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Summary My UCAS personal statement for psychology and philosophy joint hons
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Uni offers: University of St. Andrews Durham University University of Edinburgh University of Nottingham
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My UCAS Personal Statement for Psychology and Philosophy joint honours - Anette LeeMy first encounter with the link between philosophy and psychology was a poetic one, which
convinced me of the potential in synthesising interdisciplinary knowledge.
For my school's scholarship, I argued that despite a tendency to tie respectively positive and
negative connotations to 'order' and 'chaos', these ideas are more similar than we may think.
I showed that this value-ascription is inconsistent by drawing from psychology and
philosophy with my counterexample, Sylvia Plath. To me, aesthetic insights can be
generated from the idea that 'chaos', appearing as stigmatised mental disorders, produces
'order', as art that is admired. My view on aesthetic attitude from studying 'A Companion to
Aesthetics' is discordant with Kant's definition of "disinterest", as I associate my aesthetic
appreciation of tragedy expressed in art with a certain "interest": its translation into purpose.
I see aesthetic attitude as a derived object of the artwork that gives rise to an "interested"
purpose, due to its active rather than passive contemplation. I agree with Dr Cooper that
aesthetic attitudes should not be reduced to a single type.
The purpose to which I ascribe this aesthetic attitude is presented in a scientific application
to 'tragedy' - accurate diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. I contend with Kant
relating beauty to morality and his simultaneous claim of "disinterest". My opinion was
reinforced in my HKU neuroscience course, where I learned about biological markers of
mental illness. This knowledge to counter Szasz's rejection of the biological basis in 'The
Myth of Mental Illness' leads to psychiatry's scientific progress. The fight or flight response
as an example underlies modern day anxiety. Its identification with hormonal imbalances of
adrenaline and cortisol allows for medical administration to regulate them. Yet, diagnosis is
still flawed despite such advancements. I concluded from Fried in 'Mental disorders as a
network of problems' that the dimensional approach to psychiatric diagnosis yields much
experimental potential, in determining whether diagnosis is attributed to the causal interplay
between symptoms, or correlations.
Noticing a discrepancy between dualism as an underlying philosophical theory in empirical
science and as a key implied theory in the nature of consciousness led me to investigate the
dialogue between Neuroscience and Philosophy within the Hard Problem, as my scholar's
project. I concluded that physicalism leaves the explanatory gap between the functional and
the phenomenal unbridged, despite identifying Klein et al's outline of interventionism as an
acute materialist method, as it fails to explain qualia. I am keen to explore types of qualia
and if cognitive phenomenology is reducible.
I am committed to applying cognitive psychology to French tutoring, through researching
language acquisition in the working memory model. Demir's article shows the importance of
working memory capacity in learning rates as one explanation of individual differences in
process and outcome that I observed in my students. After seeing Dr Ramirez's TED talk
'Creating bilingual minds', I am inspired to fuse my knowledge of memory models with brain
mechanisms to facilitate learning.
In my highly commended John Locke essay, I argued for an innate psychological difference
between men and women by contrasting biosocial theory with sexual selection. Although I
gave a foundational evolutionary explanation, A-level Biology allows me to appreciate the
complexity of our anatomy and adopt biological methods. I believe gender-based
discrimination should not result from biological individual differences but be treated as a
social systemic issue. The skill of applying empiricism to Psychology which I have gained by
pursuing Biology practicals is pivotal to answering controversies.
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