PSYC 1013 students are responsible for knowing the
contents of this course syllabus.
PSYC 1013 – Fall 2026
Introductory Psychology
Tilley 102
T/Th 1-2:20 PM
Instructor: Dr. Biljana Stevanovski
Email: bstevano@unb.ca
I am happy to meet with you to talk about the course,
etc., and to help you succeed. Email responses may
take up to 2 business days, so plan ahead and do not
leave questions to the last moment.
Email your Teaching Assistants (TAs): psych1013sec2@gmail.com. TAs can help you with many
course-related questions. Questions regarding obtaining bonus marks must go to your TAs
(e.g., research participation sign-up, how to do research summaries, which articles are appropriate
for summaries, etc.).
Course Description: A general survey of perspectives and methods in selected areas of
psychology including learning, memory, cognitive and biological psychology. Students will be
asked to participate in various learning and research activities. Some course credit may be
earned by participation in these activities.
Where do I find information about…?
•
•
•
•
•
Textbook details & Optional MindTap Resources – pages 1-2 (GREEN headings)
Lecture/Textbook Content & Lecture Schedule – page 2-3 (BLUE headings)
Midterm Information, Evaluation, Letter-Grade Scale – pages 3-4 (BLUE headings)
Support and Ideas re: How to Complete this Course – pages 4-6 (YELLOW headings)
Bonus Assignments Guidelines – pages 7-8 (PURPLE headings)
Land Acknowledgement: I recognize and respectfully acknowledge that all UNB course
interactions take place on unsurrendered and unceded traditional lands of the Wolastoqiyik.
Textbook: McCann, D., Weiten, W., Matheson, D. H., & Wright, S. (2026). Psychology:
Themes and Variations (Seventh Canadian ed.). Cengage Learning Canada.
Can I use a different edition of the textbook? I am not sure! The 7th edition is quite different
from the previous editions—the textbook previously included 16 chapters, but this has been
changed to 15 chapters. It is possible that you can use the 6th or 5th editions as the core material
is expected to be similar, but you will need to navigate any changes. I will be teaching using the
7th edition.
2
Textbooks (e-version, hard copy, or bundled with optional resources) may be available:
o at the UNB bookstore (new or used copies)
o at the publisher website, you can buy:
• an e-textbook + MindTap (https://www.cengage.ca/c/newedition/9781778412899/)
• the textbook alone (https://www.cengage.ca/c/new-edition/9781778412899/)
• the textbook and MindTap bundle, which includes a print copy of the text
(https://www.cengage.ca/c/new-edition/9781778412899/)
o through the UNB Student Union Book Buy & Sell (during early weeks of the term).
Additional Resources (optional): The textbook is bundled with access to online resources
(MindTap). MindTap includes access to the e-textbook and it also includes mini-tests to test
your knowledge and other exercises that you can complete as you work through the material. If
you purchased the MindTap code that is bundled with your text, then go to this link:
https://student.cengage.com/course-link/MTPN043GWVQ1 (for 7th edition)
Should I purchase MindTap? Some students have found this to be a very valuable resource!
However, it’s value is dependent on whether or not you will take the time to use these extra
resources (e.g., self-testing, etc.).
Lecture and Textbook Materials: Students are responsible for material covered in
lectures and in the textbook. Lectures will focus on selections from the textbook, as well as
additional materials that are not in the textbook. Activities (e.g., demonstrations, films) or
announcements (re: exams, course material, research participation, etc.) may also occur during
class time.
The professor will not respond to emails asking for notes regarding missed
lectures. Check in with your classmates for missed lecture notes. If you miss lecture due
to illness or other commitments, then that is understandable; you do not need to contact the
professor to let them know. Powerpoint slides are posted for each chapter, so you can use them
to help you to catch up. Once you have worked to catch up, you can also meet with your
instructor or teaching assistant for clarifications (and not to have them re-teach lecture material).
Powerpoint slides are not study notes; the slides are designed to provide you structure
for when you are engaging with lecture and taking notes. Research suggests that
deeper processing and engagement with our course material will help you to learn,
understand, and remember that material.
When studying, material covered in your lectures should guide your study approach. If it was
covered during class time, then this suggests that your professor thought the material was
important and you will want to pay attention to material (and sections of the textbook). Textbook
materials that are not considered in class will not regularly be tested.
3
Schedule of Lectures (tentative):
NOTE: The Final Exam date/time is scheduled by the Registrar’s Office.
Do not book flights or other arrangements until the official examination
schedule has been posted. I am unable to offer alternate arrangements due
to travel or illness. Final exam deferral requests are made to the Registrar:
https://unbcloud.sharepoint.com/sites/Registrar/SitePages/DeferredExamRequest.aspx
Students who are approved to write a deferred Final Exam will write it in January or
February 2027.
Evaluation: All midterms and the final exam are:
o written in person
o non-cumulative (only 2 chapters covered on each test)
o composed of 50 multiple-choice questions (i.e., 25 questions
for each chapter covered on a test)
o focused on material covered during lectures
Note: midterms are written at Tilley 102 during regular class time.
Midterm 1 (Ch. 1 and Ch. 2) – Sept 29, 1 PM
Midterm 2 (Ch. 3 and Ch. 5) – Oct 20, 1 PM
Midterm 3 (Ch. 4 and Ch. 8) – Nov 17, 1 PM
Final Exam (Ch. 6 and Ch. 7) – Dec 13–21
Optional bonus assignments (due by Dec 11, 11:59PM)
25%
25%
25%
25%
100%
+ 5%
4
Make-up Tests for Midterms: Make-up exams will be given for reasons of illness or other
legitimate reasons. If you are feeling unwell, then please reach out to me as soon as
possible. Notice of absence must be given in advance of the midterm by e-mail. (Official
documentation for your absence may be required, in cases of long-term illness and
repeated absences.) Conflicts with other courses (e.g., field trips) must be communicated to
the professor at the start of the term, otherwise accommodations will not be made.
For students who are given permission by the instructor to write a deferred test, the
following make-up dates will be used: midterm 1 make-up on October 7, midterm 2 make-up
on October 28, and midterm 3 make-up on November 25. The specific time and location will
be provided by the instructor after permission has been granted, as the make-up test date
approaches.
Letter-Grade Conversion: Your final grade will be calculated using the following scheme:
Student Accessibility Center: Students requiring alternate accommodations for notetaking or writing tests are encouraged to contact the Student Accessibility Center (SAC:
https://www.unb.ca/sas/academic-success/accessibility.html or (506) 453-3515. Please
notify me of any alternate arrangements as early as possible.
Advice on Succeeding in this Class:
1. Use the electronic resources that are bundled with the textbook. Complete the practice
exercises throughout each chapter of the textbook. Take full advantage of lectures and
communicating with your instructor or the teaching assistant (TA).
2. If you are having difficulty with the course material, then please reach out to your professor or
your TAs as soon as possible. Getting things on track quickly is important to facilitating your
progress in the course.
3. When meeting with the instructor or the TA, make sure your textbook, lecture notes, and any
other study materials are at hand. By examining your study routine, we may have suggestions
as to how you might want to adjust your study habits.
4. Repeatedly reading chapters or notes does not lead to the best recall at a later time.
Instead, try to use the information in some meaningful way (e.g., try to connect it to your
everyday life) or try to articulate the material to others. Studying requires both time and
effort. You will need to spend a considerable amount of time preparing for classes and
midterms. Even when you think that you know the information well enough, research
suggests that overlearning usually leads to even better recall.
5
Electronic Communication Guidelines: Please write to your professors and teaching
assistants (TAs) in a professional manner. It is important to develop good habits now; these
writing skills will be used in future situations (i.e., upper year courses, future employment, etc.).
• In the subject line, indicate PSYC 1013 and the topic (e.g., Chapter 1) of your email.
• Begin with a salutation such as “Dear Dr. XXX” or “Hello Professor.” End with your FIRST AND
LAST NAME, so that the instructor or TA can properly address the reply to your email.
• Write in complete sentences using proper English, spelling, and punctuation. Use capital
letters to begin the sentence and a period to end the sentence. Avoid text speak.
• RE-READ the message before sending to check for spelling errors, poor grammar, unclear
sentences, or other organizational errors that happened in the first draft.
Classroom Guidelines:
Our classroom is a place for learning and every student has equal rights in this space. Please
respect your fellow classmates. Do not chat or giggle with your neighbours or play with
electronic devices (e.g., computer, cellular phone). Whenever you enter the classroom, please
remember to turn off your cellular phone. If you must arrive late, then sit as close to the
entrance as possible to avoid disruption to your classmates. If you need to leave early, then sit
near an exit and leave as quietly as possible.
Studies show that class attendance is associated with grades, so it is important to take
advantage of your time in the classroom. Use our class time to engage in the lecture
(including demonstrations or videos), think about the lecture topic, and ask questions. Questions
are welcome! If you have questions that are not particularly relevant to the current lecture or if
you have many questions, then I would recommend that you contact the instructor or your
teaching assistant by email.
Cheating: The University of New Brunswick places a high value on academic integrity and has
a policy on plagiarism, cheating and other academic offences. Plagiarism includes:
1. Adopting someone else’s or an automated writing partner or editor’s line of thought,
argument, arrangement, programming code or supporting evidence without proper
acknowledgment.
2. Copying from any source, without proper acknowledgement.
3. Paraphrasing by using different words, programming code, and/or phrasing to present
the ideas of the original source/s without proper acknowledgement. Examples include,
but not limited to, copying text verbatim but swapping words with synonyms.
4. Unattributed patchwriting by copying elements from different sources, attempting to
combine them to create new work and presenting as original work.
5. Not using quotation marks to identify exact borrowed wording while also failing to
properly acknowledge the source/s from which the wording was obtained.
6. Using charts, graphs, statistics, images programming code or other illustrative media
that is not your own without proper acknowledgement.
7. Programming code plagiarism by copying, adapting or reproducing program code and
presenting as your own.
Note: For all work that a student submits for any form of academic credit, automated production
may not be used in a way that would constitute academic plagiarism if the automated produced
text, code, and/or media were a human author whose work was used without attribution.
6
Examples of other academic offences include: cheating on exams, tests, assignments or
reports; impersonating somebody at a test or exam; obtaining an exam, test or other course
materials through theft, collusion, purchase or other improper manner; submitting course work
that is identical or substantially similar to work that has been submitted for another course; and
more as set out in the academic regulations found in the Undergraduate Calendar.
Penalties for plagiarism and other academic offences range from a minimum of F (zero) on the
assignment, exam or test to a maximum of suspension or expulsion from the University, plus a
notation of the academic offence on the student's transcript.
For more information, please see the Undergraduate Calendar, Section B, Regulation VII.A,
https://www.unb.ca/academics/calendar/undergraduate/current/regulations/universitywideacade
micregulations/viii-academicoffences/ . It is the student's responsibility to know the
regulations.
Unethical Academic Practices: It is unethical for students to:
• Tell an Instructor you “need” a certain grade.
• Ask for extra assignment(s) for the purpose of raising your grade.
• Ask for your grade to be raised because it is very close to the next higher grade.
• Ask for a grade to be raised because you did very well on one part of the course/grading
scheme.
• Ask for a higher grade because you did not like the grading scheme.
• Ask to be allowed to turn in an assignment late – even a few minutes late – because of
computer or printer problems, or any other reason.
• Ask to be treated better than other students by making an exception to the rules.
• Ask for any other unfair advantage in grading.
Academic Advising: For academic advising information and assistance, see:
https://unb.ca/fredericton/arts/advising/index.html (Arts students)
https://www.unb.ca/fredericton/science/student-services/currentstudents/advising/index.html (Science students)
Counselling Services: Students may encounter various difficulties due to life
circumstances or other things that they are dealing with during their studies. When
needed, please consider reaching to our Counselling Services team for support. You can
find information here: https://www.unb.ca/sas/wellness/counselling/
Student Advocate: Students may sometimes be dealing with sudden events (e.g.,
medical or family situations) and need to be absent from class for a short-term or a
medium-term timeframe. By sending documentation to the Student Advocate’s office, he
can communicate with your professors on your behalf and indicate when special
consideration may be important to support your success. You can reach the Student
Advocate at advocate.fr@unb.ca or visit https://www.unbsu.ca/student-advocate for
other details.
7
BONUS CREDIT OPTIONS (DUE December 11th at 11:59 PM):
As part of PSYC 1013, you are given the opportunity to earn up to 5 bonus credits. Bonus points
can be earned via either or both of the following options:
• Option 1: Research Participation
• Option 2: Research Summaries (no AI use allowed)
If you have any questions about these options, then contact your teaching assistant(s).
Note: All bonus points assignments or participation must be uploaded to D2L by the final day of
classes for the term. No extra credit can be earned after the final day of classes. Bonus mark
assignments are DUE on December 11th at 11:59 PM.
Note 2: Research participation in SONA is reported directly to the professor, so students do not
need to submit the details that are reported on the SONA website.
OPTION 1: RESEARCH PARTICIPATION
To earn bonus credits (each hour of participation is worth 1% of your total mark), you are
encouraged to participate in research conducted by the members of the Psychology
department. This is an excellent way for you to earn marks and to experience first-hand the type
of research that you will read about in your Psychology textbooks.
Note: Once you have signed up for a research study, it is important that you attend your
appointment. Failure to attend appointments (without informing the researcher in advance) may
result in a penalty (e.g., loss of opportunity to earn a bonus credit).
In some cases, the course instructor may be the investigator or the supervisor of a studentinvestigator. You can choose to participate (or not) in studies that are associated with your
course instructor; your course instructor will not know who participates or withdraws from
experiments. There is no additional benefit or cost to you of participating in one of these studies
(as compared to participating in another researcher's study).
You can access the SONA Research Participation System using the following information:
• URL: https://unbfpsyc.sona-systems.com/
• Login: Use your UNB student ID number as both the login and password
o Example: Login: 3550099; Password: 3550099
• If you are experiencing difficulties with using the SONA Research Participation System,
then please email: rps@unb.ca
OPTION 2: RESEARCH SUMMARIES (no AI use is allowed)
If you are not interested in research participation, then you have the option to earn bonus credits
by reading a Psychology journal article and writing a research summary of that article. The
summary must be in your own words and cannot use AI (e.g., ChatGPT or other AI apps).
Summaries produced using generative AI will not be given any bonus credit and those
assignments will be reported to the Registrar’s Office for cheating. If it is suspected that the
student has used AI in the course of their summary, then the professor will request a meeting
with the student to discuss the summary and written notes or evidence of the student’s work will
be required.
Each summary is worth one bonus credit and is graded on a pass-fail basis. Your research
article summaries must be submitted on D2L and will not be accepted by email.
8
•
•
In our course D2L page, click ‘Assessments’ and then ‘Assignments.’ Once within
the ‘Bonus Mark Assignments (optional)’ folder, you will be able to upload your
documents.
D2L will send you a confirmation email to indicate that your file was uploaded. You
are responsible for clicking the uploaded file and ensuring it is functional (i.e., make
sure the file works and it is not corrupted or empty).
For each research summary you complete, you will need to:
1. Read an empirical research article that is published in a peer-reviewed journal related
to a topic that was covered in one of the chapters covered in this course, noting that:
o Your article must have a method, results, and discussion section
o Magazine articles, web summaries, and Wikipedia articles are not journal articles
o One suggested journal that has high-quality research and shorter articles is
Psychological Science
o Contact your teaching assistant or your instructor with information regarding any articles
that come from sources other than Psychological Science to ensure that you have
chosen a suitable article
o The use of generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) is prohibited in this course.
2. Summarize the key points in your research article IN YOUR OWN WORDS. The use of
generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) is prohibited in this course. Your summary should
include:
o One paragraph linking the research article to some topic covered in one of the chapters
covered in PSYC1013
o A description of the research question and why it is important
o How the study addressed the research question
o The conclusion drawn based on the results; the conclusions and implications should
form the bulk of your summary
Required Summary Format
•
The use of generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) is prohibited in this course. In alignment
with UNB's academic integrity policy, students are expected to complete their own work and
should not take credit for work done by others, including by generative artificial intelligence
tools.
•
Two pages in length (not including a title or reference information)
•
Summaries that are less than two pages in length will not receive bonus credit
•
No subheadings or extra spaces between paragraphs
•
Double-spaced
•
Written in clear English with proper sentences
•
Attach the first page of the research article to your summary (i.e., the page with the title of
the article and its abstract)