Executive Control .... Civility

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DocStram

DocStram

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Joined
Feb 16, 2006
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Ever hear of "Executive Control" as it relates to brain function? It's an interesting concept. Essentially, it's the idea that the human brain uses Executive Control to help us deal with various life situations. It helps us to decide how to handle life events; how to treat people when you're upset with them; and, what strategies to use to be successful in life.

Executive control is what we need to use when we read a post that we disagree with or one that makes us angry. Before hitting the "submit" key on your computer, let's all first try using a little executive control.

Civility is one of the keys for building a community of learners. And that is what IAP is .... a community of penturners who want to learn more about their craft. Treating each other with civility and respect ...... seems reasonable to me. Don't you think?

 
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I hate it when someone tries to change a
TRADITION!!!!

(Quarterly rants are a requirement of our community ---)​
 
ed4copies said:
I hate it when someone tries to change a
TRADITION!!!!

(Quarterly rants are a requirement of our community ---)​
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Gives new meaning to the birthday "bash"...

Well spoken Doc. Actually the worst of it is online. It is so hard to show the nuances of speech in writing, especially with people you don't know in person. Satire, teasing, tongue-in-cheek, etc are so hard in text.
 
ilikewood said:
Hey.....aren't you the one who labeled me "Weasel"



Just kidding you Doc. I agree fully with your post!
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There is a difference between "irritating" and "Insulting" insults are fair play.

Seriously Doc I agree. I often read a post and my first reactions to get riled. I hate to reply while the hair is still standing on the back of my neck. usually if I keep looking the post was not meant the way I was reading it at first. Even if it was blabbering something back usually just adds fuel to the fire. sometimes people are just mad and they are going to stay that way for a while. sometimes when someone has a real bent going on the best thing you can do is cheer for them to kick it again.
 
Al, the fact you posted this 20 minutes before i posted something similar makes me want to punch you in the neck meat! Pu up yer dukes!
 
Skye said:
Al, the fact you posted this 20 minutes before i posted something similar makes me want to punch you in the neck meat! Pu up yer dukes!
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Noooo Skye Man ... I didn't post mine 20 minutes before yours. Take another look at my time of posting. Mine was posted 12 hours and twenty minutes before yours. I posted mine in the middle of the night ..... while those nasty storms were blowing through Georgia.

Besides, when it comes right down to it ... you would never hit me. Your wife loves me, remember???? And besides .... I'm the guy who gave you the Infamous Stinky Wood!! :biggrin::biggrin::biggrin:
 
DocStram said:
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you would never hit me. Your wife loves me, remember???? And besides .... I'm the guy who gave you the Infamous Stinky Wood!! :biggrin::biggrin::biggrin:
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Sounds like 2 reasons to get into it right there. See how easy it is to take things out of context.

VALIUM for everyone!!!!!!!

I amy need to have that jerk that talks to me about anger management come on the forum.:biggrin:
 
wolftat said:
Sounds like 2 reasons to get into it right there. See how easy it is to take things out of context.

VALIUM for everyone!!!!!!!

I amy need to have that jerk that talks to me about anger management come on the forum.:biggrin:
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It's true, isn't it Skye?? Go ahead, tell them it's true. Of all the creeps and weirdos in IAP ..... who does your wife like the best?? (And don't say FiferB) ..... It's me, I know it. Okay, so I don't have a tat. But, Mrs. Skye and I have a bond with each other ... we're both special ed people!
 
Not sure about "Executive Control" . . . . but I do know 1st hand that e-mailing has potential to create all the "negative" results of written correspondence. Unlike writing a letter like we did years ago where we were careful in our drafting as to not convey the wrong message.

I have recently lost a friendship that was over 35 years old . . . How, quick and nasty e-mails arguing over the election for president. Imagine that, when neither side really had a candidate they were that hot about . . . We both said things to each other we would have never dreamed of saying over the phone or in person . . . But ah! e-mail . . . .

Since then I am very careful when posting/replying in forums or answering e-mails . . . .

Recently I read where a large human resources consulting firm did a study & have determined that it is very possible that some of the problems we now have in the work place can be traced back to e-mailing among workers within the same office. . . . It is one thing for someone to embarrass you in front of your co-workers at the water cooler, but it is somewhat different when you see it in writing taped up in several cubicles . . .

I work as a designer, and a lot of the people in that field are excellent sketch artist . . . I have seen some really nasty arguments over cartoons depicting another co-worker . . .

My 2 cents . .
 
Yeah Al, you're both special alright! I'm gonna have to make sure to keep you two separated if you come to the shindig next year. You may not have the ink but you probably have a good scar on your forehead from that flying wood, and chicks dig scars.
 
wolftat said:
VALIUM for everyone!!!!!!!

I amy need to have that jerk that talks to me about anger management come on the forum.:biggrin:
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Valium is not the answer Neil.


BTW, Who is amy?

Seriously now........... There have been many times on this forum that I have been the opinionated jerk but I hope those times will become less and less. Not many folks know this but for many years I have had a serotonin imbalance that was either undiagnosed or misdiagnosed. I finally found a doctor who is on the ball and a small dosage of Zoloft is making a HUGE difference. I still have times where the three headed monster slips out but I hope those times are few and far between. I also hope that when I begin to digress that I'll always have friends like Ed, Dawn, William, Lou and a few others (like our suuuuper moderator and our wizard behind the curtain <That would be you Jeff>) to send me a pm and help me to realize that I'm slipping.
I've also practices Skye's rule and I read and re-read my replies. There have been many that I have changed and even more that I have just not posted because I knew it would just escalate things. I had a slip very recently but one of my friends mentioned above helped me to find my way back.

I'm thankful for the many friends I've made on this forum. (That includes you Neil) and I hope that we might all take a moment to ask ourselves if the post is really necessary? Will it add anything constructive to the thread? If not then I hope we might think twice before hitting the submit reply button.

My goal is that I will appear bright, even when I speak.
 
another perspective

I beg to differ. There is a balance somewhere between someone who is emboldened by the keyboard and someone who is "shaped" or guilted into not saying anything for fear of offending or "hurting someones" feelings or being "politically correct". It is almost as if we are willing to give up a abit of our rights in order to be politically correct and not say "the wrong thing". I've never heard it referred to as executive control, but perhaps you are referring to the part of the brain that is the "governer" of sorts that deals with judgment. It is the last to fully develop-some say not until you are in your 20s and unfortunately one of the first parts of the brain to deteriorate-starting in your 50s and early 60s.
 
Hey Doc!! I have a question or two about this "Executive Control" . From where does it come; from what is it formed?

(edit #1) "After posting the above questions, I've done a little research on executive control by reading a a short article in the Oxford Journals Cerebral Cortex. Found it an interesting read since they state that the findings support a notion that "EC" plays an integral role in deception; lying. Think I'll dig a little more!!"

(edit #2) "Okay, did a little more reading. Found a bit of info at the uiowa.edu site. Now I have another question. From a layman's view, is what we know as "Pavlov's dog" a result of "EC"? I ask this because from what I've read so far, isn't "EC" goal directed actions formed by experiences and possibilities in our lives that in turn cause us to determine, schedule, and terminate various tasks, such as our responses to a given motivator."

And as for my brain fully developing in my 20's and deteriorating in my 50's and early 60's, I think because of some of the things I inhaled and ingested in my teens, deterioration began in my 20's and will finish in my 50's or 60's!!!! :D
 
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cozee said:

And as for my brain fully developing in my 20's and deteriorating in my 50's and early 60's, I think because of some of the things I inhaled and ingested in my teens, deterioration began in my 20's and will finish in my 50's or 60's!!!! :D
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So I am guessing you are in you 70's then.:biggrin::biggrin:
 
cozee said:
Hey Doc!! I have a question or two about this "Executive Control" . From where does it come; from what is it formed?

(edit #1) "After posting the above questions, I've done a little research on executive control by reading a a short article in the Oxford Journals Cerebral Cortex. Found it an interesting read since they state that the findings support a notion that "EC" plays an integral role in deception; lying. Think I'll dig a little more!!"

(edit #2) "Okay, did a little more reading. Found a bit of info at the uiowa.edu site. Now I have another question. From a layman's view, is what we know as "Pavlov's dog" a result of "EC"? I ask this because from what I've read so far, isn't "EC" goal directed actions formed by experiences and possibilities in our lives that in turn cause us to determine, schedule, and terminate various tasks, such as our responses to a given motivator."

And as for my brain fully developing in my 20's and deteriorating in my 50's and early 60's, I think because of some of the things I inhaled and ingested in my teens, deterioration began in my 20's and will finish in my 50's or 60's!!!! :D
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Hey Cozee ...... you raised some interesting questions. Here's how I see it from my experience of working with kids ... focusing mostly on kids with LD and ADD.

The way I see it, Executive Control is a psychological process that we use to consciously control our actions. For example, you know how sometimes you'll be sitting in church listening intently to the preacher? And ... he's up there preaching away ... and suddenly, without realizing it, your mind begins to wander off very slightly? And, you think of a joke somebody told you and you catch yourself starting to laugh to yourself? And then you realize ... "Whoaaa, I'm in church! I better start paying attention to the preacher." And then you get yourself back on track and paying attention? You just used executive control.

A lot of LD and ADD kids are terrible at using executive control. They don't know how to be active learners or how to use study strategies. Or, for that matter, how to make themselves pay attention.

Executive control is what we use when we're sitting in IAP and read a post that ticks us off. Rather than immediately firing off an angry response, we use executive control to think about what we're about to say and the effect it's going to have on the reader.

I see it being different than Pavlov's dogs and pure behaviorism.
 
I agree with Doc's post but I'm not sure it has to be thought of as something as fancy as Executive control. I'm sure that's what it is technically but I think I learned it in kindergarten and its called the golden rule...

I'm sure we all know it but just asking ourselves "will our post be helpful to others" will take care of almost any issue. Criticism is hard to take but constructive criticism is a gift!

From what I read, the participants in this forum practice the golden rule about 99.7% of the time. When I do see that 0.3%, I just realize that everybody has a bad day now and then.

Just my two cents...

John
 
jedgerton said:
I agree with Doc's post but I'm not sure it has to be thought of as something as fancy as Executive control. I'm sure that's what it is technically but I think I learned it in kindergarten and its called the golden rule...

I'm sure we all know it but just asking ourselves "will our post be helpful to others" will take care of almost any issue. Criticism is hard to take but constructive criticism is a gift!

From what I read, the participants in this forum practice the golden rule about 99.7% of the time. When I do see that 0.3%, I just realize that everybody has a bad day now and then.

Just my two cents...

John
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John, What you say is very accurate but I think it goes beyond just having a bad day now and then. I am convinced that there a few members who thrive on controversy and can't wait to jump into a thread and make a mountain out of a mole hill just to spice things up or make a thread more interesting to them. I don't think any amount of civility control will work with them as it defeats their very need to post. When you see a dogpile going on, it's usually the same folks over and over again.

I'm probably the biggest kidder on the forum, a fact that is known to those who have met me in person but lately more and more of my little friendly pokes have been taken way too seriously, to the point I feel like not even posting much anymore.

It's hardly a family atmosphere when you can't kid each other and who wants to participate in a forum where you are afraid of making a light hearted remark now and then without some jerk starting an argument?

And FYI... I re-read and thought about this post before hitting the submit button and decided to go ahead and hit submit anyway. In a perfect world, everyone would indeed practice civility control but we need to at least realize that some won't. And that's my 2 cents!
 
wdcav1952 said:
George, that post was only worth one cent!! :wink::tongue::wink:
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Yeah I know, I started to write more (then you would have gotten your moneys worth) but decided to go out and play in the shop awile instead.

Geeze......... it's COLD out there! I hate it when you have to preheat the shop just to do a little playing.

Well, it ought to be warm again so ADIOS for awhile, I'm off to see if alumilite sets up quickly in the cold!
 
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