Chapter 1: Introduction to Psychology

Activities

Exercises: Read & Learn

Exercises: Watch & Learn

Myths about Psychology, Debunked explores some of the enduring myths in psychology

Video 1.1:  10 Myths about Psychology, Debunked. (https://www.ted.com/talks/ben_ambridge_10_myths_about_psychology_debunked?utm_campaign=tedspread&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare) Uploaded by Ben Ambridge for TedxYouth@Manchester

Exercises: Watch & Learn

Nature vs. Nurture: For a clear introduction to the debate

Video 1.2: Nature vs. Nurture  (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOK9kbUfoiuh3HE9pdxo-Cg) uploaded by PsychU 

Exercises: Do & Think

  1. Interview some friends and/or family members to see what they think a “psychologist” does. How accurate are their views?
  2. Think of a behaviour of your own that you might like to change (e.g. you might want to smoke less or exercise more). Does trying to understand the behaviour at the different levels of explanation (p. 7) help you think of different things you could do to change the behaviour?
  3. Today in the History of Psychology: This website allows you to choose any date in the calendar and see what happened on that date in the field of Psychology. For example, on the 1st of April (1906) the Journal of Abnormal Psychology was published for the first time. See if anything remarkable happened on your birthday! (https://www.cwu.edu/~warren/calendar/datepick.html)
  4. Read the section on how to effectively learn and remember and come up with a list of four or five strategies you can use to improve your study habits.

References

American Psychological Association. (2018). Science of Psychology. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/action/science/

Cherry, K. (2018).  Hindsight Bias in Psychology. Retrieved from https://www.verywell.com/what-is-a-hindsight-bias-2795236

Etchells, P. (2017, February 20). Fake news and neurobabble: how do we critically assess what we read. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/science/head-quarters/2017/feb/20/fake-news-and-neurobabble-how-do-we-critically-assess-what-we-read

Gallego-Romero, I. (2017, April 11).  The battle between nature and nuture. [Video file]. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/chzDR3feSHY

Greer, M. (2005). When intuition misfires. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/monitor/mar05/misfires.aspx

Jarrett, C. (2014, September 19). The 10 most controversial psychology studies ever published. Retrieved from https://digest.bps.org.uk/2014/09/19/the-10-most-controversial-psychology-studies-ever-published/

Rathie, S. (2017, July, 20).  The power of framing: It’s not what you say, but how you say it. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/science/head-quarters/2017/jul/20/the-power-of-framing-its-not-what-you-say-its-how-you-say-it

Street, W. R. (2018). A daily history of events in the history of psychology. Retrieved from https://www.cwu.edu/ ~warren/calendar/datepick.html

 

 

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Introduction to Psychology Study Guide Copyright © by Sarah Murray is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.