reversed. The brown eyed students became superior and the blue eyed students began doing poorly. It became clear that as an authority figure, what she said was believed. Even parents did not uncertainty her statement.The thesis of this experiment was that people accept and act upon what people of authority or social pinnacle. The film depicting her classroom experiment was mad in 1985 for the PBS show FRONTLINE. The film was entitled A Class Divided. The film included a enforce on Mr. Elliot’s students, who were young adults at the age the film was make. Thee film was followed by similar stories of experiments in other settings.The implications of this film on psychology are broad based. It demonstrates the impact of authority and social stature. The lessons learn as a result of this film athletic supporter us to understand how the influence of authority and socials stature can be utilize in some(prenominal) positive and negative ways. It helps us to understand why and under what conditions people will blindly follow others.2. Malcolm Gladwell, peeled York archives: Personality plus Overview of the articleThis article, write by Malcolm Gladwell, was printed in the September 2004 edition of the New Yorker critiques the use of personality tests. The tests discussed are those largely used in the employment arena. Gladwell gives the narration of the development of unlike tests and then their common uses, his personal experience and his perspicacity of the test as an employment tool.The article is passing easy to read and interesting. Gladwell provides background on some of these commonly used tests, which would be of surprise to employers use them.  The backdrop for the testing assessment is the story of a lieutenant in the US Army, Sandy Nininger.He explains that Niniger was an unconvincing soldier given his calm, thoughtful demeanor. Nininger however, developed into a fierce soldier and was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously for his WWII service.  Gladwell goes through the various personality tests and wonders how any of these tests qualification swallow noticed the trait in Nininger that made him such a warrior, when he was better know for drinking tea and listening to classical music.The history of the Myers Briggs is somewhat comical as Gladwell writes. He explains that the test was the brainchild of mother-daughter socialites, seeking to better understand the men in heir life and relationship between men and women. The Myers brigs was developed based on Jung, exactly according to Gladwell, these woman knew or understood precise little about Jung’s theories. In fact, he makes it clear that Jung would have never agreed with the base tenant of the Myers Briggs.Gladwell met with a psychologist and underwent the Thematic Apperception Test which essential him to compose stories for pictures. The psychologist then looked and themes in Gladwell’s stories and gave him a report. While Gladwll understood the assessment and found the psychologist to be quite perceptive, he expresses concern regarding the amount of inheringness in this test assessment. A different psychologist could have come to an entirely different conclusion.Finally, he discusses the work of a telephoner called Developmental Dimensions International (DDI). This company assesses prospective employee’s strengths and weaknesses by spending a day with the person in a put on workday. There person is given a wrinkle for the day and then assessed on a variety of levels. Gladwell spent a day with the company and true an assessment that again, he could understand but questioned the subjective nature of the assessment.Gladwell, in summary reminds us that charm personality tests are frequently used by employers, there is much subjectivity and room for interpretation. He acknowledges the fact that these tests are fun and the results are interesting, he cautions the use of them as meaningful assessments. He concludes by asking if any of the test he reviewed, would have been able to predict Sandy Niningers personality traits.\r\n'