▶ Your Answer :
Diverse types of discipline play a
significant role in formulating people’s behavior as people may have no idea
about what to do in totally new circumstances. However, people’s behavior is determined
not only by external forces, as the statement insisted, but a remarkable
portion of behavior is determined by self-decision makings; thus, I disagree
with this argument.
To
begin with, one might say that others’ forces or instructions lead people to
establish their behavior. This notion can be true for certain situations such
as schools or business world. For example, K-12 students in schools need to
take appropriate amount of discipline from their teachers or mentors. These disciplines
(or forces) can include, but are not limited to: letting them be quiet in
classroom, to walk, not run in the corridors, and to not to bully their
classmates. On the other hand, in business world, various manners are taught to
people by their bosses or supervisors, e.g., how to share business cards,
making an eye contact when shaking hands, and sitting tall when interviewed.
All of these behaviors are not by people’s own decision makings, rather, they
are trained by forces.
Nonetheless,
the argument can be not true for a considerate amount of other cases because
people are independent entities, not robots. In fact, humans desire free
choices and external forces cannot lead eventual outcomes as it hoped for when
it comes to independent choices. A proverb in China said, “You can lead a horse
to a pond, however, you cannot let him drink the water.” As stated in this
quote, living creatures have their own willing on whatever they want to choose,
achieve, and deny. If a person has a behavior of sitting tall always wherever
he goes, this behavior can be what he liberally selects to do by his own
decision making. Given this thought, the argument may not be true in terms of
human’s freedom-oriented tendency.
In
addition, behavior, the word itself refers to an “acting pattern accumulated by
a person over a certain period of time.” Therefore, we can say that “behavior”
is not just a contemporary action, but a pattern; to be called a pattern,
self-oriented and independently made choice should be processed. As Mother
Theresa said, “Thoughts can lead actions, actions can lead habits, habits lead
one’s life,” to have a behavior, one’s thought should be firstly made. Thus, it
can be conclude that, even though people’s behaviors seem to be determined by external
input, as a matter of fact, most of them are made by themselves. For example,
no matter how the business manners or school disciplines are relevant, if one
does not want to follow the rules for some reason, the socially acceptable behaviors
cannot be determined in him.
In
sum, the claim overstates the external forces’ attribution to people’s
behaviors. It might be true for some cases such as schools or business world.
However, even though people’s behaviors seem to be determined largely by others’
forces, I disagree with the statement because people are independent decision
makers for most cases, and the behavior is in fact a self-determined acting
pattern. |