AP Psychology
Tustin High School
Teacher: Mr. Giebe
Phone: 714 730 7414
Email: tgiebe@tustin.k12.ca.us
Overview: AP Psychology is a year-long, college level survey course in Psychology, culminating in the
College Board AP Psychology examination in early May. This course introduces students to the
systematic and scientific study of the behavior and mental processes of human beings and other animals.
Students will be exposed to the psychological facts, principles, and phenomena associated with each of
the major subfields within psychology. They will also learn about the methods psychologists use to
explore the processes involved in normal and abnormal perceptions, thoughts, feelings, and actions.
Through lecture, discussion, projects, and readings, this course will introduce students to the field of
psychology. We will study psychological theories and research in applied settings: education,
advertising, and clinical. The topics will include: intelligence, creativity, moral development, learning,
social influence and clinical psychology.
Course Objectives:
 Students will study the major core concepts and theories of psychology.
They will be able to define key terms and use these terms in their everyday
vocabulary.
 Students will learn the basic skills of psychological research. They will be
able to devise simple research projects, interpret and generalize from results,
and evaluate the validity of research reports.
 Students learn about some of the explorations and discoveries made by
psychologists over the past century.
 Students will be able to apply psychological concepts to their own lives.
They will be able to recognize psychological principles when they encounter
them in everyday situations.
 Students will develop critical thinking skills. They will become aware of
the danger of blindly accepting or rejecting any psychological theory without
careful, objective evaluation.
 Students assess some of the differing approaches adopted by psychologists,
including the biological, behavioral, cognitive, humanistic, psychodynamic,
and sociocultural perspectives.
 Students will learn about psychology as a profession and become aware of the educational
requirements that must be met to pursue such careers. They will learn about the ethical
standards governing the work of psychologists.
 Finally, students will prepare to do exceptional (passing) work on the AP Psychology Exam in
the spring.
Student Responsibilities:
1. Attend class on time (Tustin High tardy policy will be followed)
2. Participate in class in a positive and productive manner
3. Complete class work and homework on time
4. Students should bring the following materials for class a. Textbook
b. Pen and Pencil
c. School Agenda
5. Abide by all school rules
Attendance Policy:
1. Tardies-Tustin High Tardy Policy guidelines will be followed.
2. Cuts-Missed work may not be made up. This includes tests/quizzes.
3. Absences-Only students with excused absences may make up work.
Course Text:
Myers, David G. Psychology, Eighth Edition, New York: Worth, 2007.
Grading Policy:
Success is contingent on the students’ ability to demonstrate knowledge of major concepts throughout
the school year.
Weighted Point System: Assignments will be categorized based on the level of difficulty of the
assignment. The following categories and percentages for those categories are:
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
f.
Tests: 30% of overall grade
Projects: 20% of overall grade
Quizzes: 15% of overall grade
Classwork: 15% of overall grade
Homework: 10% of overall grade
Participation: 10% of overall grade
Late work will only be accepted during the current grading period.
Absent Work: If a student has an excused absence, the student must turn in the homework the day they
return. For any assignment missed because of an excused absence, the student will have as many days as
they were absent to complete the assignment (it is the students’ responsibility to see the teacher about
assignments missed).
Haiku Website: Many assignments, quizzes, projects, and participation activities will be found using our
district website for content, Haiku. The website is tusd.haikulearning.com. Students will be required to
regularly access the site for many up to date resources that will be essential to their learning. If a student
does not have internet access at home, please set up a meeting with me to deal with any of these types of
issues.
MYTUSD Email: Each student will be given a school email account in order to access the haiku website.
This email will allow them to also utilize google docs that may be used in order to complete various
assignments. The instructor will assist students in setting up your accounts.
Grading Scale: 100-90=A, 89-80=B, 79-70=C, 69-60=D, 59-0=F.
Course Outline:
I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
Scope, History, and Methodology
a. Historical Schools: Functionalism vs. Surrealism
b. Modern Approaches: Psychodynamic, Behavioral, Cognitive, Humanistic, Evolutionary,
Neuroscience
c. Nature of Scientific Inquiry: Sources of bias and error
d. Research Methods: Introspection, observation, survey, psychological testing, controlled
experiments
e. Statistics: Central tendency, variance, significance, correlation
f. Ethics in Research: Human participants, animal subjects
Neuroscience
a. Neuron: Neuronal and synaptic transmission, psychopharmacology, drug abuse
b. Brain: Research methodology, neuroanatomy, brain development and aging, hemispheric
specialization
c. Nervous System: Structural and functional organization
d. Endocrine System: Anatomy, HPA-axis, and immune system
e. Genetics and heritability
Sensation and Perception
a. Psychophysics: Thresholds (absolute, difference, Weber’s constants), signal detection
theory
b. Sensory Organs and Transduction: Visual (including color vision and feature detection),
auditory, olfactory, gustatory, proprioceptive (including kinesthetic and vestibular)
c. Perception: Attention, processing, illusions (including Gestalt psychology), camouflage
Consciousness, Memory, and Language
a. States of Consciousness: Waking, sleep and dreaming, hypnosis, altered states
b. Memory: Information processing, storage, retrieval
c. Accuracy of Memory: Loftus and Schacter
d. Cognition: Problem solving and heuristics
e. Language: Skinner and Chomsky
Behaviorism
a. Historical Background and Philosophy of Radical Behaviorism
b. Classical Conditioning: Pavlov, Watson, applications, biological critique, cognitivist
challenge
c. Operant Conditioning: Thorndike, Skinner, Bandura, behavior modification, biological
critique, cognitivist challenge
Developmental Psychology
a. Methodology: Longitudinal and cross-sectional studies
b. Nature vs. Nurture: Maturation vs. Learning
c. Influential Theories: Piaget and cognitive development, Freud and psychosocial
development, Kohlberg and moral development, Gilligan and gender differentiation
d. Infancy, Childhood, Adolescence, and Adulthood
VII.
VIII.
IX.
X.
XI.
XII.
Personality
a. Psychodynamic Perspective: Freud, Jung, Adler
b. Trait Perspective: Allport, factor analysis and the five-factor model, assessment (MyersBriggs, MMPI)
c. Humanistic Perspective: Maslow and Rogers
d. Social-Cognitive Perspective: Bandura and Seligman
Abnormal Psychology
a. Approaches to Abnormality: The Rosenhan study, historical approaches (deviance), the
medical model, the biopsychosocial model
b. Classifying Disorders: Evolution of the DSM-V
c. Major Categories of Disorders: Anxiety disorders, dissociative disorders, mood disorders,
schizophrenia, personality disorders
d. Major Approaches to Psychotherapy: Psychoanalysis, behavioristic, humanistic, cognitive,
group, pharmacological
e. Does Therapy Work? Eysenck, outcome studies, and the Consumer Reports study
Motivation and Emotion
a. Motivational Concepts: Instincts, drives, optimal arousal, Maslow’s hierarchy
b. Hunger and Eating Disorders
c. Achievement Motivation: McClelland and the TAT intrinsic versus extrinsic motivators
d. Physiology of Emotion: Fear, anger, happiness
e. Expression of Emotion: Darwin and Ekman
f. Theories of Emotion: James-Lange, Cannon-Bard, Schacter-Singer
Stress and Health
a. Stress as a Concept: Selye
b. Stress and Health
c. Adjustment
Intelligence and Psychological Testing
a. Psychological Testing: Methodology, norms, reliability, validity
b. Intelligence: Defining intelligence, history of intelligence and aptitude testing, Naturenurture issues
Social Psychology
a. Attitudes and Behavior: Fundamental attribution error, roles, Festinger and cognitive
dissonance
b. Group Influence: Asch and conformity, Milgram and obedience, facilitation and loafing,
Janis and groupthink
c. The Stanford Prison Experiment
d. Prejudice and Scapegoating
e. Altruism: Darley and Latane
ACLU Settlement:
The Constitution of the State of California requires that we provide a public education to you free of
charge. Your right to a free education is for all school/educational activities, whether curricular or
extracurricular, and whether you get a grade for the activity or class. Subject to certain exceptions, your
right to a free public education means that we cannot require you or your family to purchase materials,
supplies, equipment or uniforms for any school activity, nor can we require you or your family to pay
security deposits for access, participation, materials, or equipment. Under certain circumstances,
students involved in extracurricular programs, clubs and/or sports may be required to attend
fundraising events held by the program, sport or club just as you may be required to attend any other
event put on by that program, club or sport. However, you will not be required to raise funds as a
condition of participation.
Syllabus Return/Class Policy –AP Psychology 2015-2016
I, ________________________________, have read the course syllabus for Psychology and understand the
guidelines and policies. In addition to taking notes, I understand that several hours per week of studying
will be necessary to succeed. I understand that I should not miss class, and that I will not be late. Any
missed work as a consequence of being late cannot be made up; any tests and assignments due as a result
of missing just this class must still be taken or turned in.
_______________________________
_______________________________
Student’s Name (Print)
Parent/Guardian’s Name (Print)
_______________________________
_______________________________
Student’s Signature
Parent/Guardian’s Signature
__________________
Date