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We have talked about so many different topics in this class and raised so many questions I had never even thought of before. One concept that has really stuck with me the entire semester was semantic contagion from the very first reading of Carl Elliot's "A New Way to be Mad". I had kind of heard about this in my AP Psychology class two years ago, but it was never defined like this. When I first read this it just made sense and connected so many pieces of information in my mind. It really intrigued me because it made me wonder if any disease is real. It made me question reality, which seems to be the whole point of this class. I would absolutely love to do research on semantic contagion and see how it affects otherwise healthy people. If a disease isn't named, does it actually exist? In class we talked about support groups, questioning if they actually help or if they reinforce the idea of this disease. This seemingly simple question blew my mind. I felt extremely naïve in this class because of all of these new questions. I always though support groups did exactly what they sound like, support you. Now I still wonder, are they supporting the people or the disease?

At the beginning of this class, I was asking myself, what does culture have to do with science? Shouldn't science just be a constant thing, no matter the culture? From this course I learned that our upbringing can affect how we see the world significantly. From this specific topic, semantic contagion, I learned to think more critically and question everything. Why does our culture accept depression as a mental illness, but still treat those with this illness like it is their fault or it's something they can just "get over"? Is depression actually as common as it seems, or is that just semantic contagion? Why is it weird for someone to want an amputation to feel better, but not weird for someone to want part of their nose cut off to feel more attractive? Why can't amputations be elective surgeries, like nose jobs?

I think this concept summarizes the course pretty well. How does science shape our world, and how does our culture affect the way we see this world? Like I said earlier, this class has caused me to think more critically about everything. I have so many more questions now that I don't just accept the world as it is, I question why it is like this, what made it this way, why do I see it like this, etc. This class ended up being more philosophical and challenging than I thought it would be... and it was great.