Aric Nakamura
Psych 409
My Experiences with the First Three Tasks of
Psych 409
When
I first registered for this class, I had no idea how difficult some of the
tasks for this class would be. At
first, the tasks did not seem hard and I thought that this class would be quite
an easy class. In this report, I
will include all the different tasks that I completed, the pre and post task
ratings, the affective and cognitive behaviors that I noticed when I was trying
to complete the different tasks, and also the errors that I encountered while
trying to complete these tasks. I
will also include some answers to questions regarding the generational
curriculum, answers to questions regarding facing a due date, and a conclusion
about what I found out about myself during times when I have a lot of
stress. It is interesting to see
how we react to certain situations, especially when they are very stressful. Working under a due date is quite a
stressful thing to do, especially when you do not understand what to do. When I started task three for example, at
first I could not find where the generational curriculum was, and I started to
get really frustrated, Therefore,
in this report I describe what I felt and why. It asks me to write about whether I
think it was computer error or an error I made. Well personally, I think it is pretty
hard to blame the computer because we are the ones that are actually commanding
the computer on what to do.
Therefore, unless your computer is broken or something is wrong with
your operating system then you are the one in control of your computer. What you want the computer to do is
totally dependent on whether you do things correctly on the computer. Well that is what I think.
Task 1
As I
started my quest to complete the first task, I found that it was rather easy to
complete. At first I thought that
it was too easy and that I was making a mistake, but it seemed to turn out
correct. When I first started the
first task I was feeling quite positive and quite confident that I would be
successful at completing this task.
I felt this way because I have done this type of task before, such as
when I registered to be a user of Yahoo and Hotmail. At the time, I was not really thinking
of anything in particular because I did not expect to experience any
problems. I basically went to the
site and followed the directions and in an instant I was registered as a lab
user. However, now that I think about it, I suppose I did have a plan in the
sense that I planned to go to the site and follow the directions and see where
that would take me. At that time,
as basic as that plan was, I did not think it was a plan. Perhaps, it just seemed so basic that I
never paid much attention to it.
The second step in the first task was to email Dr. James saying that I
had completed my task. That also
did not cause me to have any problems.
Even for this task, I never really paid attention to the cognitive
behaviors of this task. I am not
sure why I never really paid attention to what I was thinking. It was probably because it seemed so
easy. After the task, I remained in
a positive mood. You can look at the table and compare the pre and post ratings
and make a conclusion from that.
All questions required either a short explanation for the ratings that
were given or a short explanation as the answer to the question.
Therefore,
if you would like to see the actual pre and post ratings please feel free to do
so. It will be located on my
website. Looking at the data
provided in this table, you can see that this task was not very difficult, did
not cause me any problems, and did not take very much time or effort to
complete. Well, to be quite honest
I was not really worried about having to face a due date for this task because
I have said previously it was not very difficult. Looking at the data provided, it shows
that the actual time of completion of the task was less than the predicted
amount of time given in the pre rating.
So, looking at that I think it is safe to say that facing a due date for
this task was not of concern to me.
See Task 1 pre rating. See Task 1 post rating.
|
|
Task
1 pre Rating |
Task
1 Post Rating |
|
1.
What kind of mood are you in? |
9-highly
positive |
9-highly
positive |
|
2.
Describe the task |
See
pre ratings |
See
post rating |
|
3.
Amount of time task took |
Predicted
15 mins. |
Actual
time was 10 mins. |
|
4.
Importance of completing task |
10-very
important |
10-very
important |
|
5.
Difficulty in completing task |
2-not
very difficult |
1-not
difficult at all |
|
6.
Level of anger if task was not completed |
9-very
angry |
9-very
angry |
|
7.
Confidence in successful task completion |
9-very
successful |
9-very
successful |
|
8.
Likeliness of becoming good at similar future tasks |
9-very
likely |
9-very
likely |
|
9.
Reason why task completion was successful |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
10,
Level of motivation to complete task |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
11.
Computers made tasks easier |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
12.
Amount of effort needed to accomplish task |
2-very little |
1-almost
no effort |
Task 2
Completing
the second task required a little more skill than did the first task but
nevertheless it was not very difficult.
During the pre-task stage of this task, I felt good about the completion
of this task. I had a very positive outlook on the way I assumed things would
go. I felt that since the last task
was not very difficult and this task did not seem too much more difficult than the
last that I would complete it quickly.
I had a lot of confidence going into this task being that the first task
was such a success. The first step
in completing this task was to log on to the WEBCT site and register as a user. I did not feel very apprehensive towards
this because I had registered on other websites in the past and I never had
problems. After logging on to the
site it gives you directions on what to do., so there were no problems
there.. It also helped that there
were some instructions on what to do in the task and due dates handout from the
web. As I finished the first step,
the first thought in my head was what topic would I choose to research on. Well, I looked at the topics and chose
one and almost like clockwork, my next thought was what search engine would I
use to look for this article. After I decided on my search engine, I thought
about how I would look for my article.
Because I chose speed limits as my research topic I decided that I would
use speed limits as my keywords for the search.
The
next thing after typing in the keywords took the most time out of the whole
task to do. This was reading all
the different websites on the list that was provided by the search engine. Although it took a lot of time to look
at the different articles, it was not unpleasant nor did it generate any type
of negative feelings in me toward this task. I did not make any errors during this
task or not any that were obvious because I was able to locate an article to
complete my research message. I did
notice however, that there were many articles that the search engine provided
that were not very useful to use as my research article. The articles did refer to the specific
keywords that I had used, but for some reason, most of the articles were not
geared specifically to the subtopics that I had been looking for. I wondered about this and I thought that
perhaps it was because I was not specific enough during my search and
therefore, I was provided with all articles with the specific keywords. I am not sure whether I should have
regarded this as an error, being that I was able to find an article that was
useful for my research message.
This would probably explain why affectively I was not frustrated and I
was able to keep my cognitive information behaviors focused and complete the
task. I cannot say anything about
my self-confidence and motivation to continue this task because this task did
not require me to continue my search for a long period or time.
However,
I can provide information about my self-confidence and motivation regarding the
other tasks. Being that this task
was not very hard to accomplish, my self-confidence did not change regarding
the other tasks. I felt just as
confident when I finished the task as when I started the task. My self-confidence regarding the other
tasks was as high as can be and my motivation level is also quite high. Again please feel free to take a look at
the pre and post ratings on my website.
See Task 2 pre ratings. See Task 2 post
ratings.
|
|
Task
2 Pre Rating |
Task
2 Post Rating |
|
1.
What kind of mood are you in? |
9-highly
positive |
9-highly
positive |
|
2.
Describe the task |
See
post ratings |
See
post rating |
|
3.
Amount of time task took |
Predicted
2 hrs |
Actual
1 1/2 hrs. |
|
4.
Importance of completing task |
9-highly
important |
9-highly
important |
|
5.
Difficulty in completing task |
2-very
slight difficulty |
4-mild
difficulty |
|
6.
Level of anger if task was not completed |
9-very
angry |
9-very
angry |
|
7.
Confidence in successful task completion |
9-very
likely |
9-very
likely |
|
8.
Likeliness of becoming good at similar future tasks |
See
post ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
9.
Reason why task completion was successful |
See
post ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
10,
Level of motivation to complete task |
9-very
motivated |
9-very
motivated |
|
11.
Computers made tasks easier |
See
post ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
12.
Amount of effort needed to accomplish task |
3-slight
effort |
5-some
effort |
Task 3
I
did not expect to run into problems during this task, but the problems I
experienced during the completion of this task made me quite frustrated and
angry. The first problem I ran into
was typing in the address of the website to access the curriculum. I must have typed it in at least ten times
and finally I guess I got it correct. I somehow managed to miss something each
time I typed in the address. This
did cause me to become a little irritated but as soon as the address worked, I
relaxed. I suppose however, that if
it had taken me longer to type in the correct address, I probably would have
gotten quite upset. During this
time, the first thought in my head was to relax and reread the address to make
sure I had spelled it correctly. So,
this is what I did. I believe I did
this about four or five times without success and then, I finally decided that
I should change my strategy and try something else that might work. Well, I then attempted to try and match
the address on my printout with the address on the computer screen and this too
did not work the first few times. But
alas, I figured out what was wrong.
I was missing the letter ¡°g¡± in front of the 19. Finally the address worked and I was
able to view the web page. By this
point, like I had said earlier, I was not really upset but just a little
annoyed or irritated. I took a
breath and continued with the task.
Again, I ran into problems.
This
time I was not as lucky the first time and I was not able to find what I was
looking for within the first ten tries and that just made me really
irritated. I am not sure why I
could not find what I was looking for but, affectively I was really upset. My first thought was to look for
anything that may have been related to the subject I was looking for. That did not work as well as I thought
it would and still I could not find what I was looking for. Finally, I could not take it and I
needed to just walk away from the computer and get back to it later. When I finally returned back to my task,
I did eventually find what I was looking for. This task really made me feel like I was
incompetent because it took me so long to find the material I needed to
find. Honestly, when I came back to
the computer to continue the task, I had lost all motivation to continue this
task, but I remembered that my grade depended upon completing this task. This helped to get me to continue this
task. What also helped quite a bit
was my fellow classmates who helped me by giving me some direction about where
to look for what. They had also
told me that they were having a difficult time finding the generational
curriculum themselves and they said that if they could help another classmate
have an easier time finding information then they would be glad to help. As for errors, I do not think I made any
errors except for typing in the address wrong.
Other
than that, I believe that everything else I did was correct. I was at the right webpage and all the
information I was looking for was right there but, for some reason I could not
find it. It is hard to make an
error when you are at the right place and all you need to do is just click a on
a link. Feel free to take a look at
the pre and post ratings on my website.
See Task 3 pre ratings. See Task 3 post
ratings
|
|
Task
3 Pre Ratings |
Task
3 Post Ratings |
|
1.
What kind of mood are you in? |
9-higly
positive |
2-very
negative |
|
2.
Describe the task |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
3.
Amount of time task took |
Predicted
1-3 hrs. |
Actual
4 hrs |
|
4.
Importance of completing task |
9-highly
important |
9-highly
important |
|
5.
Difficulty in completing task |
7-moderate
difficulty |
10-extremely
difficult |
|
6.
Level of anger if task was not completed |
9-very
upset |
10-extremely
angry |
|
7.
Confidence in successful task completion |
9-very
certain |
9-very
certain |
|
8.
Likeliness of becoming good at similar future tasks |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
9.
Reason why task completion was successful |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
10,
Level of motivation to complete task |
9-highly
motivated |
2-very
unmotivated |
|
11.
Computers made tasks easier |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
12.
Amount of effort needed to accomplish task |
7-moderate
effort |
10-tremendous
amount |
Task 4
I
expected this task to be the hardest of all the tasks. I have had no prior experiences with web
design and so therefore, had no idea how to create a webpage. From that day we received the assignment
I did have some anxiety about doing this task, but I thought that I have done
some hard assignments in the past and I have pulled through. I have to admit that at that time my
confidence levels had fallen slightly and I hoped that it was not as hard as I
thought it was. Cognitively, I
tried to think about how I could learn to design and build my webpage and who I
might be able to ask and if I had enough time to do all this. Well, the first thing I decided I need
to do was to ask someone proficient at web design and things of that
nature. I was able to ask my
brother for help with designing my page and he then started to teach me about
making a webpage in Word. The next
thing I did was try to set it up and then when I was finished upload it into
the directory. Well, by the time
this is uploaded into the directory and all my notes and pre and post ratings
are uploaded into the directory it should be done. The first thing I did was the title of
the page and that was pretty easy and did not cause me any problems. The next thing I did was to try and get
my email link to work. After about
15 minutes of trying I still could not get it and by that point I was
fuming. I started to feel
incompetent and stupid and not being able to get it to work just made things
ten times worse.
By
then, I no longer wanted to even think about a computer nor did I want to see
one. I had to walk away and let my
mind clear and clam down. When I
finally calmed down enough I went back to the computer and started to finish
what I had set out to do. After
another 15 minutes of trying I was finally able to get the email link to link
up to my email address. I Think my
error was to take bits and pieces of information my brother was telling me
instead of sitting down and taking notes all at one time. I wanted to take small piece of
information and try it out and see how it worked and I think that is where I ran
into so much trouble. Another thing
I think was an error on my part was being stubborn and trying to figure out
what was wrong on my own even though I had no idea what the hell was going on. If I had just asked for help, it
probably would not have taken so long and I would probably not have been so
frustrated. This task, to be quite
honest, really had a snowball effect of negative feelings toward
computers. This task took so much
out of me for the last two weeks and the only thing that kept me going to
finish the task was the grade.
Speaking of snowball effect, all the links I have been trying to get up
and running so far, does not work.
Again, the error is on my part.
I was not patient enough to listen to all the information at one time
before I started the task and the second error was that I do not like asking
for help.
Being
that I am not quite finished with my webpage I am not able to say what kind of
other problems I will experience while trying to get it up and running. See Task 4 pre
ratings. See Task 4 post ratings.
|
|
Task
4 pre ratings |
Task
4 post ratings |
|
1.
What kind of mood are you in? |
6-neutral |
1-extremely
negative |
|
2.
Describe the task |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
3.
Amount of time task took |
Predicted
¡°not sure¡± |
Actual
¡°too much time¡± |
|
4.
Importance of completing task |
9-very
important |
9-very
important |
|
5.
Difficulty in completing task |
10-extreme
difficulty |
10!!!-very
extreme difficulty |
|
6.
Level of anger if task was not completed |
10-extremely
angry |
10+++
-extremely angry |
|
7.
Confidence in successful task completion |
9-very
confident |
4-minutely
confident |
|
8.
Likeliness of becoming good at similar future tasks |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
9.
Reason why task completion was successful |
See
pre rating |
See
post ratings |
|
10,
Level of motivation to complete task |
9-very
motivated |
1-extremely
low motivation |
|
11.
Computers made tasks easier |
See
pre ratings |
See
post ratings |
|
12.
Amount of effort needed to accomplish task |
10-tremendous
effort |
10+++
-very tremendous effort |
Generational
Curriculum
The first generation I looked at was Generation 18. I chose to look at the website of a
student by the name of Arzadon. His website is very well put together http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/409as2003/arzadon/bibliography.htm
and it was rather interesting. It
was much different than what we are doing.
It was rather hard to get an idea of what our reports should be like
because his report was completely different from the report we are working on. Although their tasks were different from
the current generation it was interesting to see that the technology of their
pages are not very different from this current generations. The next site I looked at was a
student from Generation 10, by the name of Jennifer Lee. Her page, http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/409af98/lee/homelee.html
is quite interesting but again frustrating because in my opinion it did not
serve to help me with my page and report.
However, even though her website was done five years ago it has a lot of
modern things that are on the website.
Those things would be considered new at that time and yet she had it on
her page so it is a well done page.
The final generation I looked at was Generation 1. I picked Joleen Lai¡¯s webpage http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy/psy409a/lai/lai.html
and I found that her website was rather simple no fancy stuff at all. You can tell that the technology of then
was not as far advanced as it is today or even of five years ago.
Personally, I think that learning about computers and stuff
could be a very valuable and useful tool.
However, for people who have no prior knowledge about certain computer
programs it is really hard for them to be able to keep up and get things
done. Being that we are Generation
19 I think it is a little easier for us to find information on everything from
apples to zebras. I think that the
other generations from about ten to nineteen had a much easier time. In the future, I think that the
Generational Curriculum will continue and hopefully there will not be too many
more people like me who have very little computer background doing these
tasks. My advice is that I think
students should come into this class with some background of computer
knowledge. They should have at
least an ICS 101 class under their belts.
I know that having this class in their knowledge vault will help them
tremendously in this class and in others that may work with computers like this
one.
Due
Dates
This
is probably the most hated thing about assignments and tasks. It got rather stressful having a due
date with the later tasks, like tasks three and four for example. I felt that it was stressful because I
was still trying to get my webpage up and running and at this time I¡¯m still
trying to get it up and running. I
have already past the due date and the anxiety is no longer there because I
guess my brain says it is too late now so keep working and finish it. I felt a lot of stress during the last
two and a half weeks because I was trying to learn something that was so
foreign to me and it was not going well.
As of now I still have not figured it out and the only thing I can do is
play with my webpage until it works.
I just coped with it by doing my best that I possibly could and by
telling myself that I did do the best I could with the amount of resources that
I had. I guess I just continued to
work because that was the only thing I could do. While I sit here working on this report,
I have no feelings of pessimism or optimism. Doing any of these tasks I was never
really optimistic nor was I pessimistic.
All I knew was that I needed to finish this and get it turned in and
being that it was late there is not much I can about that. So, there is no sense in getting upset
or angry or anything like that because it is not going to change the fact that
it was late.
Table
Discussion
I
suppose that by keeping this type of self-observed data it will help myself and
others learn about the reasons why we as well as other people get frustrated
and this nay help myself and others learn to deal with these emotions. If we constantly self-observe ourselves,
it will be likely that myself and others will be more efficient at using
computer systems. Perhaps the next
time we will not make the same mistakes again and the next time it will be
faster when we do our project or whatever we are doing. It may also teach us to be a little more
patient when working with things like computers or driving in traffic.
Conclusion
My
conclusion is that I personally do not work well with computers. The simple tasks I have no trouble
doing, but it is those big tasks that can really get me angry and upset. Especially if it is a task in which I
have to use a program or I have to generate something on the computer with a
program that I have no clue about.
I do have to use the computer to do data input, type out research
papers, and send out email. However,
these were not that hard to learn and besides that I need to use these programs
everyday, either at work or at home for a class. To be quite honest, I do not even have
my own personal website up because I never thought that it was useful. I think that if people want to get to
know me they can come and talk to me in person. So based on my experiences with these
tasks, (namely the last two) I now feel that I am not a computer oriented
person. Yes given, the programs I
need to use I will continue to use but any other program that I do not need to
use I will let the computer oriented people use.