Understanding Multiple Sclerosis :: Health Medicine

Understanding Multiple Sclerosis Diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis There are several diagnostic tests used to detect Multiple Sclerosis (referred to as MS). An MRI (multilple resonance imaging) can confirm a diagnosis by showing lesions and sites of inflammation in the brain. Although the presence of lesions is common in Multiple Sclerosis sufferers, the absence of lesions is not a sign that the disease is not active. An electroencephalogram (EEG) can isolate changes in brain waves when introduced to audio or visual stimuli. The Evoked Potential test measures the speed with which nerve impulses travel. Demyelination significantly reduces the speed of nerve signal transmission and can be detected with this test. Lumbar punctures and spinal taps are also used to test spinal fluids for the presence of certain immuno-proteins present in Multiple Sclerosis sufferers. Facts about Multiple Sclerosis Multiple sclerosis is an inflammatory and demyelinating disease of the central nervous system and is believed to be immune mediated. This debilitating disorder affects at least 350,000 people in the United States. The disease occurs in young adults with the mean age of onset of 30 years. Women make up 70% of the MS population. This gender preference remains unexplained. Clinical Features The symptoms of MS may be mild or severe, of short or long duration and may appear in various combinations, depending on the area of the nervous system affected. Complete or partial remission of symptoms, especially in the early stages of the disease occurs in approximately 70% of MS patients. The initial symptoms of MS are often blurred or double vision, red-green color distortion, or even blindness in one eye. However, visual problems tend to clear up in the later stages of MS. Inflammatory problems of the optic nerve may be diagnosed as retrobulbar or optic neuritis. MS patients will have an attack of optic neuritis at some time or other and it will be the first symptom of MS in approximately 15 percent. This has led to general recognition of optic neuritis as an early sign of MS, especially if test also reveals abnormalities in the patient's spinal fluid. Most MS patients experience muscle weakness in their extremities and difficulty with coordination and balance at some time during the course of the disease.

Behaviorism Theory

Behaviorist theorists believe that behavior is shaped deliberately by forces in the environment and that the type of person and actions desired can be the product of design. In other words, behavior is determined by others, rather than by our own free will. By carefully shaping desirable behavior, morality and information is learned. Learners will acquire and remember responses that lead to satisfying aftereffects. Repetition of a meaningful connection results in learning. If the student is ready for the connection, learning is enhanced; if not, learning is inhibited. Motivation to learn is the satisfying aftereffect, or reinforcement.Behaviorism is linked with empiricism, which stresses scientific information and observation, rather than subjective or metaphysical realities. Behaviorists search for laws that govern human behavior, like scientists who look for pattern sin empirical events. Change in behavior must be observable; internal thought processes are not considered. Ivan Pavl ov's research on using the reinforcement of a bell sound when food was presented to a dog and finding the sound alone would make a dog salivate after several presentations of the conditioned stimulus, was the beginning of behaviorist approaches.Learning occurs as a result of responses to stimuli in the environment that are reinforced by adults and others, as well as from feedback from actions on objects. The teacher can help students learn by conditioning them through identifying the desired behaviors in measurable, observable terms, recording these behaviors and their frequencies, identifying appropriate reinforcers for each desired behavior, and providing the reinforcer as soon as the student displays the behavior.For example, if children are supposed to raise hands to get called on, we might reinforce a child who raises his hand by using praise, â€Å"Thank you for raising your hand. † Other influential behaviorists include B. F. Skinner (1904-1990) and James B. Watson (18 78-1958). Cognitivism/Constructivism Cognitivists or Constructivists believe that the learner actively constructs his or her own understandings of reality through interaction with objects, events, and people in the environment, and reflecting on these interactions.Early perceptual psychologists (Gestalt psychology) focused on the making of wholes from bits and pieces of objects and events in the world, believing that meaning was the construction in the brain of patterns from these pieces. For learning to occur, an event, object, or experience must conflict with what the learner already knows. Therefore, the learner's previous experiences determine what can be learned. Motivation to learn is experiencing conflict with what one knows, which causes an imbalance, which triggers a quest to restore the equilibrium.Piaget described intelligent behavior as adaptation. The learner organizes his or her understanding in organized structures. At the simplest level, these are called schemes. Whe n something new is presented, the learner must modify these structures in order to deal with the new information. This process, called equilibration, is the balancing between what is assimilated (the new) and accommodation, the change in structure. The child goes through four distinct stages or levels in his or her understandings of the world.Some constructivists (particularly Vygotsky) emphasize the shared, social construction of knowledge, believing that the particular social and cultural context and the interactions of novices with more expert thinkers (usually adult) facilitate or scaffold the learning process. The teacher mediates between the new material to be learned and the learner's level of readiness, supporting the child's growth through his or her â€Å"zone of proximal development. † Behaviorism Posted in Behaviorist Theories, Paradigms and Perspectives | 0 comments Summary: Behaviorism is a worldview that operates on a principle of â€Å"stimulus-response.†All behavior caused by external stimuli (operant conditioning). All behavior can be explained without the need to consider internal mental states or consciousness. Originators and important contributors: John B. Watson, Ivan Pavlov, B. F. Skinner, E. L. Thorndike (connectionism), Bandura, Tolman (moving toward cognitivism) Keywords: Classical conditioning (Pavlov), Operant conditioning (Skinner), Stimulus-response (S-R) Behaviorism Behaviorism is a worldview that assumes a learner is essentially passive, responding to environmental stimuli.The learner starts off as a clean slate (i. e.  tabula rasa) and behavior is shaped through positive reinforcement or negative reinforcement. Both positive reinforcement and negative reinforcement increase the probability that the antecedent behavior will happen again. In contrast, punishment (both positive and negative) decreases the likelihood that the antecedent behavior will happen again. Positive indicates the application of a stimulus; N egative indicates the withholding of a stimulus. Learning is therefore defined as a change in behavior in the learner. Lots of (early) behaviorist work was done with animals (e. g. Pavlov’s dogs) and generalized to humans.

Telepresence is Finally Coming of Age Free Essay Example, 1000 words

Such an approach would better not just the outcome of an organization, but the welfare of its workers too. c. Secondary importance is the organization’s ecological footprint. Evading essential travelling would be advantageous the environment. Flights will be the best method for this paper. Airplanes make up just 3.5% of the globe’s greenhouse gas emanations. At the same time, the number of people taking flights is rising by between 5 and 5% yearly (Shein 2010). Appling telepresence solutions for an organization can save an organization a significant amount of money if certain limitations like current travel rates are considered. The organization would first have to deal with some open costs, but these expenses are insignificant in comparison to the intangible merits of the aforementioned data. Question 2 There are many advantages for using telepresence in organizations. At the same time, there are certainly a number of measurable and non-measurable drawbacks to using the same innovations (Shein 2010). The most significant potential disadvantage to telepresence is losing the merits of physical communication. Organizations do not simply organize meetings between their employees and clients in remote locations, but for interpersonal communication with employees from another office too. We will write a custom essay sample on Telepresence is Finally Coming of Age or any topic specifically for you Only $17.96 $11.86/pageorder now Prior to the planned meetings, it is likely that the visitor will dine with coworkers, spend leisure time with them after work, and interact in the course of the day. This kind of interaction is referred to as â€Å"outside hierarchy† and enables members of an organization to debate ideas easily (Shein 2010). These debates are crucial for organizational innovation as these easy dialogues can result in new projects. Another major disadvantage is complacency. Complacency occurs mostly because of telepresence. Since it is much simpler to have meetings with dissociated respondents, motive and tasks could be delayed for other meetings equally easily. By employees travelling to distance meetings, they get devoted to achieving the goal of these meetings (Shein 2010). Given that these problems could be handled effortlessly by following meeting protocols and excellent practices, this disadvantage does take place easily. As a result, this demerit affec ts output and disdains the expense of the telepresence meeting. This permanent meeting can be undervalued in contrast to temporary cost benefits, as defined by Amara’s law (Shein 2010). Clearly, the abilities of the technology might form a realistic experience and question whether the experience contrasts in value to real human communication.