This Course Guide has been taken from the most recent presentation of the course. It would be useful for reference purposes but please note that there may be updates for the following presentation.
PSYC A212
Exploring Psychology
Welcome to PSYC A212 Exploring Psychology . This broadly based, level 2 course aims to explore the way in which contemporary psychology offers insights into human behaviour and experience. It introduces a wide range of psychological theories and methods, demonstrating how they are typically applied in a number of contexts – both by professional psychologists and by us all in everyday life. You will also learn how to carry out different types of psychological research.
The course is divided into three parts, each of which has a different focus and approach. Each part is presented through a separate book which has accompanying material, including video, audio, CD-ROMs, or supplementary booklets.
Course Book 1, Mapping Psychology (in two volumes – the first spanning Chapters 1-5, the second Chapters 6-9) maps out a set of perspectives (questions, theories and methods) on studying psychology that you will return to and work with later on the course. Accompanying materials take you through the range of perspectives employed by psychologists to investigate psychological questions. You are introduced to designing research projects, gathering data, and, through a series of small steps, to using a computer for statistical analysis.
Course Book 2, Challenging Psychological Issues, presents some topics (for instance, gender) which have generated lively debate among psychologists. The discussion of each topic draws on theories and empirical research within different perspectives, mainly those set up in Book 1.
Course Book 3, Applying Psychology, highlights different ways in which psychology can inform us about issues in everyday life (for instance, deception) and illustrates how theory and research can contribute to professional psychologists' practice in the fields of clinical, occupational and forensic psychology.
Book 1 and linked materials will take you approximately half of your time on the course. Books 2 and 3, together with their associated materials, make up the second half of the course and build on the foundations of the material studied in the first half of the course.
By the end of the course we hope that you will have a better understanding of the scope and range of psychological theories and methods. We also hope that you will find some personal relevance in the course -- that your study will stimulate your thinking about your own experiences and everyday life.
There are a number of different components (books, supplementary booklets and multimedia resources) of this course which combine to make up your full package of study. These are listed below. (Note that you will not have a complete set of the materials at this point. You will receive the remainder later in the year in separate mailings.)
We recommend that you familiarize yourself with the different course components that you have received so far. A brief description of each of the course components and how they all fit together is offered below. Don't be overwhelmed at this point by the all the different bits involved. You will be given support and guidance throughout the year on how to make the most of them in your study.
Study Guide
Returning to our analogy of your journey through PSYC A212 as an expedition, this Study Guide acts as your friendly 'tour guide'. After introducing you to the course and the practicalities related to studying with the Open University, the Study Guide contains a series of weekly or bi-weekly study plans. A suggested itinerary for each week or each two weeks is laid out in a bulleted list of course components (presented in the order that we suggest would be a helpful way to approach your studies). Then there is a brief summary of what you should be trying to do and to learn in that week. As a general rule, you should expect to spend approximately 15-19 hours per week on your study with PSYC A212.
Course Presentation Schedule
The Course Presentation Schedule (your travel itinerary for the year) lays out the timetable of directed study components, including the cut-off or due dates for your assignments.
If you look at the Course Presentation Schedule now, you will see that the course falls broadly into blocks of study which parallel the three course books in combination with other components. The first half of the course (19 weeks) is devoted to Book 1 (two volumes) and associated practical work. Weeks 20-30 involve Book 2 (and associated practical work). The final eleven weeks (weeks 31-41) include your Book 3 work.
Course books
The course is structured around three books:
Book 1, Mapping Psychology, edited by Dorothy Miell, Ann Phoenix and Kerry Thomas. Nine areas of psychological theory and research, covering topics as diverse as identity, evolutionary psychology and memory, are presented in two separate volumes containing Chapters 1-5 and 6-9 respectively. These areas have been chosen for their contribution to psychological thought and also because, as a set of topics, they illustrate the diversity of current psychological perspectives.
Book 2, Challenging Psychological Issues, edited by Troy Cooper and Ilona Roth, builds on the content of Book 1 and focuses on five topics which have generated controversy among psychologists – development across the lifespan, language, gender, consciousness, and the question of 'normality'. There is a deliberate ambiguity in the title of the book. Researching these areas is both challenging to do and is open to challenges between psychologists debating the issues from different perspectives.
Book 3, Applying Psychology, edited by Nicola Brace and Helen Westcott, highlights the different ways in which everyday life raises psychological issues, showing how theory and research can be applied in practice. Examples from the fields of clinical, occupational and forensic psychology covered in the chapters include post-traumatic stress disorder, witness evidence and identification, telling and detecting lies, computer-mediated communication and relationships at work.
Assignment Booklets
Throughout the year, you will need to refer to the Assignment Booklets which contains the titles and instructions for each of your formally assessed essays and projects, otherwise called assignments. These assignments provide you with vital feedback and tuition as well as being used for assessment purposes. The booklets give essential information, plus useful hints and tips, for producing each assignment, so make sure that you read these notes carefully before each assignment. Do take particular note of how many assignments you must submit and how each is weighted towards your final course grade.
Workbook
The Workbook has been designed to support your learning and develop your skills over the first half of the course as you are using Book 1. (While Books 2 and 3 do not have their own associated workbooks, you may choose to apply the type of workbook activities you engaged in with Book 1 to the work in the second half of the course.) The Workbook focuses on two broad skill areas: (i) general academic skills; and (ii) theory and research skills. General academic skills include learning how to write academic essays and developing proficiency in using information and communication technology (ICT), as well as 'learning how to learn'. Theory and research skills relate to the specific content of PSYC A212 and include learning to apply different theories and methods used in psychology. To these ends, you are invited to engage in various practical activities, readings, quizzes and items of interest each week or each two weeks. You learn through doing. Exercises have also been developed to help you to draw out and understand the main issues of the course and you should find them helpful in monitoring your learning.
The activities for some of the study weeks are labelled as 'optional', in the sense that you can skip the activities for those weeks if you believe you already have a good grasp of concepts or the skills. However, you can still work on those activities just to concretize what you have known or learned. Note also that the distinction between 'directed study' and 'independent study' made in a number of places in the Workbook is not applicable to OUHK. Please work on the activities whether it is for 'directed study' or 'independent study'.
Methods booklets
As you progress through the course, you will be directed to read specific sections from this series of booklets designed to teach you about the methods psychologists use to study human behaviour and experience. There are five methods booklets in all:
Methods Booklet 1: Introduction to Research Methods – This booklet offers an overview of the quantitative and qualitative research methods used in psychology. Research examples are offered to bring the different methods used by psychologists alive.
Methods Booklet 2: Measuring People: Quantitative Methods – This booklet examines the use of experiments, a quantitative research method. In particular, you are taught how to study and measure people's characteristics or responses to a task, and how to collect and analyse data quantitatively. The booklet guides you in your use of the SPSS software and in your reading of the Statistics Without Maths for Psychology reference book (Dancey and Reidy, 2002). You will find the frequent practical exercises useful for learning how to carry out different statistical analyses.
Methods Booklet 3: Experimental Project – You are guided in this booklet to set up your own experimental project – a project that you carry out as one of your assignments.
Methods Booklet 4: Understanding People: Qualitative Methods – In this booklet you explore the role of qualitative research, where the focus shifts away from measurement to exploring human meaning and experience. You learn about the rewards as well as the difficulties of carrying out qualitative research.
Methods Booklet 5: Qualitative Project – Here you learn how to carry out and analyse an interview, which you will do as your second project assignment.
Course software on CD-ROMs
EPoCH – or to give its full title, 'Exploring Psychology's Context and History' – is an innovative program, specially developed for this course. It provides an interactive historical resource bank of the main individuals, methods and perspectives in psychology, over the last 250 years, that are discussed within the course. Included in the biographies of most of the psychologists mentioned are pictures and text on their work and methods, who they have influenced and been influenced by, and something on the social context of the time in which they lived and worked. You are invited to explore the information on the CD-ROM, making links and following up items of interest. We hope that you will enjoy exploring EPoCH, and return to it at different times over the course. You are asked to learn about how to use EPoCH in the first week of the course.
Sensation and Perception – This CD-ROM provides information about our senses and their link to perception. When you start the program you will see a busy road. This was a specially chosen image as we use the example of driving a car to explore the processes of attention and perception in Chapter 6. The software plays with that image and allows you to click on various signposts along the road in order to explore different aspects of sensation and perception; for instance, to learn about the structure of the eye. You can spend some time, too, experimenting with some interesting visual illusions.
Book 3 Offprints – To accompany Book 3 chapters, a number of articles have been selected that help you to extend your understanding of topics and to gain experience of source material. Reading these articles associated with the chapters you are working on will give you the opportunity to see exactly how studies are written up in psychology journals and to develop your skills in evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of such studies. Notes are provided in the margins of each article to guide your reading and help you to critique the studies being reported.
Audio-CDs
(See the 'Guide to audio-cassettes' section in this booklet for full details of each programme.)
Audio CD 1: Sides 1 and 2: 'Introducing PSYC A212 and Book 1'
Audio CD 2: Side 1: 'Identity and disability'; Side 2: 'Twin studies'
Audio CD 3: Side A: 'Living with memory impairment'; Side B (skills focused): 'How to get good marks in your essays'
Audio CD 4: Side A: 'Gender'; Side B: 'Consciousness'
Video programme
(See the 'Guide to video-cassettes' section in this booklet for full details of each programme.)
Video 1 – 'Research methods in psychology' (60 minutes). (This video has been separated into two parts, with Part 1 to contain Experimentation and Observation, and Part 2 to contain Brain Scanning and Interviewing. Parts 1 and 2 will be shown separately on specific Sundays on our 'Open for Learning' programme on TVB. A copy of Parts 1 and 2 will also be placed in our library for watching within the library.)
Set book: Statistics Without Maths for Psychology, Dancey and Reidy (2002)
Statistics are a tool which psychologists use to analyse research data statistically. On this course you learn to use this tool. Be reassured, however, that you do not need to do any arithmetic for this statistical data analysis – this is where Statistics Without Maths for Psychology by Dancey and Reidy (2002) comes in. We have chosen a book which provides an accessible description of important statistical concepts and procedures, that you will need to know as a psychology student, without cluttering its text with descriptions of arithmetical methods of calculating statistics. Used together with Methods Booklet 2, it will give you a firm understanding of statistics without the maths. You will not be studying all of the book during this year but will be directed to read the recommended sections in the Measuring People: Quantitative Methods booklet. If you intend to do other psychology courses when you finish PSYC A212, keep this book handy as it will continue to be used for analysing quantitative data in your future research.
OUHK PSYC A212 Online Learning Environment
You are not required to access the website, but you may want to look at the course website where many of the course materials are available in electronic format and links are possible to other useful sites.
Two major components, the assignments and the end of course examination, each contribute 50 per cent to your final overall course grade. Note, however, that both components have to be passed in order to pass the course.
There are eight assignments, and part of their purpose is to enable you to establish a teaching-learning dialogue with your tutor. Full instructions for what is expected in these assignments are given in the Assignment Booklets. In brief, they involve you writing essay answers, doing exercises, and carrying out two practical projects and a critical review of a research paper. These are all designed to give you experience of handling theoretical discussion and the practice of doing research – two core skills of being a psychologist.
The exam is a three-hour paper. First you are asked to write short answers on a number of key conceptsand terms drawn from throughout Books 1 to 3. In the rest of the exam you areasked to write three essays, one from each of the three course books.
These assignments and the exam are marked using the university system of scoring, and you might find the following distinctions helpful: 40-54 per cent is seen as a basic pass; 55-69 per cent represents competent, average performance – the category into which probably at least half the answers will fall; 70-84 per cent and 85-100 per cent are given for good and excellent answers respectively. Further information about grading criteria and assessment strategy can be found in the Assignment Booklets.
