Introduction to Psychology Course Outline

 Assignment Week 10: Introduction to Psychology Course Outline

Introduction to Psychology Course Outline

The introduction to Psychology Course will involve:

1. Classroom management rules and expectations regarding student participation.
2. Course Description and Introduction.
3. Units to be covered throughout the syllabus.
4. Course Materials.
6. Group Activities.
7. Grading criteria for discussions, assignments, and projects.

Classroom management rules and expectations regarding student participation.

The student will be required to have an attendance of at least 80% of all classes eligible to pass the course.

All assignments, discussions, and projects are to be submitted on or before the deadline stipulated for each assignment. All assignments that are submitted less will be deducted 10% from the final score.

Learners are expected to be actively engaged in discussions and group assignments. This will not only be useful in grasping the concepts being taught but will also help other students easily understand difficult concepts.

All learners are encouraged to reach out to the professor with any questions that may require clarification and also reach out with any concerns about the course.

Course Description and Introduction

This course teaches on the first notions, research, and theories used in the study of human minds, behavior sentiments, and judgments. The course will enable you to start appreciating the way the human mind works and will serve as a platform for you to grow in your psychology career. At the end of this course you as a student will be able to;

• Identify with the field of Psychology and be able to discern it from other related fields. You will also be able to describe different systematic methods applied in the field of psychology.
• Identify the different ways the central nervous system and the brain coordinate to give us different feelings and form opinions.
• Learn the different development stages humans undergo while growing up.
• Identify and use different analytical processes to describe and demonstrate physiological processes, human development, and communal conduct and the different causes for abnormal behavior.
• Identify and differentiate the different modes of psychotherapy and how our behaviors affect the general well-being of a person (Weinstein, 2014).
• Identify and differentiate the symptoms that led to abnormal diagnosis and their significant classes. The learner will also be to evaluate the different health issues associated with psychology and how the general state of the human mind affects the general well-being.

Units to be covered throughout the syllabus includes;

1. Introduction to Psychology. (Week 1)

This week, you will learn to identify with the field of Psychology and discern it from other related fields. You will also learn of the different terms that are used in the Psychology field. We will also look at the different research methods that are mainly used in the field of psychology and also how to apply them to your research throughout the study and in professional life. We will wen the first week by looking at the major psychological theories and clarifying the different causes and effects.

The student needs to be able to grasp and get an understanding of how the general field of psychology works. The theories learned during the week will enable the student to identify with the field of psychology. This will be a foundation for further studies as we progress along the course. Learners are advised to attach the utmost importance and keenness from Week 1.

Discussion Question: What are the new concepts gained from learning psychology?

2. Biological Psychology (Week 2)

This week we will look at the evolution theories, nervous system, genetic information human functions, and how they affect our daily lives. We will look at different genetic information and research related to the same (Webster, 2008).

Studies from this week are aimed to help the student become familiar with how the body works. The different processes, body chemistry, and how they affect our overall well-being include hereditary diseases and habits. These form an important of a human being. The main focus will be on the Central Nervous System and the brain. Their different parts and how our body parts communicate.

Discussion Question: What are the different ways in which our biological systems impact our psychology?

3. Human Feelings and Opinions (Week 3)

We will look at the different ways the central nervous system and the brain coordinate to give us different feelings. By the end of the week, you should be able to distinguish different body processes related to sensations and also how human beings perceive the world. We will also look at how the different body sense work.

The week’s study will focus on the different senses and how they work and how our bodies respond to different stimuli through the senses. We will look at the different limits of senses humans have and how generally we view the words through our senses.

Discussion Question: In what ways should we be careful about the thoughts and opinions that we have, and how do they impact our psychology?

4. Human development (Week 4)

This week, we will learn the different development stages humans undergo while growing up and how it impacts their psychology. We will also look at the different ways in which we achieve maturity in our lives and look at various theories based on human development (Svinicki, 2014).

The study will be centrally focused on humans and how we develop. We will begin by exploring nature vs. nurture argument and then looking at the development of the human in the prenatal stage, the baby, and finally to a fully grown adult. We will explore the major theories on development in the psychology field and get to discuss them in-depth.

Discussion Question: How do our different development stages influence on how one is termed as mature?

5. Human emotions and motivations. (Week 5)

This week we will explore different analytical processes to describe and demonstrate physiological processes, human development, and communal conduct and the different causes for abnormal behavior. In-depth analysis of the causes of human motivations, emotions, and liken and differentiate the two.

The week will look at the different ways our emotions guide our lives and how they can be manipulated without our knowledge. We will explore human motivations like incentives, hunger, among other major theories in the psychology field.

Discussion Question: From the knowledge gain in this week’s study, how would you advise someone who is starting to withdraw emotionally?

6. Human education. (Week 6)

We will learn to identify and differentiate different habits, instincts, and adopted knowledge.  The different ways that human beings get to learn this knowledge use it and transfer it to the next generation. We will also look at the different learning processes like social, operant, and classical conditioning of human beings.

It is important to understand how we learn and interpret it for use in our lives. The week’s lessons will be focused on making sure we understand the theories that focus on human learning and the important role that the neural and cognitive networks play in facilitating learning for humans.

Discussion Question: How do our habits influence how we carry out ourselves and the people we interact with?

7. Social Psychology (Week 7)

This week we will delve into looking at how humans interact with each other. We will understand how humans distinguish and understand information and investigate different ways humans form prejudice concerning understanding others. The week will continue by looking at the different reasons human beings tolerate each other and the progressions that may lead to pro or antisocial tendencies.

We will start by looking at how the person perceives himself and how they form perceptions of themselves. We will then move on to how we create our social identities and how we start to coordinate with others into associations, like why we conform, obey and comply with others’ needs and factors that motivate us to do so.

Discussion Question: How should we balance between being prosocial and antisocial to have the perfect mental balance?

8. Abnormal Psychology. (Week 8).

This week, we will look at the behaviors categorized as abnormal and look at the different ways psychologists diagnose and handle people with abnormal tendencies and their different categorizations. We will look at the different abnormality symptoms and how they are handled and look at the various reasons that lead people to commit suicide.

We will start by getting to understand the different psychological disorders that people suffer from and explore the different studies that have been conducted on the same subject. We will then get to form an understanding of these disorders and look at different psychodynamic, biological, humanistic, medical, social-cultural disorders, among other factors that lead to disorders. We then conclude at looking at the different types of disorders that we have like dissociative, personality, schizophrenia, somatoform, anxiety, and mood disorders.

Discussion Question: What significant ways are used to treat people with abnormal behavior, and which one would you recommend and why?

9. (Week 9)

The week will focus on learning and understanding biological, humanistic, cognitive, behavioral, and psychodynamic therapies, their aims, processes, and how these therapies differ from one another.  We will also explore the different ways psychotherapy is handled in groups (Riviere, 2016).

The focus on psychotherapy is vital since it is one of the major contributions of psychology to humanity. The focus we are mainly on first identifying the personality disorder that a person suffers from. From that point, we will explore the different ways one can apply the different psychotherapy processes. We will look at each psychotherapy process and then look at which disorders are treated using which treatments. This is a big week in this course. Misdiagnosis can prove fatal to the patient; therefore, attendance for the week will directly contribute to the final score of the assignment.

Discussion Question: Why is psychotherapy essential, and at what stage is the appropriate time to seek professional help?

10. Health Psychology. (Week 10)

In the final week, we will look at general human health and how it is affected by our thoughts. We will explore the significant worries on health psychology and the different behaviors linked to sustaining proper health. We will explore the link between stress and different ailments and explore the different personality traits linked to good health and those harmful to a person’s health (Laureate Education, 2012).

We will look at the different causes of strain in our minds, how we react to different stressors, and how we can apply it to relieve stress. We will also examine how humans react to stress in different responses like emotional, behavioral, cognitive, post-traumatic, and physiological ways. We will look at different meditative methods of dealing with stress and finally end with looking at how stress impacts the overall health and how it lowers the immune system’s ability to fight diseases.

Discussion Question: Why is it always essential to look after our general health, and in what ways do we expose ourselves to harmful habits that may hurt our general health?

Course Materials

For this course, the student will be required to read Mastering the World of Psychology. Wood, Samuel E., Ellen Green Wood & Denise Boyd. 2004 2nd ed. or current edition.

Other recommended materials that a learner may explore during the duration of this course include; “Cognitive Psychology, Payne & Wenger, Houghton Mifflin, 1998, Owner’s Manual for the Brain, Howard, Bard Press, 2000, Evolutionary Psychology, Buss, Allyn & Bacon, 1999 and How the Mind Works, Pinker, Norton, 1997.”

Assignments

They will be assigned after every two weeks of study, and the student will be required to read through the course materials, answer the assignment, and submit before the due date.

Groups Activities

Learners will be required to engage in at least one group discussion every week. You will also be required to submit two projects on the course that must be submitted by the 5^th week and the second one by the end of the 10^th week (Halonen, 2014).

Grading criteria for discussions, assignments, and projects.

Grading and evaluation will be done through group discussions, assignments, and projects. Assignments and discussions will be graded on how well the student grasps the concept taught and how he applies the learned methodologies to his assignments, discussions, and projects.

Individual assignments are curated to gauge the student’s understanding of the course material learned and their ability to transfer the knowledge to real-life situations. The assignments will include essays and multiple-choice questions. All students are expected to submit work that they have done initially, and any leaner who participates in academic dishonesty will be penalized.

References

Chapter 3, “Designing Your Course”

Halonen, J. S. (2014). Teaching thinking. In M. Svinicki & W. J. McKeachie, McKeachie’s teaching tips: Strategies, research, and theory for college and university teachers (14th ed., pp. 305–318). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

Laureate Education (Producer). (2012a). Developing discussions and assignments [Video file]. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu

Retrieved from the Walden Library databases.

Riviere, J., Picard, D. R., & Coble, R. (2016). Syllabus Design Guide. Retrieved September 28, 2018, from http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/syllabus-design/

Svinicki, M., & McKeachie, W. J. (2014). Countdown for course preparation. In McKeachie’s teaching tips: Strategies, research, and theory for college and university teachers (14th ed., pp. 6–18). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

Svinicki, M., & McKeachie, W. J. (2014). Meeting a class for the first time. In McKeachie’s teaching tips: Strategies, research, and theory for college and university teachers (14th ed., pp. 19–25). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

Webster, T. (2008). How to be successful in your first year of teaching college: Everything you need to know that they don’t teach you in school. Ocala, FL: Atlantic.

Weinstein, C. E., Meyer, D. K., Husman, J., McKeachie, W. J., & King, C. A. (2014). Teaching students how to become more strategic and self-regulated learners. In M. Svinicki & W. J. McKeachie, McKeachie’s teaching tips: Strategies, research, and theory for college and university teachers (14th ed., pp. 291–304). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.