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User:Tim Malysiak

G'day
G'day there

This is the Wikiversity page of University of Canberra student Tim Malysiak. Created for the Social Psychology unit I'm undertaking, there will be roughly weekly postings outlining the work I complete and personal opinions on theories encountered

Tim Malysiak

A few weeks worth of stuff people are welcome to read and comment on.

Norman Triplett

 * While examining racing times of cyclists, he found that those competing against other cyclist performed better than people who competed against the clock.
 * The presence of others enhanced task performance

Max Ringelmann
•	Conducted an experiment whereby men were asked to pull on a rope on individually, and do the same as part of a group.

•	Found as group size increased, effort exerted by each individual decreased.

The decrease in exertion by the participants is an explicable curiosity. After all, in Triplett’s experiments the cyclist when part of a group demonstrated an increase in performance. The cyclists were competing against each other creating “nervous energy” enhancing performance. However, the participants in Ringelmann’s work were working simultaneously on a single task. The decrease in effort may be due to a belief amongst participants that less effort is required to achieve a goal with more people involved. Whether this belief is true, it can explain the reduction in exerted effort.

Other early social psychology theorists include Gordon Allport and Kurt Lewin. Allport believed understanding attitudes was crucial to exploring social psychology. Attitudes dominated research for decades. Lewin believed behaviour was a function of person and situation and that information about is required before behaviour can be understood. The Dimensions of Social Psychological Research

Research in social psychology concentrates on the effects of others on our thoughts, feelings and emotions. These three dimensions are known as the ABC Triad:

A.	Affect: how people feel about themselves, others, and various issues.

B.	Behaviour: all the various behaviours individuals engage in.

C.	Cognition: what people think about themselves, others, and various issues in the social world.

The Psyche
•	A broader term for the mind

•	Emotions, desires, perceptions and all other psychological processes.

Nature
•	People are born in a certain way

•	Genes, hormones and brain processes will dictate actions as the individual grows

•	Advocates of nature in psychology use evolutionary theory to understand behaviour patterns

Culture
•	Focuses on what people learn from their parents, society and personal experience

•	Refers to common characteristics of a large group of people

The Human Brain
•	Evolved to adapt to culture

•	Language greatly improves brain’s powers.

•	The human mind is a duplex mind as it contains a conscious and automatic system

I’m of the belief that nature and culture interact. Although, on the available evidence, nature comes first and as we grow into our culture and society our ABC Triad is further shaped.

The Self
It seems the self can be broken down into three parts:

•	Self-knowledge (self-concept): this aspect revolves around self-awareness and self-esteem. The self-concept includes the knowledge and beliefs we have about ourselves. Social roles, including group membership, are also a part of self-knowledge. Self-knowledge is the way we would respond to people enquiring about who we are.

•	Interpersonal (public) self: the image we attempt to convey to others. It is the aspect of self that works toward social acceptance. The things we do to impress employers, first dates, people at social events etc. It is important to note that the public self may not be a fully accurate representation of us as a whole.

•	Agent (executive function) self: decision making and individual thought processes. The self-control aspect of the self as a whole.

An interesting topic discusses the possible existence a “true” self and a “real” self. According to those who believe it, the true self is an entity representing the way we feel, though it may not be expressed publicly. This entity has been given the title “self as impulse”. However, the public self we display in order to perhaps conform to the social situation we find ourselves in is defined as the “self as institution”. I think it is possible that the “true” and “real” self exist, though not as everlasting entities. I believe it would be more accurate to say that people learn over time when to act according to their “true” self, and when to publicly act differently in order to avoid negative consequences. This discussion leads then to the question:

•	Do people act differently when interacting with one group than they would when interacting with another group?

According to the information highlighted it would seem that perhaps people do. However, an individual may begin to act one way with a group until they have a better understanding of the people in the group. When becoming a member of a new group, an individual may take time to understand which characteristics of them fit best. Once this has been achieved, the individual becomes more comfortable in such a group and a more active member. This can lead to a possible conclusion that the social self is entirely a function of the environment. Indeed, self-esteem is one aspect that could be argued is entirely dependent on the environment if it is accepted that people their self-worth in relation to they way they compare themselves to others.

However, this would depend on the evaluations people give themselves. For example, one university student (A) may simply wish to pass their courses in order to obtain a degree, though another student (B) may wish to gain distinctions while completing their degree because they believe that is what they need to be successful. Student A may find it easier to attain their goal and have a higher self-esteem as a result. Student B may find it more difficult to achieve their goal, which, if not reached, will lead to a more negative self-evaluation and consequent lower self-esteem. This example demonstrates that self-esteem may not be an entire function of the environment and may also depend on the individual’s self-concept.

The mere fact individual’s care about self-esteem reflects the society we live in. The level of an individual’s self-esteem seems to have a relationship with their perceived level of social acceptance. An increase in social acceptance elevates self-esteem.

Furthermore, a consistent desire for social acceptance to maintain self-esteem can have an inverse effect on individual motivation for achievement. Intrinsic motivation can diminish if extrinsic motivation for social acceptance is the dominating reason for participating and achieving in activities.

How do all the “Self” aspects interact?
There are so many aspects to the self that it can be confusing to understand how they actually interact. To discuss this, each possible aspect needs to be defined.

•	Self-esteem: feelings of self-worth often based on social comparisons

•	Self-presentation: behaviours used to convey desired image to others for social acceptance and identity.

•	Self-concept: cognitive representations of one’s self, including sub-concepts like physical self-concept, academic self-concept, and social self-concept.

•	Self-efficacy: individual’s belief of their capacity to succeed at any given task.

•	Self-complexity: people generally see themselves as being more complex and others as less complex.

•	Self-awareness: attention directed at the self often involving evaluative comparisons. Improves behaviour and makes individual more socially desirable.

Indeed, all these aspects have an influence on the self as a whole. Though their interaction with each other offers interesting scenarios.

For example, does the amount of self-awareness an individual maintains affect their perceived self-complexity? Meaning, it may be possible that people would perceive themselves as being less complex if they were less self-aware. Another example, is self-presentation just a function of self-awareness? Evaluative comparisons resulting from self-awareness improves behaviour so as to enhance social acceptance and desired identity, the main function of self-presentation.

These examples demonstrate possible interactions some aspects of “self”. It does not seem definite one way or the other how they interact, only that there are possibilities. I welcome further ideas as to their interactions and what effects they have on the “self”.

Communication Levels
There have been two levels of communication identified, namely shallow and deep. Below is an outline of each.

Shallow
Shallow communication is the basic small talk of a conversation. Examples include greetings and questions/comments regarding the weather. As a conversation continues dialogue may be directed to exchanges regarding the recent news events where opinions may be shared.

Deep
A deep level of communication will include personal feelings/emotions that may only be shared in special circumstances. Herein lies an important issue when it comes to communication.

Context
The level of communication a conversation may reach depends largely on a number of factors. One of the first and most important factors regarding a conversation between two people is the relationship between the individuals. A conversation between individuals who share a close relationship is more likely encounter a deeper level of communication. The sharing of emotions is usually reserved for people we have a close relationship with because we know that our views will be understood they way we wish. The people we share feelings/emotions with are more likely to understand our thought processes and the reasons we have our opinions.

Another factor that influences the level of communication is the environmental setting in which a conversation takes place. It is much more difficult to exchange feelings/emotions about a topic of conversation in settings where clear communication is not possible. An example of such a setting is social nightspots. The dynamics of these places limit people to only a shallow level of conversation because the setting does not allow for an extensive exchange of feelings regarding any sort of topic. However, two people conversing in a coffee shop are more likely to communicate on a deeper level because of the generally quieter setting and more conversation friendly environment found.

Communication Channels
Communications channels can be considered the mediums we use to share our thoughts, feelings or emotions. Two basic mediums are used for this purpose, discussed below.

Verbal Communication Channel
Verbal communication involves the way we use our vocabulary to articulate our thoughts/feelings/emotions. Indeed, it could be argued lexicon and articulation are the two main variables in this channel. It would seem one is dependent on the other. Meaning that the ability for a person to articulate their thoughts depends largely on the size of their lexicon. Inversely, the way a person articulates their thoughts depends on their choice of words from the lexicon.

Non-verbal Communication Channel
The non-verbal communication channel appears to have several more variable attached to it. These can be loosely divided into two categories.

Delivery of the Message

This group includes the following variables:

•	Tone of voice: the pitch of the voice adopted by the person communicating in order to give a stronger meaning to the thoughts or feelings

•	Speed of voice: a person may talk with a varying speed depending on the topic of conversation, other individuals involved in the conversation, and the setting in which the conversation is taking place.

Behaviour Of Communicator

•	Body position: whether or not the individual is directly facing the other individual involved in the conversation

•	Facial expression: the emotion demonstrated on an individual’s face can influence their message

•	Gestures: similar to facial expression, however gestures can also be used to engage others in the conversation and broaden the depth of the conversation. Included in gestures can be the amount of physical contact and the proximity of each individual to those around them involved in the conversation.

•	Level of engagement: how “into” a conversation someone might be. Influences their depth of response and articulation throughout the conversation

Though these variables interact in different ways to convey a message, context also appears to play an important role in determining which behaviours are used.

Context Effects on Communication
The context of a conversation hugely influences the importance of each channel, and our subsequent choice of communication channel. Variables associated with Context in this case instance are:

•	Audience: depending on the group of people we are communicating to, we may need to vary the amount of verbal and non-verbal behaviour applied to express our message.

•	Capacity to communicate: our ability to express ourselves using our lexicon and non-verbal behaviours.

•	Physical environment: our proximity to others in the conversation determines our level of communication.

•	Social environment: noisy environments may require us to use more non-verbal channels than we normally would because we may not be heard as clearly as we would in a quieter setting.

•	Relationships: our relationship with others will influence the amount of physical contact we share during conversation.

The interactions between these variables will have a large influence on our communication channels. We may have an intimate relationship with an individual, but the conversation may be taking place via phone call. Consequently, verbal communication channels have a greater importance. However, if the physical environment allowed for more physical contact, actions may become more important.

The social environment also has implications on communication channels. Using the example of two people out having a couple of drinks, the social environment can dictate the communication channel one individual will use to offer the other a drink. In a quiet setting, it is more likely that an individual will simply ask, verbally, whether the other wants another drink. However, in a noisy nightclub setting, it may be that one is required to use non-verbal communication channels to offer the other a drink. The two individuals may have established a communication system that has proven successful through basic hand signals. This example demonstrates the importance of contextual variables in determining the most appropriate communication channel.

Aggression-Rwandan Civil War
The horror of the Rwandan Civil War highlighted the many concepts of aggression. Many forms of aggression have been operationalized in social psychology, even to the point where it has been argued that there are too many distinctions. To begin with though, it is important to understand each concept of aggression.

•	Hostile aggression: impulsive, angry behaviour motivated by a desire to hurt someone.

•	Instrumental aggression: pre-meditated, and very calculated behaviour motivated by extrinsic desires. Eg. Obtaining money, restoring an image or justice

The important distinction between each of these is the nature of the action. Hostile aggression involves an IMPULSIVE action, while instrumental aggression requires very CALCULATED behaviour. This distinction is important when discussing the Rwandan War.

•	Passive aggression: producing harm to others by withholding a behaviour.

•	Active aggression: harming others by performing a behaviour. It is clear that the Rwandan War was a form of active aggression. Hundreds of thousands of people were killed as a result of incredibly violent behaviour.

The violence in Rwanda between the Hutus and the Tutsis was a combination of Hostile and instrumental aggression. Though in the beginning most likely a form of Instrumental aggression, it seemed to descend into Hostile aggression as each group retaliated against the actions of the other. However, understanding the motivations behind such actions are crucial to understanding this example of modern conflict. Was their aggression learned or Innate? Were children wielding rifles simply because they were modelling the actions of elders in their group? These questions particularly pertain to children involved in committing such atrocious acts of violence. It is questionable whether the youngsters really understood the warfare they were participating in. It does not seem reasonable that youngsters involved had a sound understanding of the political motivations of the warfare. This may also be the case for many adults involved. Perhaps it was merely the social environment influencing the actions of those involved. If this is the case then it is expected that actions were learned, and not innate. Nurtured, rather than part of the nature of the population.

World Cup 2006
I can’t say I’m exactly sure where to include this discussion piece. I’m discussing the incredible influence a Football (Soccer) World Cup can have on the world, highlighting particular examples. I’ve retrieved most material from an article by Roy Hay and Tony Joel (2007) who discussed the fans of the world cup in their article. There are some particular examples of fan behaviour and social influences that make the sporting event so special. Personal experiences will also be included.

Hay and Joel make the first interesting point when they report the qualifying process undertaken to determine the 32 teams that will compete at the tournament involves more countries than there are United Nations members. This point alone demonstrates the importance of Football in the international community. How is it that countries come to the decision that competing in the world cup qualification process is more important than being a member of the UN? Football in Australia has long been referred to as a “sleeping giant” amongst the other Australian sporting codes. National League reforms yielded the current competition, the Hyundai A-League, now in it’s fourth season. By Germany 2006, the A-league had just completed its first season, and the success of Australia at the World Cup has seen the A-league grow in stature amongst Australian sport. However, football’s rise in Australia has still been subject to heavy scrutiny from other football codes. Heavy critics of Football came from The Footy Show, on Channel 9. However, once they realised how big tournament was the success that comes with qualifying, the members of this show travelled to broadcast from Germany. According to Hay and Joel, the fans were quite certain it was merely a stunt to jump on the bandwagon. Indeed, when the Footy Show members arrived in Munich the fans almost immediately got involved in an altercation that involved John “Sam” Newman, who himself had been one football’s harshest critics. Reportedly the altercation involved the fans spitting on Newman. Though inappropriate, the actions did reflect the feelings of most football fans in Australia. Football has been long criticised in Australia and unaccepted by the majority of the media and Australian population. It seems that this landscape is changing due to the influence of the World Cup on whole societies. Comments of Garry Lyon, am member of Melbourne’s version of The Footy Show that focuses on Australian Rules Football (AFL), reflect the changing attitudes to football in Australia. The authors highlight one comment of Lyon’s

“As for soccer, I have had no interest, other than to argue arrogantly that the game will never be known as football here in Australia and that I will be long gone before it threatens our beautiful game (AFL) as the no. 1 ball game in this country.”

However, after visiting Germany 2006, Lyon’s comments reflected a better understanding of importance of the sport in the world’s societies.

“To be over there was a humbling experience. It is hard to argue against those who say it is the biggest sporting event in the world. I have been to the Olympics and they have a dignified prestige attached to them that demands everyone’s respect. But the World Cup is a seething mass of emotion where the passion generated by coaches, players and supporters is the closest thing to war without weapons that you are likely to find. The focus on the games reduces presidents and prime ministers to the same level as factory workers and school kids; that of the everyday sports fan.”

These comments highlight the incredible influence of Football in any society. Indeed, the authors further demonstrate the impact of the tournament through comments of a radical feminist writer from some years ago who reported the only time the guns fell silent during the previous civil war in Lebanon was when the world cup was played. These examples are there in an attempt to demonstrate the social influence of football. However, personal experience can also indicate the social influence of such a tournament. When the world cup was on I ventured out to sports club with mates to watch each game. I forced me body clock to reverse itself during the early days of the tournament so that after the first few match-days I was up all night watching all the games. When Australia played Japan there were maybe around 100 people watching at the sports club. Every seat was taken, but plenty of space still remained. The game itself was incredible. Australia came from 1-0 down to win 3-1 in the final 10mins of the game. After the second goal in around the 88-89th minute, the crowd at the club were celebrating so much that we did not actually see the third goal scored. As the games progressed and Australia made it through the knockout stages to face Italy, the crowds had grown at the club so much so that it standing room only with hundreds of people inside the club to watch the game at around 4.00am. The experience likened to that of a very crowded mosh-pit at a rock concert. The increase in crowds demonstrates the increasing interest and influence of the football world cup. Just how it has such an influence is up for discussion, I don’t know. I’ve been to English Premier League games of my team Arsenal FC and been singing in the streets with fellow fans after a game that saw Arsenal move to the top of the league, though I still don’t know. If there is any social psychological explanation I’m ready to hear it.

An English author, Nick Hornby, wrote a book called Fever Pitch, which reflected his personal experiences as a lifelong Arsenal follower. His book was adapted into a film that starred Colin Firth as the lifelong Arsenal fan. A quote from the film sums up the thoughts of most football fans and perhaps some insight as to the importance and influence of football: “Football has meant too much to me, and come to represent too many things. After a while it all gets mixed up together in your head and you can’t remember whether life’s shit because Arsenal are shit or the other way around. Been to watch far too many games; spent too much money. Fretted about Arsenal when I should’ve been fretting about something else. And I’ve asked too much of the people I love. Ok I accept all that, but, I don’t know perhaps it’s something you can’t understand unless you belong. But what about this: Three minutes to go and you’re 2-1 up in a semi-final, and you look around and you see all those thousands of faces contorted with fear and hope and worry. Everyone lost, everything else gone out of their heads. And then final whistle blows, and everyone goes spare. And just for those few seconds you’re at the center of the whole world. And the fact you cared so much and the noise you made has been such a crucial part of it is what makes it special. Because you’ve been every bit as important as the players and if you hadn’t of been there then who’d have been bothered about football. The great thing is that it comes round again and again, there’s always another season. Lose the Cup final in May, well there’s the Third Round to look forward to in January. What’s wrong with that? Its actually pretty comforting if you think about it.”

The Australian Eye
Jane Elliot has been conducting her work on racism for many years, starting out with American children. Her program is based on discriminating between people based on their eye colour. She uses eye colour because it means that people who have different colour skin may be discriminated against because of their eye colour. The main aim of the program is to place white skinned individuals with a certain eye colour into a minority group. Eye colour was chosen because it is just as arbitrary as skin colour and no individual has control over either of these features.

The force with which Elliot delivers her workshop is very admirable. In this case, she discriminated against green-eyed individuals with such force that really upset some individuals. Some participants in the discriminated group where reduced to tears by the way Elliot treated them. However the message was delivered and some attitudes were changed. Elliot’s program does not seem to breaching any ethical guidelines. In this example some participants were reduced to tears in the discriminated group. However, those members of the other group, mainly of aboriginal descent, believed it was a good thing some were in tears (this was not meant in any malicious way), as it meant the pain of racism was felt by those of non-aboriginal descent. Her techniques have been adopted more widely in other settings. Employers have begun to use her techniques to reduce discrimination in the workplace. However, it’s most effective use must surely be in schools. Educating young children as to the damage racism can cause is the best way to lessen the frequency of racial behaviour in future generations. Her work in earlier years demonstrated the impact of her workshop on younger generations. Her techniques should be adopted as a requisite part of education in young children.

Culture Shock
Culture shock is the physical and emotional discomfort experienced by people enetering a new society or group of people. However, it really does seem to just come down to knowledge. Before we enter a new culture, we may attempt to increase our knowledge of the place we are going to. By doing this we become aware of certain customs or rules that govern this society, but not ours. Customary greetings are an example of a custom that may differ from our own culture. Without the knowledge of these differences, we may find it hard to integrate into a new society and our experience of culture shock will be much stronger.

Culture shock can be experienced in many circumstances and is not dependent on visiting different countries. Starting a new job can produce the same discomfort. New colleagues will already be aware of their surroundings and be conscious of all the correct ways of doing things. The amount of success an individual has in becoming a valued member of the workplace is dependent on the amount of knowledge they gain from those around them. Increasing their knowledge of the company’s structures, working principles and attitudes will increase the chances of successfully moving into a new job and company. Our knowledge of our new surroundings is probably the best adaptation method available. Many travellers use travel guides to educate themselves as to the important cultural details of their new surroundings. By doing this, the likelihood of embarrassment and “faux pas” is decreased.

The development of a cultural map will assist the integration to a new culture. Culture mapping is a clear description of how to behave in set social situation accompanied by an explanation of why these behaviours are preferred. Perhaps the most useful aspect of this process is first identifying how the specific situation would be dealt with in the current culture. This allows for the adaptation of the current behaviour with the knowledge of the behaviour expected in the new culture to ensure the behaviour change is understood relative to familiar situations from the individual’s previous culture.

Need to belong
The need to belong consists of two parts. Firstly, positive social contacts are a satisfying experience of desired social contact. People also need stable long-term relationships whereby there exists some sort of mutual concern for wellbeing. People ultimately tend to form groups of around five-six people for their close relationships. However, there does appear to be a personality variable that creates differences in people’s social contact. Some people seem to want more friends than others, opening a discussion on the influence of extraversion and introversion on people’s social contact. Given the nature of the two personality dimensions, it should be expected that extraverts would seek out more friends than introverts.

People’s need to belong to social groups is evident in many dimensions of society. For example, why would people regularly drink at the same pub or club? These people have probably found others they can relate to, and consequently form a social group that satisfies their need to belong. Just the same as people venturing out to watch the same sporting team every week. Though it is likely there will be more than five or six people there, supporting the team with possibly thousands of others doing the same further satisfies the need to belong to a social group.

Opposites or “Birds of a Feather”?
Most social psychologists agree that opposites do not very often attract. Similarity is one the very things that attracts us to another individual. Therefore, it is generally agreed that “birds of a feather” flock together and stay together.

Matching hypothesis
Continuing from the similarity idea, the matching hypothesis states that people tend to pair up with individuals who are equally attractive. Couples similar in attractiveness are more likely to progress toward a more loving and committed relationship.

Self-monitoring
People change to become more similar to those with whom they interact. People high in self-monitoring adapt to each social situation to get the most out of it. Those low in self-monitoring tend to stay closer to more permanent social connections and feelings. This could further be influenced by personality. Extraverts, due to their sociability, are probably more likely to adapt to the situation to create more social connections. Introverts are probably less inclined to do adapt in such a way, preferring to stay close to familiar connections that have been previously formed.

Reinforcement theory
According to this theory, attraction is more likely if the person we are attracted to improves our feelings of wellbeing or provides some other positive reward. This explains why men will take a woman out for dinner, and pay. The man is trying to put himself in a positive position in the woman’s view by doing favours for them. Complimenting a woman is another strategy involved in the reinforcement theory. Praise is used as people feel good about a compliment. However, those who have negative experiences related to people who have previously behaved in this way could view the compliments as manipulative and disregard them.

Other theories of attraction exist in social psychology. The mere-exposure effect, positing we become attracted to an individual simply through our frequency of exposure to them. The “what is beautiful is good” effect is another. The effect is the belief that because an individual is attractive, they will be superior to others in other aspects. For example, we may believe someone we consider beautiful to be more intelligent, popular, and successful.

Rejection
People who are rejected have a higher pain threshold than those who are accepted. This leads to the conclusion that emotion and pain reactions are intertwined. People who are often ostracized by others report a variety of personal problems, including suicidal thoughts and depression. Continual rejection can lead to the development of rejection sensitivity. If this trait is developed, those that are continually rejected will expect rejection from others. If this becomes serious enough, people may begin to push others away for fear of being rejected, thereby leading to more rejection and isolation.

Love
Two types of love have been found to exist; passionate and companionate. Passionate love is characterised by deep feelings of longing, desire, and excitement. Companionate love involves more mutual understanding, caring, commitment, calm and serene emotions. Companionate love is a more critical component of a long-lasting marriage, though passionate love is more important for starting relationships. Many models have been developed to explain love.

Sternberg’s Triangular Model of Love
Sternberg broke love down into three different factors. The first of these is passion. Passion involves the attraction one feels, both physically and romantically, and the subsequent sexual interest. There are physiological characteristics defining this factor. Passionate feelings increase heart rate, and induce alertness and excitement. The second factor is intimacy, which Sternberg believed to be the core of all love relationships. When intimate, people have a real sense of caring and concern about one another. Empathy is also considered an important facet of intimacy because people have to have areal understanding of the other person in the relationship, and for the other to understand them.

Finally, Sternberg found that when discussing love, people often refer to a conscious decision. Sternberg believed emotions can come and go, though the decision made to commit to a person remains constant.

Sternberg emphasises that these three factors are not three different kinds of love. Rather, love was made up of some kind of combination of the three facets. Some relationships may be high in passion, but low on intimacy and commitment. However, others may be high in intimacy and commitment, but low on passion.

Other theories have been included in social psychology research on love. However, Sternberg’s theory seems most appropriate. Its flexibility allows for the formation of many relationships differing in their passion, intimacy, and commitment. Many different relationships can be formed between various levels of these factors.

Ending relationships
Loving relationships can come to an end. Reasons for ending a relationship have been identified and broadly described as four factors.

·	A new life seems the only alternative ·	Alternative partners are available ·	Expectations of relationship failure ·	Lack of commitment

Once a relationship does end, people seem to go through a series of stages.

·	Loyalty: people will stay in the relationship with the hope of seeing some improvement ·	Neglect: people begin to neglect the relationship and allow it to deteriorate. This indicates alack of commitment to the relationship. ·	Voice behaviour: the two in the relationship may discuss the issues that they are faced with and attempt to resolve them. ·	Exit behaviour: the relationship ends.

I personally have experienced all these stages in order in past break-ups. Though accurate, I would argue it depends on the strength of the relationships according to each of the three factors of Sternberg’s model. Relationships high in passion may be less likely to end according to the four stages with the same amount of accuracy as relationships that are high in intimacy and commitment. Experience seems to indicate that relationships that are high in intimacy in particular will more likely progress through each stage because of the initial reluctance people may feel to end such a relationship.

Groups
A group is a collection of people being, or doing something together. However, this definition is weak. The example given in the textbook highlights forty sitting on a bus. Can this collection of people be considered a group? After all, they are all doing something together. But this is not a group because it’s unlikely they will personally know each other. Perhaps this collection of people could be a group if they were all travelling to the one destination. If a bus full of senior citizens arrive at a destination, they are automatically considered a group because they have all arrived together to participate in a single activity together. It is arguable whether a group of public servants taking the bus to owkr of a morning can be considered the same. It is far more likely that these workers are travelling to different destinations. According to the above example, a group is better defined by adapting the initial definition to include the singularity of the activity in which a collection of people participate, and the personal relations between them.

Perhaps the most interesting example of the effects groups have on people is that of Nazism. The textbook explains that the essence of fascist groups is to submerge an individual in a group so self-interest is subordinated to the best interests of the group. Nazism was so successful that the actions of the party degenerated into the destruction of their own country.

Leadership
With groups come leaders. Most good leaders are perceived as having many basic traits. The textbook explains that leaders are decisive and competent at their tasks. Good leaders are also seen as having integrity and good moral character. Finally, a good leader has vision and uses this vision to motivate others.

However, leaders can be affected by the power they attain when becoming leaders. Some managers will simply use praise, advice and targets to motivate their workers. Others will use more threatening tactics like wage increases or decreases. Managers who use these more threatening techniques often view their workers more poorly than those less powerful managers. Powerful managers see their workers as just carrying out their commands, while less powerful managers believe that worker’s motivation and efforts are responsible for successful work.

The textbook argues that submerging an individual in a group often leads to bad outcomes. There are cases where this is true. The above example of Nazism supports that. However, the discussion on leaders leads me to believe that a good manager will have the ability to get more out of individuals in a group if their management skills are appropriate. If submerging individuals in a group really did lead to bad outcomes, as often as is implied, the world would be in a more negative state than it currently is.

Prosocial Behaviour
Prosocial behaviour is defined as doing something that is good for other people or for society as whole. This definition does not really mean much to me. The most important variable in prosocial behaviour are the motives behind them. It is fine for an individual to behave in a way that benefits others and society. However, it has to be asked whether they were the intentions of an individual in the first place. People can behave in prosocial ways on the basis of personal motivations. For example, if I cover a shift for someone at work, I’m doing it for the extra money as much as I’m doing it as a favour for someone else. It’s rare I’m doing it for the pleasure of working extra hours. The textbook reports two motives for helping: altruism and egoism.

Altruism
Altruistic helping occurs when someone does something for someone else, without expecting anything in return. Altruistic helping is apparently motivated by empathy: a response corresponding to the feelings of another person. The textbook introduces the empathy-altruism hypothesis: empathy motivates people to reduce other people’s distress. Psychologists have debated the concept of altruistic behaviour and in the textbook the story of Oskar Schindler is used as a case in point. Some argue that Schindler acted according to his own ego trip, rather than acting purely out of a desire to save as many of the Jewish population as he could. I disagree with this, Schindler spent a lot of time, effort, and money saving the people he did. There may have been some sort of personal motivations, though it would appear these were far outweighed by altruistic motivations to simply help people.

Egoism
Egoistic helping is where the helper wants something in return. Essentially, the helper wishes to increase their own well being by first helping someone else. For some to argue that Schindler acted in this way, as opposed to helping altruistically, is a bit absurd. Though there may have been some personal motives, Schindler did not gain as much as he gave during, and after, his time saving the Jews he saved. He was forced to flea to safer grounds to escape the death penalty for assisting so many of Jewish population. Of course he is regarded as a hero by the Jewish race, and was granted his wish to be buried in Jerusalem. However, it does not seem fair to criticise someone for acting egotistically after he helped to save so many people.

Hugh Mackay: Australia’s Foremost Social Psychologist
During his speech at the 6th Annual Manning Clark lecture, Hugh Mackay raises some interesting discussion points. Citing the Gender Revolution as a major factor, Mackay reports “we have reached a stage where around 45% of marriages will end in divorce. This is a staggering statistic compared with the 8-9% divorce rate of around 25 years ago. The reasons for this appear to stem from two areas: the conflict resulting from chagiong gender roles, and the postponing of commitment that is so characteristic of the younger generations. It appears that constant change is the norm; the young generations are continually seeking the new thing, Mackay describes this as the “keep your options open” generation. Reasons for this are due to the environment these generations have grown up in. the pace of change has taught them to anticipate and embrace change to use Mackay’s words. The mean age for marriage has increased and subsequent birth rate has gone down. This is symptomatic of the changing gender roles. More women are pursuing tertiary education and entering the full-time workforce, resulting in less time to give birth to and raise children. Those that do have children will often seek to return to the workforce. After all they spent years studying do they could work full-time, why should they stop once the child is old enough to go to school? Therefore, there is less time for children. This reaction of mothers has further ramifications for the younger generations. To explain I need to refer to a book written by Mackay in the Mid-90’s called “Reinventing Australia” I took to reading after we discussed the Manning Clark speech in tutorials. In this book, Mackay discusses at length the effect full-time working mothers have on the next generation. When mothers work full-time, they are sacrificing a great deal of quality time spent with their children during the day. This time is crucial of course for the child’s physical and psychological development, but it is also important for the development of a child’s understanding of the world. Therefore, with less time spent with children generally, any time that is found will be spent in an attempt to cram in all this important interaction in terms of raising the child. Ultimately, Mackay reports in his Manning Clark speech this will result in over-protected, over-indulged children. However, in Reinventing Australia, Mackay offers far more discussion on this. Mackay argues his qualitative research found there is a feeling of guilt on the mother’s part for not always being there for their children in the same way their mother was. This is down to the fact that they have decided to participate in full-time work and part-time motherhood. Consequently, any time found for their children must be spent in such a way that will make for all the quality time missed while at work. Unfortunately, Mackay argues this has resulted in generations of children who lack boundaries because the parents want to be seen positively.

Though I will comment further on Hugh Mackay’s Manning Clark speech and his book I have some thoughts on the above discussion. Frankly, though I have no issue at all with mothers working full-time, unfortunately with the rising divorce rate some have no choice at all, the seemingly resultant lack of boundaries that has been a result of the above discussion is plainly clear to me. When reflecting on the people I know and their various familial backgrounds, it is easy to see what he means. Though it doesn’t lead me to think any less of anyone I know in the slightest possible way, Mackay’s words have certainly cleared some confusion I had regarding the way some people of my generation seem to think and act. After reading his words, I gained a greater understanding of the way I was brought up. Quite frankly, he is spot on when it comes to the interactions of working mothers and their children.

Mackay raises issues in other areas of society. Perhaps most interestingly, he reports in his Manning Clark address that although unemployment may be quite low, the real truth of the matter lies in UNDERemployment. This relates largely to the fact that the gap between the richest 20% of the population, and the poorest 20%, has been growing larger and larger. Basically, although unemployment may be low, underemployment is a far greater problem due to the fact that the bottom 20% of the population has an average income of just $12,000 dollars. Therefore, although unemployment is low, a large portion of the population are living on unsustainable incomes.

Tim Malysiak 00:16, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Tim Malysiak 03:49, 9 September 2008 (UTC) Tim Malysiak 04:01, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

title: User:Tim Malysiak


text:
Lecture 2.0

refers to a learning and research project to explore use of Web 2.0 principles, philosophy, and technologies in enhancing the pedagogical value of "traditional" style lectures (Lecture 1.0). Note that the numbers (1, 2, 3 etc.) don't really matter much - they are just a way to signify some possible evolutions or mutations of the traditional lecture.

Got a view? Fantastic. Can you improve this resource? Even better. Be bold and hit "edit" :) (or post to the talk page).

Statement of the problem
Something is rotten in the state of the lecture! Whilst it's one of the oldest forms of communication and teaching, student numbers in lectures appear to be dwindling. This claim seems to be at least anecdotally true in Australian universities in the 2000s compared to previous decades, and the issue is increasingly being recognised (references needed; cf Tahir, 2008). From this observation stem several possible points of departure, not the least of which are: This learning resource aims to describe explore these and related issues and to explore "new" ways for the lecture in the 21st century.
 * 1) "Why?" and
 * 2) "What (if anything) should be done about it?".

Description of lecture practices
Lectures are far from monolithic. A "lecture" can and does mean many things. So, in order to have a meaningful discussion, we need some sort of descriptive taxonomy. This (incomplete) section aims to roughly typologise lecture forms. Please add your own conceptions - e.g., describe how you lecture or what do you like or not like about lectures. What are lectures good for and what alternative or enhancing pedagogical methods might be used?

Lecture 1.0
The Lecture 1.0 (traditional lecture) style often exhibits at least several of these distinguishing or defining characteristics:
 * 1) One-off, time-bound events; they are generally unique, live performances (although the speaker may replicate the lecture on different occasions and in different locations).
 * 2) Copyright of the content is commonly (but doesn't have to be) restricted.
 * 3) There is generally limited availability of recordings of the lecture material (text/images, audio, and/or video), lecture slides (e.g., electronic slides with notes). Thus, lecture is generally not easily replayed, copied, reused, etc. although the performance may be repeated live in various locations and times. This emphasis on live performance for Lecture 1.0 risks a rather lecturer-centric (as opposed to student-centric) approach. We might wonder, for example, what happens to the knowledge when the lecturer stops lecturing - hence Lecture 1.0 is rather mortal and fragile. At least a playwright generally leaves behind a script. Many times lecturers leave a university with all their materials - and a new lecturer starts from scratch.
 * 4) The style/format is generally "flat" - i.e., "speaking" by an lecturer to a "listening" audience. In communication, this is referred to as a "transmission" model. Is a lecture simply a speech?
 * 5) As Stephen Downes points out, the preparation and delivery of a lecture is often a learning experience for the presenter, but not necessarily for those listening to the lecture.
 * 6) An engaging presenter may be able to "reach into the audience", take their pulse, and respond accordingly, and thus enhancing engagement and involvement - e.g., some speakers who are particularly good at this are paid large sums and/or attract large crowds just to hear them speak in Lecture 1.0 style. However, these individuals tend very much to be exceptions, with a relatively large number of boredom-inducing lectures occurring for every engaging lecture.
 * 7) Limited audience participation/involvement (didactic), although we see some inklings of Lecture 1.5 e.g., with "questions from the floor".
 * 8) May or may not use visual images (e.g., projected text /images) to accompany spoken text.
 * 9) Because Lecture 1.0 is so lecturer-centric, much is dependent on lecturer expertise with the content, and with lecture style. In "banking education" (see Freire), we find a surprising lack of these two qualities (content and style expertise), and this is much in evidence in 21st century tertiary-education. Often experts are more likely to become researchers or to move into consulting/industry, leaving their younger, less experienced, and less knowledgable counterparts to "deliver" content to the masses.
 * 10) Textbook publishers work hard to make their own lecture slides and images for commercial textbooks readily available to lectures - to help make lecturing on a new topic "easy".

Chalk-and-talk

 * 1) Many lectures around the world use a "chalk and talk" style. In this approach, a lecture generally consists of a lecturer making verbal statements with handwritten notes on a blackboard, whiteboard, or overhead projector.
 * 2) Students are generally expected to make handwritten copies of these notes on paper and to subsequently review these notes.
 * 3) Oftentimes in formal education, students are then examined on their memorisation and understanding of these notes and the concepts and knowledge to which they refer.

Lecture 1.5
Lecture 1.5 might be used to describe the steps involved in journeying from Lecture 1.0 to Lecture 2.0. Such steps might include:
 * 1) Lecture recordings (audio, video, electronic files).
 * 2) Open licensing, open formats, and open access.
 * 3) Interactivity between lecturer and audience.
 * 4) Chunking of lecture content into digestable pieces.

From a practical point of view, this is what most institutions could be doing right now and are starting to:
 * 1) Audio and video stream and record all lectures.
 * 2) Release the lecture text/slide materials, audio, and videos (hopefully using open licensing).
 * 3) Chunking lecture content so that it can be used in a greater variety of ways.
 * 4) Rationalising what belongs best in lecture style and for other content, shaping into other media.
 * 5) Make greater use of free and open educational media resources (e.g., video clips) of real experts on topics (which gives students freedom to use/remix/copy, etc.).

For such approaches:
 * 1) Should be 'easy'.  However not all academic lectures make good "TV" the Open University has over the years moved on from its (sometimes derided) twilight lecture format to the use of celebrities to help deliver their message; which is often part of a larger whole.  The more focused website ted.com where lecturers deliver online whilst at the same time to a receptive live audience shows that only a combination of the best speakers on the hottest topics with often good/great graphics succeed in appealing to distant audiences.
 * 2) Requires cultural r/evolution especially around intellectual property - but MIT etc. started, catalysing others to follow.
 * 3) Is simply good pedagogical practice, but needs more training, action, commitment, examples, etc.
 * 4) As per 3.
 * 5) Let's do it - education and promotion of available resources needed e.g. see Educational Media Awareness Campaign.

Example 1: Hardt 2005
For a rather unique combination of slideshow and lecturer style, see what you think of Dick Hardt's Identity 2.0 - maybe not everyone's cup of tea, but generally people who watch this seem to be "wowed" into thinking new ideas about how we might do lectures differently.

Example 2: Neill 2008
At the moment, here's how James Neill provides lectures - live, audio and video recorded with accompanying electronic materials, including open-licensed |embedded slide presentation (using http://slideshare.net) with downloadable .odp format files (open document presentation, created using Open Office Impress, a free and open source slide presentation software)), pdf handout downloads via a university enterprise wiki (note: I've recently discovered that pdf files can be uploaded to Wikimedia Foundation wiki projects so will try this in future), plus accompany wikitext pages containing notes, activities, links, etc. Audio and video are currently only available to enrolled students and in Windows formats (.wma and .wmv).

Some goals to progress towards are:
 * 1) Audio-synching the slide presentations to make 'slidecasts', e.g., I did this for a conference presentation (and experimented with voice synthesisation too - Technology and the outdoors: Some experiential possibilities).
 * 2) Wikiversity currently doesn't allow embedding of slideshare presentations. Experiments with this could be conducted on the sandbox server.
 * 3) Progressing towards use of only open educational resources during lectures
 * 4) Further 'fractionation' and 'multiplicity' of channel delivery for students for lecture content, including higher-quality, chunk-style, on-demand audiovisual teaching content (note: University of New England have been experimenting in this direction).
 * 5) Making high quality audiovisual lectures painlessly and publically available!

Example 3: Lecture as Performance

 * 1) Amanda Burrell and Michael DePercy at the University of Canberra have both been experimenting and presenting about lecture as performance (in a dramatic sense).

Example 4: My last lecture

 * 1) Tom Worthington at the Australian National University recently announced that he had given his last lecture. No, he's not retiring. He and his students simply don't have a need for lectures. Check out Tom's Net Traveller blog for more information.

Example 5: Lecturer as DJ
Imagine a teacher as a DJ, keeping a class kicking like a dance floor - alive and inspired. David Wiley did back in December of 2005. Since then Brian Lamb has mixed media in real life and second life lectures, and here he points to Gardner Campbell mixing it up. Michael Wesch does it in a more low key but even more potent way. The lecture is not dead - far from it. It is enhanced by the media age - so long as it samples and remixes media - even makes it central to the experience. Teaching has always had a lot in common with performance. As First Monday contributor Doug Brent wrote in April 2005, Teaching as Performance in the Electronic Classroom.

Lecture 2.0
A significant proportion of tertiary-level teaching lectures tend to have become more or less didactic and repeated relatively unchanged year after year. (This differs, say, from conference presentations which tend to be relatively unique.)

Thus, some institutions are experimenting with recording lectures one year, and then providing students with the recordings the following years and then putting the face-to-face teaching time instead into more interactive learning activities and learning support for students.

If effort is put into a creating a high quality recording, then we are making a kind of educational "documentary". A high quality documentary offers potentially higher pedagogical value than a series of ill-prepared lecture by a lecturer who is not necessarily particularly expert in the subject at hand (as is often the case in modern universities).

Some other possibilities for Lecture 2.0 strategies might include:
 * Lecture streaming and recording, e.g.,
 * iTunes U
 * Smaller, chunk-style lectures on specific topics
 * Greater interactivity / experientialness
 * Encouragement of collaboration among 'students' using other web 2.0 resources

One example of Lecture 2.0 being carried put into practice is what the Los Altos primary (elementary) school in California have done integrating Khan Academy content into their curriculum to provide greater teacher student time.

Alternatives to the lecture

 * Activities
 * Autodidacticism
 * Blended learning
 * Coaching
 * Conversation
 * Debate
 * Documentary
 * Interactive polls and quizzes - e.g., see http://www.votapedia.com
 * Interview
 * Mentoring
 * Tutorial

Principles/ideas

 * Action research to experiment and improve lecture methods, and to listen and adapt to the needs and interests of students.
 * Banking education
 * Cognitive theories of learning (e.g., attention span, chunking, memory)
 * Didacticism / Didactic learning
 * Disruptive technology
 * Experiential learning
 * Humour

Questions
These questions were initially posed by John Reece at the Australian Psychology Learning and Teaching Conference 2019. The dot points reflect some audience responses. Feel free to edit/add.

What's good about lectures?

 * Cheap(ish)
 * Efficient (a lot of content can be covered in a relatively short period)
 * Offers a social gathering/connection
 * Can introduce and explain especially complex concepts to relative novices - helps them navigate difficult territory
 * A great lecture can be a revelation
 * Brings some accountability to lectures (e.g., performance evaluated by students)
 * Allows lecturer to "read the room in real time"
 * Provides a way to link content and concepts across the unit
 * Can help to build the student/teacher relationship

What's bad about lectures?

 * Real time attendance doesn't meet the diverse needs of students' complex life circumstances
 * Lacks interactivity
 * Lazy method
 * Tends to focus on content delivery (rather than relational learning)
 * It is in some ways easier to attend a lecture than find the self-discipline to watch an online lecture in your own time
 * Not everyone has to be at a lecture for it to be worthwhile - a good lecture for a willing audience is worthwhile
 * Can be an ego/power trip for lecturer

How can we improve lectures?

 * Students like to know what and why
 * Improve quality of teaching via all modes (how do we curate learning experiences)
 * Students like lectures if they are well-delivered (e.g., good material, enthusiastic lecturer, cares about learning)
 * Humanise lecturers (e.g., debate about whether lecturers should self-disclose)
 * Start from design of learning activities (some of which may be lectures)
 * Include meta-cognitive learning strategies
 * Good lecturers are sensitive to cues from students and adjust the pace, focus, method accordingly
 * Invite the world in; make all lectures public and advertise them as such

Interactivity?

 * Include small-group activities

What alternatives are there?

 * What does the research tell us?
 * If we abandon lectures, are we throwing the baby out with the bathwater?
 * "There is no such thing as a bad lecture, there just bad lecturers." (aka common factors/dodo bird argument in psychotherapy / cf. Hattie effect sizes of teaching methods for student achievement)
 * Are there any other critical questions that should be asked about lectures?
 * Imagine if the lecture hadn't been invented, how would you teach this?

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Lecture 2.0


text:
User talk:Tim Malysiak

Well done on setting up!
Nice work, Tim, on getting your account set-up and introducing yourself! Some official welcome to Wikiversity below - and a random mascot. Let me know if I can do anything. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 02:01, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

 Hello Tim Malysiak, and welcome to Wikiversity! If you need help, feel free to visit my talk page, or contact us and ask questions. After you leave a comment on a talk page, remember to sign and date; it helps everyone follow the threads of the discussion. The signature icon in the edit window makes it simple. To get started, you may

 * Take a guided tour and learn to edit.
 * Visit a (kind of) random random project.
 * Browse everything on Wikiversity, or visit a portal corresponding to your educational level: pre-school, primary, secondary, tertiary, non-formal education.
 * Find out about research activities on Wikiversity.

 * Read an introduction for teachers and find out how to write an educational resource for Wikiversity.
 * Discuss Wikiversity issues or ask questions at the colloquium.
 * Chat with other Wikiversitans on #wikiversity-en.

And don't forget to explore Wikiversity with the links to your left. Be bold to contribute and to experiment with the sandbox or your userpage, and see you around Wikiversity! Jtneill - Talk - c 02:01, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

 Hello , we are the Baah and Bahh twins and we'd both like to welcome you to Wikiversity. While you sit back and explore Wikiversity, enjoy some of our fresh goat milk. You can help us learn by creating new learning resources or help us by improving the guided tours and other exploration tools. We look forward to seeing you around. Baaaahbye for now.

Formatting - Headings
Hi Tim, I received your wiki-email re help with formatting. More than happy to work with you on this. Will try to go one step at a time :). So Lesson 1, is on headings. Let's try first to add "Level 2" headings throughout the portfolio. This will automatically also lead a table of contents being displayed. We tend to skip "Level 1" headings, so "Level 2" means your top-level. We can make anything a level 2 heading by adding two equals signs ( == ) before and after a heading. I will do some for you, then you can do the rest. I'll keep an eye out, then we can tackle the next step - or feel free to suggest what you want to do next. So, just to be clear: -- Jtneill - Talk - c 11:07, 9 September 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) Go to your user page
 * 2) Click edit
 * 3) Add == blah blah (i.e., the heading description) ==
 * 4) Save the page

 * Since you've already got a clear, hierarchical structure, we can proceed also with adding "Level 3" headings - these will have three equals signs == . I will add some to the first couple of sections, then you can apply the rest. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 11:13, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Initial content feedback
I'll add some more on this, but my first impression is that the content is well organised and "chunked", making it quite readable and clear that you're engaged with the unit structure, etc. and exhibiting with independent thinking and depth. I will provide some more specific and detailed feedback, but just wanted to let you know that this seems to be on the "right" track. So, let's tidy up the formatting, and then it will help us to be able to refer to specific parts, etc. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 11:11, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Bullet-points
-- Jtneill - Talk - c 00:24, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Well done with the headings!
 * Next we might tackle bullet-points. Any new line preceded by an asterisk (*) will be bulleted.
 * Double asterisk (**) will create a sub-bullet-point.
 * Alternatively you can the same principles for numbered lists (using #, ##, etc.)
 * FYI, I've demonstrated this at User:Tim Malysiak. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 00:25, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Soccer culture
Your thoughts on the World Cup 2006 reminded me of Desmond Morris' (1981) book, The Soccer Tribe. Basically is discusses (with lots of pictures) soccer as a modern ritual which has replaced "the hunt". It's out of print, but you can find some information on the web, e.g.,. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 00:30, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Bullet-points
Hi Tim, at a quick glance, this is looking excellent - breadth and depth - and well-organised. You could add wiki bullet-points - these start each point with an asterisk (*); or in some cases, a numbered list might be appropriate - these start each point with a hash (#). -- Jtneill - Talk - c 00:22, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

title: User talk:Tim Malysiak


text:
Wikiversity:Colloquium/archives/July 2008

== We would like to create a system with interactive study, each individual at his / her own pace, effectively teaching themselves all about Judaism ==

Hello, feedback regarding this is welcome. Please add your helpful comments here in the colloquium. Thx, Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 22:04, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Please try out the original tour for newcomers
In anticipation of letting my students loose on Wikiversity in a month or so, I've been through the The original tour for newcomers and tweaked it a little. Can I invite others to also take a look and make some changes or offer feedback. Here's what I did (I think): -- Jtneill - Talk - c 15:15, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Made the first and last page a little fancier/friendlier looking
 * Changed the navigation bar spacing
 * Reformatted the headings
 * Embedded the editing movie in Part 1
 * Tweaked wordings (mostly to simplify)
 * Tweaked some image sizes and captions
 * Transcluded the content (it was duplicated)
 * Suggestions:
 * the title: why "The original tour for newcomers"? The original things use to be those, that were created earlier. Moreover you refer to orginal version of this page in the lower section
 * Remove the "Now visiting: Wikiversity:Introduction/Part 1 (visit original version of this page)" headings from pages. It could be confusing to a newcomer... He may start the simplified version and finish the "old" one... If you want, you can add a link to this on the first (or maybe better) on the last page.
 * Change the tip in the box a little to: Tip: Only click on links inside this green box in order to continue in tour! --Gbaor 05:45, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Proposed: A New Format for Search Results & Browsing
What would be wonderful is a way to more effectively use the categories function to classify search results and also to enable browsing. What if search results came up as a list of items under their categories with a "+" dropdown as things do in the categories lists, but with a page listing in it.

E.G.: I search for "Astronomy Mars"...and my results are: [-]Category:Physical Sciences|Physics and Astronomy|Astronomy 2 KB (216 words) - 03:31, 17 December 2007 3 KB (455 words) - 02:61, 21 March 2007 [-]Category:Physical Sciences|Physics and Astronomy|Astronomy|Introduction to the Planets Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun and closest to Earth after Venus. A grea ... 2 KB (255 words) - 10:37, 8 June 2008 [-]Category:Life Sciences|Biology|Exobiology ... ave been even more common on Mars in the past. Has there ever been life on Mars? ... m. It has been suggested that this might be a good target for a mission to Mars that would seek signs of past life. 1 KB (233 words) - 07:03, 1 May 2007 [+]Category:Humanities|Comparative Mythology|Introduction to Myth [+]Category:Physical Sciences|Physics and Astronomy|Physics etc. This would really help in getting around safely, and would turn search results into something that could help us find what we want, even if the results are simply close and not exactly right. --Gustable 08:35, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
 * The visible sky
 * The Planet Mars
 * Mars
 * Search for life on Mars

 * Sounds useful, but that might be difficult to implement and use a lot of CPU time per search. What I'd prefer is if Wikiversity used a Google site search, which can correct spelling errors and still find Wikiversity articles.  I often go to Google to search Wikiversity now, so it would be nice to be able to do that from within Wikiversity.  For example, the poorly spelled Google search "ahstanamy site:wikiversity.org"  gives this useful result:,  while a Wikiversity search for "ahstanamy" gives me nothing. StuRat 12:42, 3 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Feel free to list your ideas at Technical needs, Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 19:53, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Question retrieved from deleted page
The following should have been posted to the colloquium, I think --McCormack 09:09, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

my name is Dato mohammed, i am from Ethiopia i would like to request you to help me for thing tha i had un able solve yet by my selfe. so i needed help from you if you are volenter to help me for that. i am living in dullsa tawon, the area located in south afar-National-Stat  of Ethiopia  and there is no internet access, telephone and electricity also anyather. doue to this, i could not able to in prove my English Language. the ways only i using to in prove my language skill is listinig radio programs, but that was not saficiant to me i needed developed language skill to get that one also i wanted to some money fore the material cost, to that one i am also poorest one in the area so what shall i do? PLEASE TEL ME WHAT TO DO SINCERLY YOURS Dato Mohammed Dato User:213.55.73.249

 * A computer could work on solar energy. Once this man has a working computer and an internet connection, he could start a business. The benefit for living in Ethiopia is that the cost for living is low, so if a company can earn a bit of profit, it would be enough to cover daily needs.

 * What i discovered on the internet is that most active users (in the english language section) are people from America and Europe. We could start a project to come into contact with people from Africa, Asia and Latin America and to help them with their daily survival.--Daanschr 10:11, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Also, there is Microfinance and Kiva.org... --Emesee 10:33, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
 * May I ask from where you write this now ? (school, university, ...) You seem to have internet there. But the time you can spend at that location is not so much ? People used to learn languages too before computers and internet were invented. I couldn't find your named town by a search engine to help you further. But did you ask around in your neighborhood (or around) if someone wants also to learn English or knows it already ? They can be of assistance to you. Now the question is how to motivate them to do so ? Even if you have no money you can provide other services which you can exchange - trading exists since long - humans are based on needs. It is always better to create a cell - I mean - group :-) where people help each other. Find people who have the same goal as you and I am sure this will already help a little. Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 13:04, 6 July 2008 (UTC)
 * "It was also true that Iban maidens as "sleeping dictionaries" did exist, and to this day, there are in fact many prominent Eurasians in local Borneo society who are living proof of that practice." The Sleeping Dictionary. (2008, June 12). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 18:20, July 8, 2008, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Sleeping_Dictionary&oldid=218825535

Wikiversity Wordle
http://wordle.net/gallery/wrdl/64322/Wikiversity That site creates word maps based on input from the Internet. Emesee 10:32, 12 July 2008 (UTC)
 * [[Image:Wikiversity wordle cc by.jpeg|200px]]

Prospectus
Would it be a good idea to create a wikiversity prospectus? Would we need more than one for different levels? Please discuss. Donek (talk) - Go raibh mile maith agaibh 00:31, 10 July 2008 (UTC)
 * It could be - depends on audience/format/focus, etc. Also see Publicity. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 01:26, 10 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Prospectus (university) - interesting. We certainly could start one. Perhaps at Prospectus. Emesee 20:58, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Stub created. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 23:47, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Random
For those interested in exploring randomness, please see the beginnings of Random. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 01:49, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Content/Course Categorization Idea for Department Pages
I thought I should bounce this arround and see what everyone thinks.

I have been working at Organising School of Electrical Engineering and School of Electronic Engineering for some time now. I thought of improving these department as follows

 * Making Department pages Less Daunting and easy for interested contibutors and even visitors by showing A list of Available courses with individual current estimation of percentage of completion of courses offered.

 * Taking all Requested courses/topics into a Course Wish List Subpage and hence avoiding displaying a whole lot of red links.

 * Adding a featured Biography for the related school.

This is more asthetics (in my POV) and can allow contributors to have a snap-shot of the progress of their department. Ofcoures this needs some one who will be actually bored enough to actually do these manual edits and to update the relevant department regularily (Hmm... Maybe I can created a bot for that one day ).

Please have a look at my Current Version For School of Electrical Engineering in my Sand Box here --Thuvack 16:53, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

 * Hi Thuvack. Your test page looks great, and the ideas above are good as well. A couple of suggestions: (1) avoid a dated news box on your page, because if your enthusiasm ever slips, the news dates will quickly show people that nothing is happening; perhaps put news onto a subpage; (2) avoid those course codes (EE 000 and so on) - course codes are usually country-specific and can be off-putting to people who don't understand them. Otherwise: great. --McCormack 17:23, 14 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Very well picked up, the Dates and Course Codes have been a thorn on my mind for a while. I will act on these as soon as I can. Thuvack 07:32, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I have created a sub page to keep Department news, how can I set up rss feeds for the deparment news for interested people to subscribe to? Thuvack 08:35, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

I realy need some help creating RSS Feeds for Department News Sub pages that can be subscribed to by Participants of related schools. This would be Helpful ( in my opinion ). Any one? Please. I am almost ready to move my Sand Box pages to Relevant School pages and would like to sort that out before the move.Thuvack 07:19, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Chat meeting on WikiProject organized debate
SB_Johnny asked me to restart the Wikipedia WikiProject organized debate, with a new name. The purpose of this project was to improve an article by discussing relevant sources, mostly literature. An announcement would be made a year in advance, in order to be able to discuss sources and read books on the topic. After a year, a month of article improvement would commence. My idea with this project was that slow change would work the best in order to improve the quality of Wikipedia. I wanted to attract those who were willing to invest enough time and energy into the project and to find a structure which would ensure a certain stability and growth. Stability and growth is hard in our time, because continuous change makes life too fast, but many things that are the most worthwhile come slow and need time to digest.

I ended this project because i believed that a minimum of participance was needed for a lift-off. I entered topics, and put templates on articles dedicated to the topic, but nobody volunteered, except for Mystictim. In order to make this WikiProject work, i want to ensure that the picking of topics becomes a collective rather than a individual choice. Is anyone interested to discuss this WikiProject and to think of topics that they like to read and discuss about, than they are welcome to join in a chat meeting on this subject. A date for this meeting has still to be set for this.--Daanschr 18:59, 4 July 2008 (UTC)
 * So, let's make a chat - even if it is just the two of us :-) Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 18:15, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

I propose to chat about this on saturday UTC 5 o'clock in the afternoon on july 19th. Which will be CET 7 o'clock in the evening.--Daanschr 10:23, 9 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Works for me, Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 16:22, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

One topic has already be chosen, see WikiProject organized debate: Wiki related learning
 * Start on 1st August 2009 - End 31st august 2009
 * Main language will be English. Other languages are also possible perhaps.
 * Some of the recommended literature and other sources:
 * Suoranta, Juha and Tere Vadén, Wikiworld. Political Economy and the Promise of Participatory Media (Tampere 2007) --Daanschr 18:34, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

The topic has been cancelled. There is no topic at the moment, but perhaps there will be one somewhere in the future.--Daanschr 20:32, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Offline browsing
I thought about possibilities to browse WV pages offline, and I came to ScrapBook FF extension, and created also an example - Educational Media Awareness Campaign/Biology (uploaded to RapidShare, while WV doesn't allows to upload zip files). In case the link doesn't work just drop me an email and I will re-upload it or send it via mail. To start it, just unpack the file and hit the "!click_here_to_begin.lnk". Please note, that only pages at the Gallery of featured media for biology box work in offline state. It could be done nicer, certainly, but I didn't have time to play with it (this was done in 5 min.). Please try and tell me you opinion. --Gbaor 11:43, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Interesting tool, I am looking for something similar. I have lot's of time on weekends but no internet. It would be nice to have a small wiki-like engine that I can install in my Linux Lap top box. This would mean that I would be able to work on my Sand Box Pages and other Course pages off line over the week-end and only cut and paste on monday morning. Nice Find! Will you be writting a small how to on this?Thuvack 12:51, 15 July 2008 (UTC)
 * As far as I know, this tool is for browsing only (i.e. to save changes or to use the preview button you need to be online). But this could be useful to create offline versions of course pages and distribute them further in a "wiki-like" environment (I said wiki like, because these pages are just bare copies). You can notice also, that I removed my name, talk (...) and also all tabs (discussion, edit, history...) from the example. (Solution to your problem: You might want to install MediaWiki.)
 * Other: The general problem in using and reading WV or WP is that you need to be online all the time. Other approach is, that one can download separate pages, but this could take much time and at the end you got a bunch of pages with no cross-links between them (own experience). I see the (great) potential of this approach in delivering the content of well-developed resources to part of the world with no or very little internet access. They could be easily sent via mails, CDs, uploaded to various file sharing and torrent engines... --Gbaor 05:07, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

How to is ready. Improvements welcomed. --Gbaor 05:55, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I downloaded the ScrapBook and installed it on my Linux Box ( Had Fire fox already ). I also down loaded your example and it worked very well. I think I will use this tool more now that I understand it's use.Thuvack 07:10, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

 * Thuvack, If you use windows, you may check wiki on a stick and you can see how to install WOS, which gives you, apache, mysql, php, mediawiki, moodle, and a lot more. Hillgentleman|Talk 17:18, 16 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I will check it out ;-)Thuvack 05:03, 17 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Any news, Thuvack? Hillgentleman|Talk 09:04, 20 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Hey there, I haven't had any chance to do anything this weekend, I will get to it sometime this week I promise ;-)Thuvack 06:14, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Stats

 * THEwikiStics : Page Hits toplist (compare traffic | searches) --- Best regards, Melancholie 00:45, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Good & interesting stuff; thanks. Added to Statistics. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 09:14, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Oh, you already added it! :) Tx. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 09:14, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Lecture 2.0
Lecture 2.0 is looking for ideas - feel free to contribute. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 01:58, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Sidebar search
I got a little frustrated today in class because I was introducing Wikiversity to students and asked them from time to time to use the search box. They found it hard to locate (had to scroll down). So, Erkan showed me how to shift it - and now its in the top left for a little experiment. What do you think of it now? Discuss here or MediaWiki_talk:Sidebar. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 16:17, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Looks good. --McCormack 20:12, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Bolted cover joints [Pressure vessel] to reduce cover od
Hello friends,

I want your guidance please,

While I am designing a cover joint for pressure vessel with reference to ASME VIII, the bolting area required increase for L7 when compared B7 material, since allowable stress of L7 is less when compared to B7.

Is there any better material which can replace L7, since B7 is not used for low temperature application?

Thank you

--Chennai08 14:31, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately I don't know the answer yet, but I could provide you some links here at WV where you could go by and ask/read, e.g. Topic:Mechanical engineering, Category:Mechanical engineering. Besides this looking at Pressure vessel and other pages at Wikipedia might give you more information on the way to reach a solution. btw: the version history of every wiki page shows the contributors. Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 16:34, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Edit bug?

 * I've tried FF2 and IE7, but am having problems suddenly editing Lecture 2.0. Can you edit it? I just get a blank page or a this section doesn't exist when trying to edit. But I can see the page, its history, etc. no worries. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 04:04, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I experimented, and found I could recover the page by going back to the previous version. The edit history of the page is interesting, because it shows clearly that you successfully created a 3000 byte empty page - surely a bug in Mediawiki and an excellent way to torture a developer? IRC into #wikimedia-tech, point them to http://en.wikiversity.org/w/index.php?title=Lecture_2.0&diff=298587&oldid=298584, and watch their reactions! --McCormack 04:11, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Proposal to disable hotlinking
For all those interested, I have made a proposal to disable hotlinking on all Wikimedia projects. Please join the discussion at Meta. JohnnyMrNinja 21:04, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

 * For the interest of Wikiversity users, the 3rd part of his proposal is unrelated to hotlinking and relates to mass deletion of user-created public-domain images on Commons. I regard this as in opposition to the goals of Wikiversity. My reasons are as follows. (1) Many images get uploaded to Commons which are not used on Wikipedia pages and have no obvious use for encyclopedia articles. (2) These "unused" images are a fantastic resource for educators who can browse through them and choose images for their projects. (3) Image media are generally of far greater usefulness for educators than for encyclopedia writers, and to mass delete unused images from Commons would discriminate against educators and cripple the way in which educators work with media. Perhaps JohnnyMrNinja can modify his principle by deleting proposal 3? --McCormack 07:28, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Quality
User:Emesee (Remi) has revised the quality perception of Wikiversity upwards from 3/10 to 6/10. His personal recommendation is now 7 to 8, compared to his personal recommendation of 3 about 14 months ago. Is he right? What do you think? --McCormack 07:21, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * With the new main page and the Featured at least the organization + access is better than it was before. People can easier see what is available (if it is good is another question). So, from that point, I would rate it with a 8. Here again a big thank you (in German) to you McCormack + the others who helped here.
 * The grade about interaction/working together: 3 (so from what I see, this may totally be wrong from your POV - hit me then)
 * About quality of contents I will not give a value: this is subjective and everybody probably sees it (slightly) different depending on which learning resource they are interested in.
 * If someone wants, let's do a quality model, so we go back from more subjective to less subjective (I don't say rational with purpose): Wikiversity talk:Assessment Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 16:09, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * What is the methodology of this test? Can anyone repeat it? I havent check it.--Juan 16:26, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

RSS feed (again)
These questions were copied from Thuvack's talk page. I made the initial suggestion, but don't know anything about RSS feeds. I hope someone will have an answer... --Gbaor 10:16, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I tried Wikiversity Blog howto, and It seems to be explaining how to create a manually maintained Rss feed.

 * I have done an RSS feed for my Blog and added the this link that you can copy to an aggregator. I then subscribed to my Blog feeds using Feedreader 3.13 and that seemed to work.

Error adding feed:;Cant add/update feed.http://en.wikiversity.org/w/index.php?title=User:Thuvack/Blog/rssaction=raw c type=application/rss+xml
 * I cant however Get Rssbot to create and maintain rss feeds for me for the Test Blog I created. Is Rss bot broken? beacuse when I follow the instruction for using the Rssbot template, then subscribe to the blog on my aggregator using this link, I get the following error message:

Did I do something wrong? --Thuvack 14:29, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I am convinced that the RSSbot is not functional/malfunctioning. I have tried to use it on two pages to no avail. I just looked at User contributions by MichaelBillingtonBot and the last edit was 00:53, 2007 June 24! Am I missing something?--Thuvack | talk 14:33, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikiversity community blog
I've just set up this page (Wikiversity community blog) to discuss a possible communal blog (either an aggregator of posts, or one which would be edited directly). Pending the RSS funcionality (above), does that take care of the aggregation side of things - thereby making much of this proposal redundant? Or is there still some merit or scope in the idea? Cormaggio talk 10:20, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

MobilizeThis2008 on 22 - 24th October 2008
 - ''>ps. let your network know....perhaps we could host some other discussion that would mesh positive practical ideas together.'' This user is hoping for some more presenters at MobilizeThis2008 on 22 - 24th October 2008. It's mainly online with many cross-sectorial voices on positive applications of ICT's. Presenters information document will be sent out around the 1st of October. But careful: I just asked about what kind of topic would be looked for and got nailed down already to one :-) I hope we can use e.g. Cormac's demo. Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 12:44, 26 July 2008 (UTC Please make comment at MobilizeThis2008 blogand introduce yourself. We are keen to hear ( and have Presenters from ) from those in the Wikiversity community who are finding positive practical applications of wiki use in education and related industries...and who's use of networked online space bring about proactive change in education settings.--alexanderhayes 12:57, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Your theme
 * Your platform presentation of choice
 * Your timing
 * Our collective audience

 * Thanks for this, Erkan - and feel free to use my demo, and any other resources I may have uploaded (I need to be much more systematic about this...). Also, out of interest, what topic were you nailed down to - in order to avoid others talking about the same topic? Cormaggio talk 10:26, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
 * see here (what was done and I even can't edit the page - it is protected :-)), Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 17:52, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Discussion about activating WikiTimeLine extension on Wikiversity
Activating the WikiTimeLine extension on wikiversity would be a good idea I think. Its the, kind of, interactive and real-time version of easytimeline. Controlled by the reader of the article instead by the writer. You add tags to an article, if the reader clicks on such a link, an event will be added to the timeline. You can add the events you want (and so create an individual timeline), zoom in/out and move around. See the live example and more information here (just click on a few of the links at the "Examples" section) and the MediaWiki page here. Its like a mix out of WikiTimeScale and the Simile Timeline. The interface is in JavaScript, so there's no heavy load put on the server since nearly everything runs client-side. Thus it can be used by heavy traffic wikis (like the wikimedia foundation wikis) too. The guys at bugzilla told me we would need to be interested here first and afterwards the admins of wikiversity could go to bugzilla/the developers of mediawiki and request the activation of the extension. Any interest? ColdCase 12:31, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * further info, Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 15:23, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

General observations
Is there anywhere to make general observation about Wikiversity. Not about the material but about the organisation of the material. As an extreme novice I am somewhat reluctant to expose myself to the combined erudition on display here but, by the same token, I feel that a novice eye might see things that are obscured by familiarity to others. --TheresaWilson 23:13, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

 * Hi Theresa, I recently heard a CEO interviewed and he described that he makes a conscious point of getting around to all new employees within the first three days of their employment to ask them about their initial observations of the company. Why? Because fresh eyes see so many things that less fresh eyes can no longer see. Please, feel free to share - here is as good a place as any - and we would value your observations :) -- Jtneill - Talk - c 00:17, 1 August 2008 (UTC) -
 * Thanks, Jtn. Here goes - it does feel a little over the top though, now that I've thought about it:

 * (Operating on the premise that a University is ultimately there for the benefit of the Students)

 * The category listings need to be tightened up. I looked at the History portal (a subject in which I have no interest) and found that categories were repeated (Europe, European History [Apparently exists twice] and History of Germany existing separately). There are no doubt Historical (sorry) reasons for this but a new student will have to search unnecessarily through a rather tangled web. I've got a screen grab available which demonstrates this point)

 * Should instructions to contributors be on the actual pages of content?

 * There is only one discussion (talk) page for each project page - as time goes on, this means that "Staff" comments and "Student" queries will be confusingly intermingled.

 * The purpose of a University is to impart learning (?), so there should not be artificial barriers to finding the content. TheresaWilson 00:56, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

 * Thanks very much for this Theresa - I'd just like to reiterate what James said in that we really need and value critique from fresh eyes (as well as more seasoned ones!) - and in no way do I see this as "over the top". :-) Much work needs to be done on our structure, and its been debated at long length as to how best to allow for the finding and developing of resources. But there's another dynamic at play here - and that is that we're very much engaged in the exploration of what Wikiversity means in the world of learning - how to provide for engaging experiences, and what we need to take from different models of learning (including new ones) to do so. So the separation of "student/learner" and "staff/teacher" is something that is often deliberately blurred in order to emphasise that we're all learners here, and that learners have agency in shaping learning resources and spaces. However, this said, some people are creating resources which stick very much to student/teacher roles - so it very much depends on your educational outlook as to what kind of space you want to create. (Think of Wikiversity as a blank canvas in which to paint your educational vision.) Imparting learning is one model - learning by doing and collective learning are others. A big part of Wikiversity's initial phase (and we're still at its beginning) is figuring out what models and what structures provide for what kinds of learning - and how these can be facilitated, and to what extent, in a wiki. But please don't let me confuse you :-) - just take it that if you can see a way in which learning can be improved through a particular structure (whether cleaning up categories, creating page templates, or developing a model for interaction), be bold and help shape it in your own vision (while of course respecting other people's visions too). Cormaggio talk 09:45, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Also a big thank you (in German) from me for your feedback (see also: Feedback in the future).
 * fixed: European History [Apparently exists twice]
 * "so there should not be artificial barriers to finding the content."
 * I have a question to you - as a newcomer would you have been able to fix this ? I am asking because it may be a real problem. Other barriers we need to overcome in the future - content accessibility for e.g. blind people :-(
 * "only one discussion (talk) page": this can be fixed by e.g. creating on the first talk page separate links to other pages for different groups.
 * "Should instructions to contributors be on the actual pages of content?"
 * that depends how people want it: some like it so, some so.
 * I assume now you seem to see WV as a university like institution/place ? Probably because of the "versity". I think I also was first attracted to WV by this :-) There are many roles you can have here at Wikiversity (e.g. Wikiversity teachers). As Cormac says we all share the hunger for learning and wait for you to help us build WV. Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 17:35, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Not ignoring you Erkan - thinking. Back in a short time, Wiedersehen. TheresaWilson 20:00, 1 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Answer when you feel like it: I remember what once I got told: do here at WV what you like.
 * btw: if you need any help with something at WV, please shoot your questions anytime. Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 20:46, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

The Question of Identity.
Who are you?

→ What are the different ways in which one can answer the question "who am I"? How can one answer this question other than with a name? Remember when attempting to answer that a personal description of qualities answers more the question "what am I". To answer the question is it unavoidable to involve other questions; is this question valid; is the answer a record of deeds or personality-- what purpose does identity serve? What can we gain from answering this question; if better understanding is possible, how are this understanding useful?

I would like to know... who are you?

99.179.102.74 00:52, 23 July 2008 (UTC) ...?

 * As you indicate there are many many ways (should I say infinite?) to answer "Who are you?" (even with untrue/not verifyable/not understandable information, ... not answering also provides info to you), so I interpret this "you" as a question to me and not to WV (more info about WV at Help:Contents):
 * I am someone taking the time to read what you wrote
 * I am someone who has a mother and father
 * I am someone writing here something what you then perhaps read
 * I am someone who has 2 arms
 * I am someone motivating you to contribute to the learning resource Who are you?
 * I am someone who breathes
 * I am someone annoying others and losing time with this text
 * I am someone who may continue later on here
 * I am someone who may not continue later on here
 * I am

 * These characteristics above I can share with one or more persons on this earth.
 * What I gain from answering this ? I believe - on short term - your question helped me to think more. About what ? me ? others? useful/unuseful things ? useful/unuseful for whom ? other things I don't know yet ? Sorry, if I didn't answer all your questions.

 * May I ask: Who you are and why you are interested in this question ?
 * You can answer this on your userpage if you like - after registering. Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 16:19, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

 * You may also be interested in these lecture notes on Social self - it offers a 'social' perspective on the self, i.e., that the self is at least partly a function of our social environments, groups, etc. i.e., a social identity. -- Jtneill - Talk - c 11:08, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia Weekly - Interesting interview...
Courtesy of Wikipedia Weekly, Wikimania, and Cormaggio... Emesee 21:14, 18 July 2008 (UTC)
 * thanks, Erkan Yilmaz uses the Chat (try) 16:54, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks - I downloaded, but haven't listened yet. I'm looking for a new audioplayer - one that can handle .ogg so I can listen in the car. Suggestions? Are there any other Wikiversitarians at Wikimania 2008? -- Jtneill - Talk - c 09:10, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Maybe Openmoko... but it is a bit more than just an audio player, and could be a pain to make work. There are others if you search Amazon it seems. Some of the smalle iriver's seem like they might be decent. And I was not at Wikimania. Were you? Emesee 09:18, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
 * JT, try http://www.rockbox.org/ - it will run on many portable devices. Countrymike 22:50, 22 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I can vouch for iriver, they're really nice, good battery life, and play OGGs natively. --pfctdayelise 12:36, 4 August 2008 (UTC)


text:
Social psychology (psychology)/Admin/Experimental

Experimental

 * Moodle (A test LMS site for this unit)
 * Social psychology (psychology) (Sandbox site)