Days, Time: MWF, 10:00 – 10:50

Instructor: Dr. Ed Crawley

Email: crawley@marywood.edu

WebPage: http://ac.marywood.edu/crawley/www/

Web-CT: http://disted.marywood.edu:8900/webct/public/home.pl

Office Location & Hours: McGowan 1024; MW 3:00-5:00, T 2:00-4:00, Th 1:00-3:00 and by appointment

TEXT: Baron, R. A. (1999), Essentials of Psychology (3rd edition). Allyn & Bacon.

Course Description: Psychology is the systematic empirical analysis of the behavior of organisms. Thus, material in this course covers a wide range of basic psychological phenomenon. Major topics include introduction to research methods, the biological basis of behavior, perception, learning, memory, motivation, personality and abnormal behavior.

This section of general Psychology has a distance-learning component. As such, students at Marywood University will have an opportunity to engage in discussions with students from the Bangor School District via video-conferencing and Web-CT bulletin boards and chat rooms.

Course Objectives: This course is designed to give you an overview of the field of psychology. As we will see the field of psychology has a broad base that ranges from statistics and experimental design to biology to social interactions. Because of the general nature of this course we will be moving quickly covering a different topic or sub‑field of psychology almost every class. Although breadth rather then depth is emphasized this course, we will often pause to cover selected topics in greater detail. As a student in this course you should develop a vocabulary of psychological terms, an understanding of the topics studied by psychologists, an appreciation for the various schools of thought, and knowledge of various techniques employed by psychologists in their quest to understand behavior and mental processes.

Course Requirements:

Exams. There will be four exams. Each exam will consist of 50 multiple-choice questions. Exam questions will be based on all of the material covered in lectures as well as that covered only in the book. The purpose of the exams is to evaluate your mastery of the basic material as well as your ability to generalize and draw connections between the material presented in different sections of the course. Possible 200 points

Identifying Psychological Research in Popular Media. The information presented in this class was largely obtained through the research activities of a large number of scientists. This requirement is designed to provide you with a deeper appreciation of the types of psychological research currently being conducted. Pay attention to stories you see or hear on TV, Radio, Newspapers, the Web etc. Once you hear about some interesting research see if you can find more information about it on the World Wide Web (the internet). Provide me a with a brief summary (1 page) of the research and the address of a website that has information about this study. Over the course of the semester you must provide three summaries. Possible 30 points

Class Participation. You are expected to attend lectures and be prepared for class on a regular basis. You will be evaluated on your willingness to be an active participant in the learning process. Fulfillment of this requirement entails asking and answering questions, sharing your opinions and insights with the class, and participating in class experiments and submitting written reactions to films and discussions. You also expected to participate in online discussion of class material. Possible 50 points

STUDENTS WITH SPECIAL NEEDS: Any student with a documented disability can request an adjustment to course requirements and procedures. In order to request such adjustment, you should contact Mr. Christopher Moy in the Office of Disabilities Services through email (moy@marywood.edu) at his office (Liberal Arts Center 220b) or by telephone 348-6211 x 2107

Grading Policy:

Letter grades are assigned based on the Highest Obtained Total score in the class.

Anyone receiving 95% of this score receives an A; 90% A-; 87% "B+" and so on.

To give you a better idea of what this means here is the course grade distribution from the last time I taught this class:

Total Possible = (Exams + Research + Participation) = 280

Highest Obtained Total = 270

95% A 257 and up

90% A- 243-256

87% B+ 235-242

83% B 224-241

80% B- 216-223

77% C+ 208-215

73% C 197-214

70% C- 189-196

59% D 160-188

F <160

Some things you should understand concerning grades:

The above distribution is provided to clarify my grading scheme. The exact distribution depends on the actual performance within this class (although I would not expect it to differ significantly).

When exams are graded I will provide ranges for letter grades. You should understand that these single exam letter grades are only approximations and that your final grade is based on cumulative points earned and not by averaging single exam letter grades

Recommendations for Maximizing Test Scores:

I recommend that you READ the assigned material before the corresponding lecture (see schedule below). This will greatly facilitate your understanding of the material presented in class and will make studying for the exams much easier. It is also helpful to review the text after the lecture but this assumes you have already read it.

Download and print the lecture outlines, learning objectives, and handouts from my Website (http://ac.marywood.edu/crawley/www/). Review these and bring them to class.

I also recommend conscientiously attending class and taking good notes. I have reviewed the notes of students who were doing poorly in my class and have consistently found their notes to be very sketchy, often consisting of nothing than the topic heading. Also research has show that active participation on your part will lead to a better understanding and thus higher test scores. The best why to be active is to ask questions and be willing to express your point of view.

Finally, test yourself on the material before an exam. Have someone ask you to define and describe terms. Think about the material and how it could be presented on an exam.

Schedule
Date		Text	Topic
Psychology: The Science of human Behavior
Monday January 20 MLK DAY		Ch.1	Introduction: Historical Perspective Y
Wednesday January 22		Ch.1	Current Perspectives
Friday January 24		Ch.1	Description
Monday January 27		Ch.1	Prediction
Wednesday. January 29		Ch.1	Experimentation
Friday January 31		Ch.1	Movie: Animal Intelligence
Monday February 3			Review
Wednesday February 5 EXAM 1
The Biology of Behavior
Friday February 7 Monday February 10		Ch.2	Biological Bases: The Neuron
Wednesday February 12 ©Friday February 14©		Ch.2	Biological Bases: The Nervous System
Monday February 17 Wednesday February 19		Ch.2	Biological Bases: The Brain
Friday February 21 Monday February 24		Ch.2	Vision N
Wednesday February 26		Ch.3	Perception: Depth Perception
Friday February 28		Ch.3	Movie: Mystery of the senses
Monday March 3			Review
Wednesday March 5 EXAM 2
Learning and Memory
Friday March 7	Ch.4			Learning: Classical Conditioning
No Class ☺☺☺March 10-14 "SPRING" Break ☺☺☺ No Class
Monday March 17 Wednesday March 19		Ch.5	Learning: Operant Conditioning
Friday March 21 Monday March 24		Ch.6	Cognitive Psychology: Memory & Forgetting
Wednesday March 26			Genie: Portrait of a Wild Child
Friday March 28			Review
Monday March 31 EXAM 3
Wednesday April 2		Ch. 8	Development: Freud vs. Piaget
Friday April 4		Ch. 8	Development: Erikson & Kubler-Ross
Monday April 7			Biography: Sigmund Freud
Wednesday April 9		Ch.10	Approaches to Personality
Friday April 11		Ch.10	Types vs. traits
Monday April 14 Wednesday April 16		Ch. 12	Defining Abnormality
Friday April 18 & Monday April 21 No Class Easter Break =
Disorders and Treatment
Wednesday April 23		Ch.12	Psychopathology: Mood & Anxiety Disorders
Friday April 25		Ch.12	Psychopathology: Schizophrenia
Monday April 28 Wednesday April 30		Ch.13	Psychotherapy
Friday May 2			Last Class * Review
Final Exam Week Begin &