Psychology 269

Required Textbook:

Gaulin, S. J. C., & McBurney, D. H. (2004). Evolutionary psychology (2^nd ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education.

Recommended Internet Lecture:

The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature. Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology, Harvard University. http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/23/ . View on your own during the first week of classes. Total time, 1:50.(RealPlayer required. All computers on campus already have RealPlayer installed. Click on logo if you wish to download a free version for your computer. )

Cancellations due to Weather:

Please read the campus procedures concerning delay or cancellation of classes due to weather conditions at: http://www2.ds.psu.edu/Home/WeatherCampusClosings.html .
If the campus announces a delay due to weather, this will not affect our class because the shortened class periods occur only before noon. Obviously, if the campus announces cancellation due to weather, we will not be meeting. If the weather is bad but the campus does not announce a cancellation, and you believe that driving conditions are too dangerous for you, please do not risk your life for the sake of class. This is a valuable class, but your life is more important! 
 

Course Description:

Evolutionary psychology strives to understand how human thinking, motivation, behavior, and social relationships evolved over evolutionary time. Evolutionary psychology differs from other subject matter fields in psychology such as learning, motivation, perception, or social psychology. Instead of focusing on one subject matter, it represents an approach to all aspects of psychology. Evolutionary psychology assumes that the brain has evolved particular mechanisms to deal with problems such as deciding what foods to eat, determining whether someone is lying, dividing time and attention among different relatives, and choosing a mate. Evolutionary psychology is all about proposing and testing theories about the way these mechanisms work.

This course demonstrates how knowledge and principles from evolutionary biology are used to conduct research on the design of the human mind. The course explains how evolutionary psychologists identify adaptive problems faced by our ancestors and test hypotheses about psychological mechanisms designed by natural selection to solve these adaptive problems. The psychological mechanisms discussed are involved in phenomena such as perception and the control of activity, learning and cognition, mate selection and courting, development and parenting, altruism, aggression, and social structure.

Objectives:

Hopefully, by the end of the course all students will have learned to think like evolutionary psychologists. They will be able to explain how evolutionary psychologists frame research questions and be able to frame evolutionary hypotheses themselves. They will understand how natural selection has designed adaptive mechanisms that serve a purpose or function that ultimately affects survival and reproductive success. They can describe the adaptive mechanisms identified so far by evolutionary psychologists in perception, consciousness, emotion, cognition, learning, mating, parenting, and social behavior. In addition to being able to explain universal adaptive mechanisms, they will be able to explain individual differences, including differences in physical and psychological health. Each student's success in achieving these objectives will be evaluated with four examinations and class participation.

The course outline (see below) calls for covering one chapter from the Gaulin and McBurney textbook each week. Material will be presented, primarily through PowerPoint slides, on Mondays and Wednesdays. The PowerPoint presentations are available for downloading through ANGEL: https://angel.psu.edu .

Fridays are flex days in the course. Portions of some Fridays may be used to review and discuss material presented on Monday and Wednesday or to catch up if we get behind. If a Monday or Wednesday class is cancelled due to bad weather, it will be made up Friday. Each of the four exams is scheduled on a Friday.

But, most importantly, we will often have time for class discussions on Fridays (see section below). So come prepared to engage actively in our discussions.

Class discussions can occur both in the physical classroom during regular meeting times and on the course Discussion Forum that can be accessed through ANGEL. Students may of course ask questions and start discussions during any class, but Fridays are being reserved specifically for special activities, including class discussion. Discussion can be about specific points we cover in class, course-relevant questions and ideas that simply occur to you, and course-relevant material that you see or hear about elsewhere, including ideas you find on the Internet.

Consider browsing the links on the following two sites for material you would like to discuss in class.
Human Behavior and Evolution Society: http://www.hbes.com/links.htm and Great Ideas in Personality—Evolutionary Psychology: http://www.personalityresearch.org/evolutionary.html.

You might also consider joining the Yahoo Evolutionary Psychology Group. This requires obtaining a free Yahoo account http://groups.yahoo.com and sending an email to the group moderator, Dr. Robert Karl Stonjek, at stonjek@ozemail.com.au requesting membership into the group. In the Subject line of your email header, use the following exact phrase: [Evol-Psych] Join
In the body of your email, explain to Dr. Stonjek that you are a Penn State student in an evolutionary psychology course who would like to be added to the group. Once you have been added, you can read the posts there and even post messages yourself if you like.

Finally, I think it would be wonderful if everyone read one of the books on the recommended book list at the end of the syllabus (or a similar book based on evolutionary psychology) and shared what they learned with the rest of the class.

By participating in discussions (in class and/or on the course Discussion Forum), students can earn up to 40 points, added to their test point total. I do not have a specific formula for points based on how many times a student says or posts something. But, rest assured, if you raise questions and get involved in discussions on a weekly basis, especially on Fridays, you will earn a fair number of discussion points.

Course Outline:

Read the preface to the textbook immediately. Whenever possible, reading assignments should be completed before class to facilitate discussion and then reviewed after class to prepare for exams. Pay particular attention in the textbook to words in boldface, to their "trail markers," and to the summaries at the end of each chapter.