Summer, 2015
Felice Varini, Square With Four Circles, 2010, New Haven
" Cogito, ergo sum : I think, therefore I am."
René Descartes
" Classic economic theory, based as it is on an inadequate theory of human motivation, could be revolutionized by accepting the reality of higher human needs, including the impulse to self actualization and the love for the highest values."
Abraham Maslow
“Every perception is to some degree an act of creation.
Every memory is to some degree an act of imagination.”
Gerald Edelman
“The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitudes of mind.”
William James
“I use my psychology background all the time.”
Natalie Portman
“Psychology is the most interesting subject in the known universe.”
Dan Schacter, Dan Gilbert, and Dan Wegner

PSY 110 (Summer, 2015)
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Introduction
Introduction to Psychology is designed with three themes: 1) Psychology is the science of the mind, brain, and behavior, 2) Psychology is relevant to everyday life, and 3) Psychology is fun. Lectures and discussions will touch on a broad range of topics: What is happiness? Can we read minds with brain imaging? Are men more intelligent than women? What do babies know about the world? How can I manage stress, have a better lifestyle, be more emotionally intelligent? What are the different types of mental illness and how are they treated? How prevalent is unconscious prejudice? How do others affect our behavior? How can we influence other people’s behavior? How can a better understanding of psychology make the world better?
Instructor
Marvin M. Chun, Ph.D.
Richard M. Colgate Professor of Psychology; Neurobiology and Cognitive Science
Office Hours: Professor Chun will be on e-mail Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays.
E-mail: marvin.chun@yale.edu
, put “s110” in the subject header.
Marvin Chun’s research uses functional brain imaging to understand how to improve memory, attention, conscious perception, and decision-making [projects] [press] . His research has been honored with a 2006 Troland Research Award from the US National
Academy of Sciences, a 2002 American Psychological Association Early Career Award, the
2000 Chase Memorial Award from the Department of Psychology, Carnegie Mellon
University, and a 1998 APA Division 3 New Investigator Award. For his teaching, he has received the Phi Beta Kappa William DeVane Award for Teaching and Scholarship and the
Lex Hixon Prize for Teaching Excellence.
Teaching Fellow
Becky Fortgang
Ph.D. Student, Department of Psychology
E-mail: rebecca.fortgang@yale.edu
, put “s110” in the subject header.
Textbook
Schacter, D.L., Gilbert, D.T., & Wegner, D.M. (2010).
Psychology (2 nd Edition). Worth Publishers. Available at Yale
Bookstore or Amazon .
The second edition (white cover) is recommended. The first edition (dark cover) is outdated, so we cannot take responsibility for misaligned page numbers or missing information that may be tested on the exams. The third edition (dark cover, 2014) may be used if you can’t find the second edition.
Course Website
• The slides are available online.
• Grades and important announcements will be posted on this site.

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Course Requirements
Exams (50%)
There will be two examinations. Each exam covers about a half of the course material.
The exams are not cumulative. The questions are in multiple choice or short answer format, and they can focus on content unique to the lectures, unique to the textbook, or covered in both the lectures and textbook. The course material should not be difficult, but there is a large volume of information to understand and remember. Successful students view all classes and study the material throughout the term (i.e., don’t try to cram at last minute).
Research Papers (20%)
You will write two brief (1000 word) term papers, each worth 10% of your final grade.
Due dates and more details are available in a later section of this document.
Class Participation (21%)
There will be eight discussion sections, worth 3% each. We will drop your lowest section grade. To receive full credit, we expect you to 1) be promptly online at the section starting time (0.5% on time, 0.25% by the first ten minutes), 2) completed viewing of the assigned lectures (1%), 3) completed the assigned readings, and 4) participate in discussion (0.5%).
Discussion Questions are due by noon (EST) on the day of each class (1% each class, -
0.2% deducted for every hour late). Please prepare two questions per section based on the assigned lectures and readings. E-mail your responses to both marvin.chun@yale.edu
and Rebecca.fortgang@yale.edu
with “s110” in the subject header.
Assignments (9%)
Credit will be given for various offline assignments and surveys. These need to be submitted on time for full credit.
Brief Offline Activities are due by noon on the day of each class. These will be described when classes start, and they should take no longer than 15 minutes each day.
The bottom line
Your final grade will be based on the following formula
Exam1 (25%) + Exam (25%) + 2 Research Papers (20%) + Class Participation
(21%) + Assignments (9%)
Your final grade will be based on a 100 point weighted average. As a rough guide, you may expect some kind of “A” if your weighted average is above 90, and some kind of
“B” if your weighted average is between 80 and 90. However, the actual boundaries for letter grades are not determined until all exams and papers have been graded at the end of term. If necessary, a curve may be used to ensure sufficient A’s and B’s. We will not

PSY 110 (Summer, 2015)
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Homework
Short daily activities to be described in class.
Week 1: Sleep Journal (1%)
Week 2: Gratitude Journal (2%)
Week 3: Mindfulness Exercises (2%)
Week 4: Emotional Regulation Exercises (2%)
Week 5: Social Exercises (2%)
Academic Honesty
All work must be conducted as your own according to the highest standards of academic honesty, as detailed at http://yalecollege.yale.edu/content/academic-honesty .
Schedule
For more detail, consult modules on the course website. Major deadlines include:
June 2: Classes Start
June 11: Paper #1 due
June 18: Exam #1
June 25: Paper #2 due
July 2: Exam #2 (not cumulative); Classes End
Topics
Week 1
We're All Psychologists
Happiness
Psychology is a Natural Science
Week 2
Irrational Exuberance
Sex and Evolution
Origin of Irrationality
Shaping Behavior
Performance
Stress
Week 3
Babies are Smart
No Child Left Behind
Intelligence
Personality and Politics
Language
Law and Order I: Sins of Memory

Week 4
Law and Order II: Evil or Insane?
Psychological Disorders
Emotional and Social Intelligence
Why Do Fools Fall in Love?
Impression Management
Week 5
Get Along
Social Influence
Altruism and Sustainability
(More Below)
PSY 110 (Summer, 2015)
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Miscellaneous Questions
Is this course for me?
• If you received a 5 in AP Psychology, you should not take this course. You’re welcome to audit any specific lectures that seem new and interesting to you.
• If you are familiar with all fields of psychology through other courses and personal readings, and you do not plan to major in psychology, this course may not be appropriate for you. Please meet with the professor to discuss this further.
• This is not a gut course. The material should not be difficult, but you will not do well on the exams if you do not keep up with the readings and study carefully. Note that the textbook has over 600 pages of detailed information. And the lectures include new findings not in the textbook.
Need help with the material?
The TF can help answer any questions you may have.

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RESEARCH PAPER ASSIGNMENTS
PSYC 110
Overview
To give you a chance to actively investigate and discuss a topic in more depth, we are asking you to write two brief (1000 word) research papers, each worth 10% of your final grade.
Ideally, you will find relevant articles on your own. However, we will provide sample references to help get you started.
Topics
Choose one from each pair of topics. Sample references will be posted.
For Paper #1, Due Date June 11 (noon)
Does Media Promote Violence or Other Misbehavior?
Benefits of Early Education
Neural Bases of Mental Disorders
Paper #2, Due Date June 25 (noon)
Sports Psychology
Emotional Intelligence
Marketing for Social Good
Paper Format
• The assignment is to
1.
Research articles relevant to one topic you choose from the two choices. You may use the sample articles for your paper, but ideally, you’ll find other articles on your own to write about. One reference article is sufficient for the assignment, while consulting more than one source article can lead to a higher grade.
2.
Summarize the article(s) in your paper.
3.
Evaluate the merits and limitations of the article(s).
• Research paper length should be around 700 words and no longer than 1000 words.
Consider the fact that editorials of most newspapers and magazines can get their points across with a concise piece of this length. To ensure fairness and to encourage everyone to follow these guidelines, papers that exceed 1000 words will have the grade capped.
In-text citations are included in the word count; the bibliography is not.
• Use 12 point font with at least .75 inch margins. The reference list (bibliography) will not be included within these limitations and may be provided on a separate page. A separate cover page listing the title of your paper and your name is permissible but not required.
• The paper must be double-spaced and typed.
• Your primary reference should be a scientific journal article. Ideally, the article should include some form of empirical data, but this is not necessary. General newspaper articles or magazines can be used to help find studies or to help make certain points, but they should not be used as a primary reference. That is, if you see something interesting in a newspaper article (e.g., New York Times) or webpage (e.g., Scientific American, wikipedia), try to find the primary source and base your paper on that. Ask your TF if in doubt about the rigor of a source, although it should be fairly straightforward (e.g.,

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Science or Nature are rigorous and technical; National Enquirer or Cosmopolitan , less so.)
• Again, we are interested in more than just a summary of what you’ve read. Your paper should include your critical opinion and evaluation, suggestions for improvement and future directions, and so on.
• Please be sure to cite all sources of any findings that you describe. Provide a bibliography at the end (not included in the word count). Please use APA format for citations and the bibliography. For more details, see the relevant “Reference Citations” and “Reference
Formats” sections at the following website: http://writing.yalecollege.yale.edu/using-sources
More tips
How to find a good article?
Going through the literature for a relevant article is fun and challenging like shopping. Here are some useful resources to find what you need. From a Yale internet connection, you should have access to all these websites. All you need to do is enter the right keywords.
Scopus and ISI are especially useful because they allow you to see all the articles that cite
(and hence are relevant to) a particular study – extremely helpful for finding more current articles that follow up on a classic, but outdated study.
Access to journal articles is restricted to the Yale community. That is, if you're logging in from off-campus, you need to set up a Virtual Private Network connection. You can log in using your net-id and password. Please contact Yale ITS for assistance with this process if needed. Here is the link to set up a VPN: http://www.yale.edu/its/help/off-campus-access.html
SCOPUS http://scopus.com
This is Professor Chun’s favorite tool for researching the literature. With a userfriendly, self-explanatory search interface, you can search by topic, author, journal, or any other variable. It comprehensively covers both natural science and social science journals. The best feature is the ability to search through articles that cite a target article. Citation searches of influential papers or recent paper bibliographies (such as the ones we’re providing as samples) are a highly efficient way to find relevant studies.
ISI Web of Knowledge http://apps.isiknowledge.com/
PsycINFO http://info.med.yale.edu/library/ovid/connect.php3?D=psyf

PSY 110 (Summer, 2015)
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PubMed http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi
The Google search engine is pretty useful as well. http://www.google.com
http://scholar.google.com
Where to get articles?
The Yale University Library has an incredible selection of on-line journals that you may use as sources for your papers. The URL is http://sfx.library.yale.edu/sfx_local/azlist
Paper Grading
• Each paper will be graded on a 7-point scale that constitutes 10% of your final grade.
• 0.3 points will be deducted for every 24 hour window that the paper is submitted late, starting the minute after the deadline. (Papers submitted after 1pm for each deadline date will start receiving the penalty). Maximum late penalty is 2.4.
• See the following page for a sample of the criteria we will use to grade your paper.
Please note that even in professional academia, evaluation of writing is somewhat subjective and prone to variation. That said, in prior years, TFs have shown remarkable consistency in how they graded papers using our criteria.
• Most papers will receive a grade between 5.5 – 6.4. The range of grades is such that it should not have significant impact on your final letter grade.
• Excellent papers receiving grades higher than 6.4 generally have the following strengths: o Show evidence of careful and thorough literature review (cites more than one article or uses one heavy-duty source, like a book) o Cite references from rigorous sources that involve technical material. o Raise points that go beyond what’s discussed in class or the textbook o Integrate multiple sources in a coherent way. o Include independent discussion that critically evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of the articles and state of scientific evidence o Suggest how the field could move forward. o Exhibit an engaging writing style.

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TERM PAPER GRADING FORM
PSYC 110
Student Name : _______________________________________________________________
___________ Evaluation
4.6 : Submitted
5.2 : Satisfactory
5.8 : Good paper
6.1 : Very good paper: Coherent and evaluative. Shows evidence of
careful thought and research beyond the textbook and references.
A grade higher than 6.1 is only available to papers that adhere to the
1000 word limit, not including the bibliography.
6.4 : Top 30% Engaging, critical, integrative, and concise.
6.7 : Top 20% Highly engaging, critical, integrative, and concise.
7.0 : Top 10% Grader’s favorites.
___________ Late submission penalty
(-0.3 pts X # of days late, starting immediately after the deadline)
(Maximum late penalty -2.4)
___________ PAPER GRADE (Maximum 7 points)
General Comments