We are enrolling for next semester and several of my students have asked me, "Which psychology course is next?" By that they mean which course would make sense for them to take next.
To answer, I have to take off my instructor hat and put on my advisor hat. What is their major? What are their career goals? Where do they plan to transfer after Connors (a two-year school). What psychology courses have they already taken?
Connors' Associate of Arts in Psychology degree requires a minimum of 61 hours, including four required 3-hour psychology courses:
Introduction to Psychology (the pre-requisite for all other psychology courses): an overview of the study of psychology. Each chapter in the textbook is on a different area of pscyhology.
Developmental Psychology: the study of the changes that take place in people in each stage of life, from conception to death.
Personality Psychology: the study of individual differences between people, and how those differences show up in their behavior.
Social Psychology: the study of how the presence of other people affects our behavior.
In addition, we offer the following as psychology electives:
Psychology of Adjustment: the study of how psychology helps us cope with and adapt to life's experiences and challenges (3 hours).
The next four are all 1-hour, seminar electives:
Madness at the Movies: psychological disorders as described in the DSM-IV, compared to how they have been portrayed in the media.
Myers-Briggs: using the most widely-used personality inventory to discover your personality's strengths and weaknesses.
Living With Loss: how to cope with grief, and how to help others work through it.
Enhancing Relationship Skills: how to listen, communicate, and resolve conflicts.
Now, maybe you are a little better equiped to answer your own question, "Which psychology course is next?"
One more thing. We are developing online versions of all our required psychology courses. Is taking an online course a good idea for you? Tomorrow I will give you a 10-question quiz to find out.
November 14, 2009
November 12, 2009
Security Cameras May Actually Make You Insecure
Research in 2009 by Dave Williams and Jobuda Ahmed, published in Psychology, Crime & Law, appears to have blurred the picture about whether the presence of security cameras actually makes people feel secure. But research by Leonard Berkowitz in 1967 may give the clue to what is going on.
Williams and Ahmed's participants were shown either photographs of a "skinhead" or a "smartly dressed woman" on a street. A second variable was whether there was also a CCTV (security) camera in the photograph. The camera was in some of the photos of both the skinhead and the woman, and absent in others.
Which scenario "raised concern about walking in the scene"?
Woman with camera? Shake your head "no."
Woman without a camera present? No.
Skinhead without a camera present? Again, no.
Skinhead with a security camera present? Bingo!
What? Every security oranganization in the world says that the presence of security cameras make people feel more secure. But the presence of one in the photo (the only variable that made a difference) actually INCREASED fear.
(Research Digest reports a similar study in America a decade before that showed the same negative result from the presence of "Neighborhood Watch" signs.)
Rewind to 1967. Berkowitz let research participants decide how much they would shock another participant. The room they were in had either a gun displayed in a case, or a badminton racket displayed. Neither was mentioned, or referred to as a part of the study in any way.
Those participants in the room when the gun was in the display case shocked more than those who in the room with a badminton racket.
This became known as Cognitive Neo-Association. There was a new (neo) association made in the participants' thinking as a result of the presence of an object. The task they were asked to do got associated (unconsciously) with "cues" in the environment, either a gun or a racket. That new association was interpreted as what would be "appropriate" behavior, more shock or less shock. Gun - more shock is okay. Racket - less shock is expected.
Fast forward back to the security cameras.
The fact that a security camera (or Neighborhood Watch sign) is present is interpreted as a cue. The unconscious thinking process goes something like this. "There is a security camera present. This must be an unsafe place. They don't put security cameras in safe areas."
Add that to an ambiguous or perceived-negative element (i.e., a skinhead) and you have fear.
Keep the cameras. Add more of them. (Sorry. I let my bias come out.) Who cares if they actually arouse fear? They deter crime and make criminals easier to catch.
Williams and Ahmed's participants were shown either photographs of a "skinhead" or a "smartly dressed woman" on a street. A second variable was whether there was also a CCTV (security) camera in the photograph. The camera was in some of the photos of both the skinhead and the woman, and absent in others.
Which scenario "raised concern about walking in the scene"?
Woman with camera? Shake your head "no."
Woman without a camera present? No.
Skinhead without a camera present? Again, no.
Skinhead with a security camera present? Bingo!
What? Every security oranganization in the world says that the presence of security cameras make people feel more secure. But the presence of one in the photo (the only variable that made a difference) actually INCREASED fear.
(Research Digest reports a similar study in America a decade before that showed the same negative result from the presence of "Neighborhood Watch" signs.)
Rewind to 1967. Berkowitz let research participants decide how much they would shock another participant. The room they were in had either a gun displayed in a case, or a badminton racket displayed. Neither was mentioned, or referred to as a part of the study in any way.
Those participants in the room when the gun was in the display case shocked more than those who in the room with a badminton racket.
This became known as Cognitive Neo-Association. There was a new (neo) association made in the participants' thinking as a result of the presence of an object. The task they were asked to do got associated (unconsciously) with "cues" in the environment, either a gun or a racket. That new association was interpreted as what would be "appropriate" behavior, more shock or less shock. Gun - more shock is okay. Racket - less shock is expected.
Fast forward back to the security cameras.
The fact that a security camera (or Neighborhood Watch sign) is present is interpreted as a cue. The unconscious thinking process goes something like this. "There is a security camera present. This must be an unsafe place. They don't put security cameras in safe areas."
Add that to an ambiguous or perceived-negative element (i.e., a skinhead) and you have fear.
Keep the cameras. Add more of them. (Sorry. I let my bias come out.) Who cares if they actually arouse fear? They deter crime and make criminals easier to catch.
November 10, 2009
When is it "Right" to Obey?
Until I read Sprinthall, I never thought about how Milgram and Kohlberg might interface.
In 1958, Lawrence Kohlberg published his famous "Moral Development" dissertation. We move through three levels of moral development. Conventional morality is driven by external rules: "right is obeying the rules, wrong is disobeying the rules." Postconventional morality is driven by interal values, which carry more weight than external rules.
In 1961, Stanley Milgram conducted his famous "Obedience Studies." 63% of the participants were willing to administer a 450-volt shock to another participant because someone in authority (the researcher) told them to.
In October, 2009, Norman Sprinthall wrote in American Psychologist about both of them.
POP QUIZ: Who is more likely to obey the demand to administer a potentially life-threatening shock, Conventional or Postconventional?
KOHLBERG'S ANSWER: Conventional.
Specifically, according to Sprinthall, "About 75% of subjects classed as postconventional... disobeyed, versus 13% of subjects grouped as conventional."
Now that Sprinthall has gotten me to thinking about it, it makes perfect sense (to me, at least) that a person who determines right or wrong based on rule-obedience (conventional) would administer the shock when told to. Those who say, "There is more to take into consideration that just rules" would choose to not obey.
Sprinthall wrote, "Postconventional judgment comprehends democratic princples of utilitarianism and social justice, wheras the conventional stages stop at social conformity and adherence to law and order. There is certainly a logical connection between the conventional stages and following the rules."
In 1958, Lawrence Kohlberg published his famous "Moral Development" dissertation. We move through three levels of moral development. Conventional morality is driven by external rules: "right is obeying the rules, wrong is disobeying the rules." Postconventional morality is driven by interal values, which carry more weight than external rules.
In 1961, Stanley Milgram conducted his famous "Obedience Studies." 63% of the participants were willing to administer a 450-volt shock to another participant because someone in authority (the researcher) told them to.
In October, 2009, Norman Sprinthall wrote in American Psychologist about both of them.
POP QUIZ: Who is more likely to obey the demand to administer a potentially life-threatening shock, Conventional or Postconventional?
KOHLBERG'S ANSWER: Conventional.
Specifically, according to Sprinthall, "About 75% of subjects classed as postconventional... disobeyed, versus 13% of subjects grouped as conventional."
Now that Sprinthall has gotten me to thinking about it, it makes perfect sense (to me, at least) that a person who determines right or wrong based on rule-obedience (conventional) would administer the shock when told to. Those who say, "There is more to take into consideration that just rules" would choose to not obey.
Sprinthall wrote, "Postconventional judgment comprehends democratic princples of utilitarianism and social justice, wheras the conventional stages stop at social conformity and adherence to law and order. There is certainly a logical connection between the conventional stages and following the rules."
November 9, 2009
Learning From Toddlers
Robert Fulgham wrote the best-selling book, Everything I Need to Know, I Learned in Kindergarten. According to recent research, he should have learned some of those things 3 years earlier.
Believe it or not, he could have arrived at the kindergarten door already altruistic.
At first blush, "altruistic kindergartener" is an oxymoron, but toddlers as young as 18 months display altruism.
Reminder: altruism is helping someone with no expectation of it benefitting you in return.
Here's your student-of-human-behavior assignment for the week: "accidentally" drop something as you walk by a toddler and see if she picks it up and hands it to you. Researchers say that you might be surprised how often they will. Why?
Why altruism so young? Seems to me that altruism is Nature, not Nurture. Built into us as humans.
Believe it or not, he could have arrived at the kindergarten door already altruistic.
At first blush, "altruistic kindergartener" is an oxymoron, but toddlers as young as 18 months display altruism.
Reminder: altruism is helping someone with no expectation of it benefitting you in return.
Here's your student-of-human-behavior assignment for the week: "accidentally" drop something as you walk by a toddler and see if she picks it up and hands it to you. Researchers say that you might be surprised how often they will. Why?
Why altruism so young? Seems to me that altruism is Nature, not Nurture. Built into us as humans.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
