Exercise: To Do Or Not To Do That Is The Question

By Rogelio N. Banez

The 5 Masters and Their Psychological Thoughts

The three levels of behaviors, Affective, Cognitive, and Sensori-motor developed from Swedenborgs psychological thoughts by other psychologist. Freud developed affective behavior, one of the three mechanisms of social influences. Mead and Lewin developed cognitive behavior and Skinner established the sensorimotor behavior. These men are the 5 masters of social psychology who developed the three mechanisms of social influence.

Affective behavior is by definition behavior arising from feelings or emotions. Cognitive behavior arises from memory, perception and so on. Sensori-motor behaviors are motor responses based on sensory stimulation of which, all three are dependent upon each other to occur. The combination of these three mechanisms of social influence provides the make-up of the integrated self.

Affective behavior occurs when an individual decides whether his/her feelings or emotions are positive or negative/good or bad and acts accordingly. Positive/good feelings or emotions are usually acted upon because it illicits that type of feeling. Negative/bad feelings or emotions are reacted to in an opposite manner or not at all.

Cognitive behavior occurs when an individual uses their memory or perceptions to justify their actions. This involves reasoning based on external knowledge of the mind. Rationalizing becomes the important factor involved when choosing the appropriate behavior. The external knowledge is the factor being rationalized in order to determine what behavior will occur. Our decisions are thereby logical based on ethics and morality which provides the proper norms for action in the society.

Sensori-motor behavior involves two factors which must be present in order for this type of behavior to occur. The presence of some form of sensation is needed in order for some type of action to occur. These sensations are then based on some external stimulus which causes some kind of reaction in a person. This clearly shows why or why not an individual reacts in the way they do.

All these three behaviors interact in many ways to become the make-up of the integrated self. What we feel personally (affective) determines to some degree what we believe in the external world (cognitive) and how we should act to sensations (sensori-motor). Norms of society (cognitive) can determine how we should feel as well (affective) and it does set up some limitations on our actions (sensori-motor). Any limitations on our actions (sensori-motor) can limit the influences of our feelings (affective) as well as our reasoning or justification (cognitive). These are just a few relationships between the three mechanisms but as we all can see, they are related to each other as well as having an affect on each other.

Self-assessment holds a great value in behavior modification. It gives an individual a chance to grasp a closer look at himself. This gives the ability to realize the reasons for his actions based on their beliefs and knowledge. With this knowledge, they will be able to understand the factors that illicit their basic behaviors and will be able to change their behaviors which they may see least beneficial in their lives.

Since any change on any one of three mechanisms would undoubtedly have some effect on the other two, modification on any aspect of their behaviors would then be possible. Some possible changes would be better health, study habits, temperance, stress control, and better relations.

Another important point to consider is the social psychological aspect of self-assessment. We have discussed the basic self-assessment previously which involves personal thoughts, beliefs, and essentially internal factors of the person. The social aspect deals with external factors which illicits a behavior. Basically, they are inter-related in which a persons beliefs are manifested from social powers. Therefore, a change in incorporating social controls will have a definite affect upon individual personal thoughts.

Based on the previous explanation of the three social mechanisms, internal and external factors, I will elaborate on my health behavior relating the above mentioned ideas. This will provide an actual relationship and should show an example of self-assessment.

Personal Health Behavior

The format of the report will include a bi-polar paragraph scale for the affective, cognitive, and sensori-motor mechanisms. They will be followed with an explanation based on why I am like that during each situation. This report will be made from systematic observations.

The bi-polar paragraph scale is a description of extremes. The paragraph will simply relate the reasons a certain behavior occurs or does not for each social mechanisms. The explanations following the scale will involve my past, present, and future. This should enable you to relate to my reasons for my health behavior based on exercise.

As a child and until my high school years. I was an active person at home and school. In high school, I played in the school tennis, volleyball, track, and football teams. As you can well see, I never even had to think about exercising because I always did have some kind of exercise or activity. As I started college, my physical activity went down to almost zero. Why? For one thing, I did not have the same assets like I did not have at home like a car, equipment and so on to continue the things I used to do. I also did not have to contend with the work in college when attending high school.

Consider my weight lifting behavior. I used to think that its main purpose was to build a large body strictly for competition. I believed it took up a lot of energy that should be saved for later and better uses. The idea of having a muscular body appealed to me a great deal but I always thought that I was in good physical shape and it was not necessary to do such a thing.

As I started college, I found myself getting tired and short of breath after a little strenuous activity. Even during the day, I found myself getting tired real quickly and not doing the best I can with most of the things I do daily. I finally decided to try weight training after realizing that I did not get enough exercise as I did in high school which I thought and believed caused the slowly decreasing strength during my college years.

I presently weight train three times a week during my three hour break between classes. I did this because I did not have anything else better to do and I believed that studying all the time was not psychologically healthy. Weight training began to look appealing because today it is a popular sport and many articles or magazines can be found to provide an individual with an appropriate program.

It is clear in this case, my affective behavior is the cause for my weight lifting behavior, the sensori-motor behavior. The cognitive is the reinforcement which helps me maintain this activity for a good part of my time and will do so in the future.

As for my running, I enjoyed it especially in my grade school days. I was considered by my playmates and even by the upper grades to be the fastest. I was called on by everyone to play with them and usually chosen by older students to be on their team.

As I entered middle school, I became inactive which eventually affected my performance in high school sports. Upon entering highschool, I entered many sports and found that I had lost most of my speed but had still maintained my determination which kept me going. After high school before entering college, I could run two miles in thirteen minutes but that soon changed drastically after going to college.

In college, I was no longer running but under my situation. I had to maintain my two mile run under fifteen minutes. Since this was almost impossible after a year of inactivity, I had to start running again. I did start running but only at night since that was the only time I could run on Waikiki without inhaling too much carbon monoxide from the exhaust made by the automobiles. Because I ran so late, my studies soon lagged behind and I had to quit after a semester.

I do not run at the present because studies need my greatest amount of attention at this time. The test still occurs once a semester but the consequences are greater if I fail a class than failing the two mile run. The maximum for the two mile run will soon be increased to fifteen minutes and at that time, I will need to take up running again.

As you can see, running, the sensori-motor behavior, does not occur even with the proper justification, cognitive behavior. My strength of the affective behavior plays a great importance in the actions, sensori-motor behavior, I should take and the obvious link these mechanisms have on each other.

Now consider my exercise behavior based on sports. In high school, I entered my initial sport by persuasion from close friends. It was the IN thing to do at the time because the school spirit was in their sports. Once in my first scholastic sport, I met new people and made new friends. I also received awards and praise for doing an excellent performance. I soon joined three other school teams for the above mentioned reasons.

I soon believed that joining sports was the thing to do. It was popular in and out of school. Many things could be achieved in sports and it was recognized island wide. Support came from local newspapers and magazines for everything I and the team did.

In college, thought about entering college sports but many factors held me back. For one thing, the athletes came from everywhere which brought greater athletic ability which I felt that I could not even come close to their level. They were larger, faster and stronger. It was quite obvious that I did not have their size, speed or strength to compete against such athletes which we have at the university. People are acknowledged in their abilities by papers, people of authority and the public.

I also did not have the time they had because of my other commitments. I am a full time student which needs intense studying to get along at the university. In order to maintain my academic status, I had to give up sports even though I thought and felt that it was an excellent form of exercise.

Therefore, even if my cognitive and affective behavior would justify being active in sports, the strength of its importance plays an important role on whether I should act accordingly. Academics is important above all things and because I believe this so strongly, I could not even consider slowing down my education by being involved with any type of sport at this time.

Conclusion

As I have stated previously, self assessment provides the avenue towards personal improvement. I realize now that in order to change my behavior, sensori-motor, my affective knowledge must be changed by gaining information from the external world. This will give my cognitive knowledge the strength to maintain a good exercise habit, sensori-motor behavior.

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