PSYCHOLOGY 100B Introduction to Psychology Fall 2013

Class Information Section 1: Mon, Wed, Fri, 10:10am 11:00am Section 2: Mon, Wed, Fri, 2:10pm 3:00pm Room: May Auditorium, Olin Business School Text: Psychological Science (4th ed.) Gazzaniga, Heatherton, & Halpern Teaching Assistants Name Shelley Kohlman Jihyun Suh Sara Weston Office E-mail Office hours Mon 11:30 1:30pm Tues 4 6pm Wed 8 10am Instructor Information Brian Carpenter, Ph.D. Office: Psychology 235G Office hours: Wednesdays 11-12 or by appointment Phone: (314) 935-8212 e-mail: bcarpenter@wustl.edu

Psychology 208A mk@artsci.wustl.edu Psychology 424G jihyun.suh@wustl.edu Psychology 108B sweston@wustl.edu COURSE OBJECTIVES

Psychology is the scientific study of the mind and behavior. What does this include? Practically every facet of human existence. Thought, feeling, action, relationships; the biology, psychology, and social factors that influence them all. Psychology is a broad discipline that spans many topics, and this introductory course, by necessity, can only provide a general introduction. If you find yourself intrigued by a topic that you encounter during the semester, chances are there is a more in-depth upper-level course that will take you deeper into that area. So one way to use this course is to help you discover what you find interesting about psychology and what you might like to study further. But even if this is the only psychology course you take, here youll get broad exposure to many facets of this science. And psychology is a sciencea behavioral and social science that uses the scientific method to understand human beings. Throughout the semester, youll learn about experiments that have been designed to understand the phenomena of interest to psychologists. While you are learning more about how the body influences the mind and how the mind influences the body, youll also learn what psychologists do and how we use the scientific method to explore ideas about human nature. Along the way you also may learn psychological principles that can help you understand yourself, your friends, your parents, and other people you encounter every day. Psychology is relevant to everyone, regardless of your major, regardless of your eventual career, and this course may help you see how psychology goes on around you every day.

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ADMINISTRATIVE DETAILS This syllabus provides some of the information you will need about class. Equally, if not more, important is the Blackboard page for this course. There youll find the schedule of readings, information about completing experiments, grades throughout the semester, and other details. Also make sure to check your Wash U e-mail account. I will use e-mail to make announcements about class and contact you individually, if necessary. You may want to check Wash Us on-line directory to make sure the e-mail address listed with the university is the one you want to use; thats the address to which all messages will go. We will be using a student response system (clickers) in this class. This is part of a trial to see whether clickers enhance your learning experience. Clickers will be passed out in class, and you are responsible for bringing your clicker to each lecture and returning it. Each section of the class (morning and afternoon) will use clickers for half of the semester: the morning section will start out with clickers in the fall, and the afternoon section will get clickers midway through the semester. COURSE REQUIREMENTS Reading assignments Readings will come from your textbook, Psychological Science by Gazzaniga, Heatherton, and Halpern. Please make sure you have the 4th edition, and the American edition. The textbook has a companion web site that includes chapter summaries, demonstrations and activities, quizzes, and supplemental resources. All readings should be completed before the class to which they apply. During lectures Ill assume you are familiar with material from the reading. In class Ill highlight important concepts from the readings and expand on the material, and in order to follow the discussion it will be important for you to be familiar with the readings that have been assigned. Exams also will assume you are familiar with material from the reading even if we have not reviewed it explicitly in class. Class participation and attendance Even though this is a large class I encourage you to participate in class discussions. Raise questions, debate (constructively and respectfully) with me and your classmates, and propose new ways of thinking about the information you are learning. Also, feel free to bring in personal stories and experiences, as long as they are relevant to the topic under discussion. If you have questions about something Ive mentioned in class, raise your hand and ask. Or you can tweet it to the TAs (@WUPsych), and Ill try to answer at the end of class. Attendance at lectures is your responsibility, and a substantial proportion of material on the exams will come from lectures. Although I wont take formal attendance, we will be tracking how often people use their clickers in class. If, from your clicker records, you

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appear to have been at more than 90% of the lectures, youll get 1 point added to your total for the semester, 2 points if you have been at more than 95%. If you are unable to attend class, please ask a classmate if you may share their notes. Exams During the semester we will have three exams, followed by an optional cumulative final exam at the end of the semester. Review sessions will be held prior to each exam. The exams during the semester will be held in the evenings. The final exam will be during the official finals period. Below are the exam dates. Please check your other classes to make sure you dont have conflicts with other evening exams. Contact me before September 15th if you do, and we will make arrangements for you to take the exam at another time. Exam #1 #2 #3 Optional Final Date Wednesday, October 2nd Monday, November 4th Friday, December 6th Tuesday, December 17th Time 7:00 8:30pm 7:00 8:30pm 7:00 8:30pm 3:30 5:30pm

The only acceptable reason for missing an exam is attendance at another university event, a religious holiday, or a medical emergency. Regarding other university events and religious holidays, they are planned well in advance, and if you know that you wont be able to take an exam during the regularly scheduled time because of a university event or holiday, please let me know, in writing, by September 15th. Regarding medical emergencies, please bring me a note from your physician. I will make arrangements for you to take the exam at another time. Otherwise, no make-up exams will be offered. If you miss an exam for any other reason, you will receive a 0 on the exam, but you can drop your lowest exam score at the close of the semester. You may elect to take the final examination to improve your score in the course. If you elect to take the final examination and your score on the final is greater than one of the three regularly scheduled exams, I will replace the lowest exam score with your score on the final exam. If your score on the final exam is lower than any of the regularly scheduled exams, then I will base your final grade on the three exam scores from the semester. Note that this means that taking the final cannot hurt your grade in any way; it can only improve your score. THE FINAL EXAM WILL BE GIVEN ONLY ON THE SCHEDULED DATE. DO NOT MAKE TRAVEL PLANS THAT HAVE YOU LEAVING BEFORE THE SCHEDULED DATE. Participation in additional assignments In order to give you additional experience within psychology to supplement lectures and readings, there are several additional assignments you can choose. You can earn up to 6 credits toward your grade with any combination of the following options.
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Option #1. Participate in psychology experiments. You can see first-hand how psychology experiments are conducted by being a research participant. Throughout the semester researchers in the Psychology Department conduct research on a variety of topics (e.g., memory, personality, stereotypes, perception, aging, language). You can sign up online to participate in experiments and earn 1 point toward your grade for every 1hour experiment you complete. (Note that no partial points are given. If you earn half a credit for participating in a half hour experiment, that is not rounded up; you only receive credit for each complete whole credit.) Details about how to participate appear on Blackboard. Option #2. Attend research presentations in the Psychology Department. These are one-hour presentations on campus given by researchers who are invited from other universities to talk about their work. They are typically on Mondays from 4-5 pm. You can find a list of upcoming speakers, topics, and locations on the Psychology Department website: http://psychweb.wustl.edu/events. Sign in when you arrive, and youll get 1 credit for each talk you attend. Option #3. Write a brief summary of a research article in psychology. You can write a critique or summary of classic research studies that have been conducted over the years. Each paper must be 1 page long, and the list of research articles is available on Blackboard. Each paper is worth 1 point. You can use any combination of these three options to earn your 6 credits. If you do more than the equivalent of 6 credits, only 6 points will be counted toward your grade. All experiments, presentations, and papers must be completed by the end of classes (5:00pm on Friday, December 6th). Papers must be sent to me by e-mail by that deadline. One piece of advice: dont wait until the end of the semester to sign up for experiments, as some experiments fill up quickly and you may be left with few choices as everyone rushes to participate in experiments as the semester wraps up. Instead, I would encourage you to start participating in the experiments early in the semester. Course evaluation Course evaluations are an important way for you to express your opinion about course content and instruction. I use the information from evaluations to modify the class for future sections, and its valuable feedback for me. In order to get a representative sample of opinion in the class, its important that everyone complete the evaluation. You can earn one extra point toward your grade if you complete the course evaluation later in the semester. Heres the website for evaluations: http://evals.wustl.edu Grading Grades are assigned based on the number of points you accumulate during the

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semester. There will be no opportunities for extra credit, so it is important that you concentrate on the assignments throughout the semester. If you have questions about your progress in class please speak to me BEFORE they become dire. The maximum points for each assignment are: Assignment Maximum Exam #1 50 Exam #2 50 Exam #3 50 Final exam 50 (Only your 3 highest exam scores are counted.) Research/papers/colloquia 6 Total 156 Course evaluation 1 (added after all other points) Participation points 1 or 2 (added after all other points) The extra points will be added to your total before I compute your percentages, which will be still based on a maximum of 156. For example, if you end up with a total of 145 points after adding the extra points, your percentage will end up being 92% (145/156). Note: There is no rounding in the grade calculations. 92.9 = 92%, 92.5% = 92%, 92.2% = 92%. Final grades are calculated as follows: Cumulative Points 153-156 146-152 141-145 136-140 130-135 125-129 121-124 114-120 110-113 105-109 99-104 94-98 < 93 grade. If you feel that your grade on a test was unfair, you have the right to appeal. In such cases, write a note (not an e-mail) stating a) what test item you are questioning, and b)
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Percentage 98-100 93-97 90-92 87-89 83-86 80-82 77-79 73-76 70-72 67-69 63-66 60-62 < 60

Letter Grade A+ A AB+ B BC+ C CD+ D DF

If you are taking this class Pass/Fail, you must earn a C- or better to earn a passing

your rationale for the appeal. Appeals should be turned in to me in writing, not the TAs. Appeals must be submitted within one week of the time grades for the exam were posted. This will be your only opportunity to review your exam. There will not be any opportunity to review your 3 exams prior to the final exam. Class etiquette This course is based on a simple principle of mutual respect and politeness. Just as it is important for me to act in a courteous and respectful way toward you, it is equally important for you to extend the same courtesy to your fellow students and me. Empirical research shows that many of the following behaviors are judged to be equally disruptive to students and instructors. Students talking with their neighbor after the instructor has begun lecturing. When surveyed, students rate this as extremely annoying because it interferes with their ability to take notes. It is also distracting to me. I will not repeat portions of the lecture because of others talking or because of other similar disruptions. Thus, when you talk to your neighbor you may well be hurting the grades of others around you (and your grade, too). Thus, once I dim the lights and start class, as a courtesy to all of us in the room, please stop talking. Use of laptops in class. Laptop use is permitted in class for note-taking purposes only. Any other noncourse related use of laptops is prohibited, such as emailing, social networking, surfing the Internet, playing games, etc. Non-course related laptop activities are distracting to both you and your peers and hinder engagement and learning in the classroom. Several research studies (e.g., Fried, 2008) have found that (a) students report laptop use by their peers, as well as their own laptop use, as the most distracting aspects of class; and (b) there is a negative relationship between laptop use and course grade, student attentiveness, lecture clarity, and understanding of course material. Please be considerate when using your laptop in class. Ringing/using cell phones. Please turn off or silence all phones before class begins. Coming in late. Class starts promptly 10 minutes after the hour. If you come to class late, please select a seat in the back; do not clamber over other students to find your usual favorite seat. Audio/video recording of class. Please get my permission if you would like to record a lecture. In order to make the classroom experience enjoyable for all, youre expected to comply with the above commonsense guidelines.

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A Note on Academic Integrity As a member of the Wash. U. academic community you are bound by honor regarding your academic work. Academic dishonesty includes, but is not limited to, cheating on tests, fabricating information or citations, facilitating acts of academic dishonesty by others, having unauthorized possession of or distributing examinations or examination questions, submitting work of another person or work previously used as your own, or tampering with the academic work of other students. Plagiarism is another unacceptable practice. Plagiarism occurs when an individual uses the thoughts or words of another person as if they were their own. In your written work, you must provide adequate citation of other peoples work. Identify where your ideas have come from when they are not your own. On examinations, answer questions for yourself rather than relying on information from other students. Academic dishonesty on any assignment will result in written notification of the charge, a score of 0 on the assignment, and referral to the Dean. If you have questions about what might constitute academic dishonesty, please talk with me or an administrator at the University. Additional information can be found in the University Student Judicial Code or from the Academic Integrity Committee of the College of Arts and Sciences (https://acadinfo.wustl.edu/WUCRSLFrontMatter/WebWUCRSLInfo_AcadIntegrity.htm). Student Educational Services Wash U. provides academic resources for students at Cornerstone: The Center for Advanced Learning. Located on the South 40 at Gregg Hall, the Center offers academic resources such as study groups, peer mentors, help desks, and course workshops. The Center also offers technological resources such as programs for web design and learning style assessments. Students seeking disability information should contact Disability Resources at 935-5970 or link to Disability Resources from the Cornerstone web site. Contact information for Cornerstone is 935-5970 or http://cornerstone.wustl.edu. Please let me know in advance of any learning accommodations that have been suggested by the Disability Resources office.

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