Introduction

Welcome

By Inside_my_head.jpg: Andrew Mason], via Wikimedia Commons

Welcome to Psychology 101! We hope you find this course to be a refreshing, enlivening, and enjoyable look at what psychology is and what psychologists do.

This course introduces you to several psychological disciplines and shows how psychology advances through scientific research. The course examines general topics such as how people perceive the world around them, how the brain works, and how we think, feel, learn and remember. It also provides a foundation in the nature of research and how psychologists use scientific methodology.

Aims

On successful completion of this course you will be able to: Understand how psychology developed and its scientific underpinnings Evaluate major themes in experimental psychology and explain how they can be applied; Conduct and interpret simple psychological experiments.

Microblog activity

Activity

This is the first Microblog activity for the PSYCH101 course and an opportunity to share and connect with fellow learners. Building connections with other learners around the world will enable you to discuss ideas and concepts that are new to you. This gives you the opportunity to dig deeper into the course material and to see things in a different way. Seeing things in a different way can be a challenge, a surprise, and a way to grow in understanding. Look at the visual illusions on Dr Deborah Serani's 2006 blog post More fun with psychology and watch Richard Wiseman do the Colour changing card trick (video, 3:10 mins). Think about how your mind 'plays tricks' on you. Can you explain why this happens? Find another example of a visual illusion or a trick of perception and post the link to your fellow students. identi.ca, twitter or WEnotes. Remember to include the hash tag "#PSYCH101" in your post. For example: I found a site with optical illusions collected by an opthalmology professor at http://www.michaelbach.de/ot/. He also links to an interesting research paper about how they work. #PSYCH101