Definition of Adjustment The biological concept of adaptation

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CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Adjustment

2.1.1 Definition of Adjustment The biological concept of adaptation

Lazarus 1976 said the biological concept of adaptation has been borrowed and changed somewhat by the psychologist and renamed “adjustment” to emphasize the individual’s struggle to get along or survive in his or her social and physical environments. Adaptation as process and as an outcome As cited in Grasha and Kirschenbaum 1980, George Vaillant, Richard Lazarus, and Harold Fishbein stated that adaptation can be regarded as a “process” or an “outcome” of our efforts. In both these cases, we make value judgments about how well we are doing things. Each of us has some thoughts and feelings about how well we use various processes to adapt and the things we have achieved. How we evaluate ourselves affect our thought and actions. Evaluating ourselves very negatively can interfere with our willingness to try new things and our overall ability to 15 cope successfully with problems and demands of the environment. The most important fact about adaptation is that we can loose sight of the fact that most of us are, to varying degrees, good and bad at different things. For international students, the first time in their new environment they have to learn how to come around so they can find a way how to get around by themselves. Through finding their way by themselves, will make the process or the outcome of their stay a much easier or difficult tasks. Grasha and Kirscenbaum 1980 define adjustment as follows: Adjustment refers to the things we do to meet the demands of our environment. Adjustment is concerned with our success and failure matching skills and abilities to events in our lives. Thos e things we do to “get by” or “to hold our heads above water ”, to meet basic needs, and otherwise keep ourselves free of symptoms of problems in living, are typically associated with an adequate adjustment. According to Atwater 1983, adjustment consists of the changes in ourselves and our circumstances necessary to achieve a satisfactory relationship with others and with our surroundings. Benjamin B. Wolman also explains in Atwater, 1983, that adjustment is a harmonious relationship with the environment involving the ability to satisfy 16 most of one’s needs and meet most of the demands, both physically and socially, that are put upon one. The variations and changes in behavior that is necessary to satisfy needs and meet demands so that one can establish a harmonious relationship with the environment. According to Watson and Tharp 1973, adjustment is a value judgment about the relationship between a person’s behavior and his environment. These relationships are learned. To arrange the parts suitably to themselves and to something else, and to do this according to the laws which govern this harmony. Watson and Tharp 1973, also explains that adjustment is a question of feelings and behavior, both of which occur in specific situations. Thus a person might be well adjusted in that he can do in one type of situation, but badly adjusted in that he cannot do what he wants to do in other situations. Behavior is a function of the environment. The particular behavior that one person shows in a particular situation is influenced by the learning experiences that the person has had in similar situations. Different learning experiences produce different behaviors. 17 Bonner 1953, gives a clear explanation on how students should function in order to adjust to their environment. As long as students are in interaction with others, they must at every turn adjust themselves to that particular behavior. The process of socialization is long and complicated. It begins at birth and ends at death. Social interaction is the condition of surviving and living in a good-adjusted manner. The analysis of social interaction invariably leads one to an examination of the learning process. Learning is a fundamental process of all behavior. Social learning is the process through which the individual is conditioned to behave in certain ways. A human individual is human because of his relatedness to others and to the customs of his group. The organization of a personality in significant ways is in the organization of a culture. Cultural factors play an important role in shaping the personality of an individual. From a broad cultural point of view values and norms are the established codes, or existing social rules of behavior. Apart from them personality is the organization of the rules of behavior into a more or less consistent pattern of responses. Behavior may be described as normal or abnormal depending upon its conformity with the existing social rules, or with the cultural norms of a group. 18 From the standpoint of cultural norms, therefore, maladjustment in one culture maybe described as adequate adjustment in another. These are the integrative systems, or systems of orientation, which enable the individual to organize his attitudes and behavior around a few and relatively stable systems of ideas and practices. These systems are found in one form or another, with more or less controlling pow er over the individual’s conduct in every society. In order to survive students has at all times found it necessary to devise means of maintaining control over himself or herself and their environment and giving sense of direction. These means have been of three kinds: the rational systems, the believe system, and the social ideologies. The rational believe system are all those methods of control which make up the knowledge, technology of a group, such as tools, instruments, the system of skills for manipulating these instruments, and its abstract and symbolic knowledge. The chief function of these systems is to adjust individuals and groups to the natural environment and to transform non-usable or natural forms into usable or social forms. 19 The belief systems are all the ideas, invariably absolute, which function to adapt members of a group to those areas of life which cannot be manipulated by the existing technology or skills namely the realm of the unknown. The belief system consists of verbal and conceptual systems such as religion, ect. The social ideologies are the set of ideas or values which express the power relations members and groups. The institutional life of every society is based to some degree on these three integrative systems. No society is dominated by one or the other exclusively, though one may offer greater individual and collective security than the others, Bonner 1953. The researcher concludes that adjustment is an interaction process. Through this process students learn things about their new environment and how to socialize in an appropriate way. The beginning of the process is a very important step, because it will determine the success of the student in a great way. Through socializing the students become experience and wise how to operate their condition. For those students who interacts less with their environment, adjustment is a very difficult process. Many students misadjust because of culture. The fact that people grow up with different cultures, these sojourners have to master cultural factors on a high level. If mastered on a 20 low level, students will face many problems. Another factor is the every people interpret culture in a different way. In order for students to maintain control over themselves, it is important to stay with what you believe in, because what a person belief in, is very important to stay healthy and focused. As your belief system is the structure of your personality.

2.1.2 Concept of adjustment