Psychology 243

Syllabus for PSYCH 243:

<div class="MsoNormal">Dr. John A. Johnson </div>

Introduction to Well-Being and Positive Psychology

Office 172 Smeal 375-4774

T&Th 9:25-10:40 010 Multi-Purpose Building

Office <div class="MsoNormal">Hours: T&Th 1:30-2:30</div>

Fall Semester, 2009

<div class="MsoNormal">Email: j5j@psu.edu</div>
Web: http://www.personal.psu.edu/~j5j/

Required Readings:

Optional Book:

·         McKay, M., & Fanning, P. (2000). Self Esteem (3rd. Ed.). Oakland, CA: New Harbinger. ISBN-10: 1-57224-198-5 ISBN-13: 978-1-57224-198-5.

I will be talking about ideas from selected portions of this book from time to time. Your course grade will not be affected by whether or not you buy this book, so I would purchase a copy only if I were interested in owning the book.

Course Objectives:

The overall objective of this course is to learn how to make your life more satisfying and meaningful. This general objective can be broken down into three more specific objectives, namely, learning how to:

(1) avoid and escape negative states such as anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, anger, and self-defeating behavior;
(2) deal effectively with the normal demands of everyday life (have good relationships with others, cope with stress, organize yourself, set and accomplish goals, etc.); and
(3) improve yourself beyond mere normality (become more creative, increase awareness, and develop a higher quality life).

The study of psychological well-being has undergone and interesting evolution over the past 60 years. Originally, the focus was on the first two objectives, that is, helping people to overcome emotional and behavioral problems and to cope effectively with the stresses and demands of everyday life. Courses dealing with this subject matter were often called "The Psychology of Adjustment," which gave the impression that there was one standard of mental health for everyone to live up to.

Over time, however, psychologists became dissatisfied with this focus on eliminating negatives and encouraging adjustment. An alternative approach, which began with humanistic psychology in the 1960s and developed into what is now called Positive Psychology, came to focus on each person's unique potential for positive growth and excellence. In the words of our textbook author, Chris Peterson, Positive Psychology is "The scientific study of what goes right in life" (p. 4).

This course promotes both the original goals of a psychology of well-being (getting rid of negatives and dealing with ordinary challenges), while emphasizing Positive Psychology's focus on growth and excellence.

Methods for Achieving Course Objectives:

Chapter 2 of Chris Peterson's textbook is titled "Learning About Positive Psychology: Not a Spectator Sport." This means that in our course we will be learning by doing. Prior to every class, everyone will be expected to complete a homework assignment in preparation for that class. The assignment usually includes reading from one or more of the textbooks. But in addition to any textbook reading, you are expect to engage in an activity related to the topic. Instructions for each activity are posted on ANGEL. The instructions will tell you how to write a short "activity report" for the activity.

You are to bring each activity report to class to help you discuss your experiences with the activity with members of your small group. In these discussions, students are meant to learn from one another. I will usually kick off the discussions with a short lecture. After groups discuss the topic of the day for a period of time, I may visit the various groups to see how things are going, or I may moderate a full-class discussion of the topics for that class period. You will turn in your activity report at the end of class.

Course Outline:

The following course outline charts when we will be covering the different topics. Any changes from this outline will be announced in class. For reading assignments and other activities in our books, I have used the following shorthand book titles:

Primer - A Primer in Positive Psychology, by Christopher Peterson

Taking Control - Thoughts & feelings: Taking Control of your moods and your life, by Mathew McKay, Martha Davis, and Patrick Fanning

Freedom - How I Found Freedom in an Unfree World, by Harry Browne

Week

Meeting 

Topic 

Reading Assignment 

Activity

1

1 T Aug 25 
 

2 Th Aug 27 

What is Positive Psychology?

Active Learning and Learning Styles

Primer, Chapter 1 

Primer, Chapter 2

 


1. Begin activity Three Good Things which is due on class 4

2

3 T Sept 1


4 Th Sept 3 

Cooperative Learning


Pleasure

 



Primer, Chapter 3

2. Cooperative Learning

 

(Turn in Three Good Things)

3

5 T Sept 8 

6 Th Sept 10 

Happiness: Survey of theories


Happiness: Freely choosing what you really want to do

Primer, Chapter 4;
Freedom, Chapter 27

Freedom, Chapters 1-3

 

3. Happiness Profile


4. Identity, Intellect, Emotions

4

7 T Sept 15 
 

8 Th Sept 17 

Happiness: Changing limiting thoughts

Happiness: Developing attitudes of acceptance

Taking Control, Chapters 2-4

Desire, Pain, and Suffering (on ANGEL)

5. Changing Limiting Thoughts


6. Desire, Pain, and Suffering

5

9 T Sept 22

10 Th Sept 24 

Compassion

Attention

Compassion (on ANGEL)


Attention (on ANGEL)

7. Compassion


8. Attention

6

11 T Sept 29 

12 Th Oct1 

Gratitude

Balancing self-interest with others' interests

 

Gratitude (on ANGEL)

Freedom, Chapters 5-6; pp. 55-58 of Chapter 7 

9. Gratitude


10. Balancing self-interest with the interests of others

7

13 T Oct 6

14 Th Oct 8 

Freedom for Yourself and Others

Mid-Semester Examination

Freedom, Chapters 9, 17

 

 

11. Freedom for yourself and others

 

8

15 T Oct 13 

 

16 Th Oct 15

Positive Thinking; Visualization

 

Relaxation and Wellness

Primer, Chapter 5

 

Primer, Chapter 8
Taking Control, Chapter 5

12. Positive Thinking

 

13. Relaxation

9

17 T Oct 20 

18 Th Oct 22

Worry Control

Decreasing Depression

Taking Control, Chapters 6-7

Taking Control, Chapters 13-14
Freedom, Chapter 29

 

 

10

19 T Oct 27 

20 Th Oct 29 

Increasing Self-Esteem


Your Morality

Taking Control, Chapter 15


Freedom, Chapters 4, 28

14. Disputing Limiting Musts and Shoulds

15. Your Morality

11

21 T Nov 3 

22 Th Nov 5 

Managing Anger

Character Strengths

Taking Control, Chapter 17

Primer, Chapter 6

 

16. Using Signature Strengths in New Ways

12

23 T Nov 10 


24 Th  Nov 12 

Values

Interests and Abilities

Primer, Chapter 7

Primer, Chapter 8

17. Values


18. Interests and Abilities

13

25 T Nov 17 
 

26 Th Nov 19 

Love

Communication strategies for overcoming control dramas

Primer, Chapter 10

Communication and Control Dramas (on ANGEL)

19. Love Styles


20. Control Dramas

 

[T Nov 24]

[Th Nov 26]

NO CLASS! Thanksgiving vacation

NO CLASS! Thanksgiving vacation

 

 

14

27 T Dec 1 

28 Th Dec 3

Sex differences in interests, behavior, and communication

Marriage and Families

Sex Differences in Communication (on ANGEL)

Primer, Chapter 11,
Freedom, Chapters 19-21 & Afterword

21, Sex Differences in Communication


22. Marriage and Families

 

15

29 T Dec 8 

30 Th Dec 10

Your future

The end

Primer, Chapter 12

(no reading)

 

Finals Week

TBA

Final Examination

 

 

Assignments and Grades:

Assignments have two completely separate purposes: (1) to allow students to achieve their own personal self-development goals; and (2) to allow grades to be assigned. I do not especially like assigning grades in this course. I am more concerned that the course assignments help students achieve their own self-development goals. However, I do realize that grades are important to many of you in your educational career; furthermore, the university requires that grades be assigned.

Grades are based totally on the number of points earned on activity reports you submit, your contribution to your group's discussions, and on the midterm and final exams. Descriptions of these factors and the manner in which they determine the final grade are presented below.

Activity Reports

For 22 of our 30 classes, you are to bring to class a written description of your experience with the homework activity assigned for that class. The instructions for each activity tell you what to write. The reports are graded on quality. A high-quality report provides thoughtful, sincere, complete responses to the assignment according to the instructions. An low-quality report gives thoughtless, sketchy, incomplete, irrelevant, trite, or phony responses to the assigned activity, or does not conform to the instructions. Low-quality reports usually look like they were thrown together at the last minute The key to writing high-quality reports is to approach the activity with enthusiasm, and then to really put your heart into writing about it. Reports should be typed, but need not follow a particular, formal writing style.

Each activity report is worth 20 points. To earn the full point value, you must write with high quality and turn in the report on the day that it is due. Full credit for late reports can be earned only for a legitimate absence (normally only athletic participation, illness, emergency, death in the family). I will be the judge of whether an absence is legitimate. A report turned in late will receive less than the full 20 points or no points at all. The sooner you turn in a late report, the fewer points you will lose, so if you know you will not be turning in a report in class, emailing it to me the same day would be your best option. Any student who develops a pattern of submitting late reports will have increasingly more points deducted for lateness. The total maximum number of points that can be earned for activity reports is 22 x 20 = 440.

Group Participation

To earn points for participation, you must demonstrate that you have prepared for each class by reading the textbooks, engaging in activities, and making quality contributions to discussions in your group. To judge how well you prepare and participate, I will rely heavily on the assessment of the other members of your small group. Each member of each group will have a fixed number of points (= 10 x [number of persons - 1]) to distribute among all the other group members. If you think everyone contributes equally, you assign an equal number of points to everyone. If you think someone contributes more, and another, less, than the others, you can assign more points to the first person. Your participation score will be computed as 400 x (total points received)/(points distributed by one person).

For example, let's say four people are in your group, including you. Each person will have 30 points to distribute among the other three members. If everyone distributes their points equally, you would receive 30 points. Your participation score will be 400 x (30/30) = 400. If someone is judged to be a slacker and receives only 5 points from each of the other three group members, his or her score would be 400 x (15/30) = 200. Note that if your group members believe you contributed more than an average amount, you could actually end up with more than 400 points for participation, but there is a limit of 440 points that can be earned for extraordinary contribution. We will conduct an informal assessment of participation (assigning points as per the formula above--but it won't count toward your grade) at mid-semester just to see how things are going. At the end of the course, if any individual's participation score seems to me too high or too low due to bias, I may adjust the score.

Midterm and Final Examinations

The midterm and final exams each consist of 40 multiple-choice questions, worth two points each, based on the readings and lectures. The midterm covers material from the first half of the course and the final covers material from the second half of the course. Readings covered by each exam are as follows:

 

Primer

Taking Control

Freedom

Handouts

Midterm Exam

Chapters 1-4

Chapters 2-4; 20

Chapters 1-3;
5-7; 9, 17, 18

All handouts

Final Exam

Chapters 5-12

Chapters 5-7;
13-15; 17

Chapters 4;
19-21; 28

All handouts

 

Letter Grades

The maximum possible number of points you can earn in the course is 1000 (440 for activity reports + 400 for group participation + 160 for the midterm and final examinations). Grades will be assigned on point totals as follows:
  

Point Total

Letter 
Grade

Point Total

Letter Grade

960-1000 points

A 

830-839 points

C+

920-959 points

A-

700-829 points

C 

910-919 points

B+

600-699 points

D 

850-909 points

B 

< 600 points

F 

840-849 points

B-

 

 

 

Note to Students with Disabilities:

Penn State DuBois welcomes students with disabilities into the University’s educational programs.  If you have a disability-related need for modifications or reasonable accommodations in this course, please contact The Office for Disability Services, Diana  Kreydt, 110G DEF Building, at 372-3037 or dlk34@psu.edu. 

For further information regarding the Office of Disability Services, visit their web site at www.equity.psu.edu/ods/ .  Instructors should be notified as early in the semester as possible regarding the need for modification and/or reasonable accommodations.

 

Attendance is Good—Unless You Have the Swine Flu

 

Attending class is essential to doing well in the course. When you attend class, you have an opportunity to learn from both the instructor and from other students. If you often miss class, you will miss information, and your participation rating from members of your group will suffer. However, if you are ill, especially if you have flu-like symptoms, please send me an email describing your illness as soon as possible and do not come to class. Public health considerations are more important than missed work, which can be made up.

 

Statement of Academic Integrity:

All students are expected to act with civility, personal integrity; respect other students' dignity, rights and property; and help create and maintain an environment in which all can succeed through the fruits of their own efforts. An environment of academic integrity is requisite to respect for self and others and a civil community.

Academic integrity includes a commitment to not engage in or tolerate acts of falsification, misrepresentation or deception. Such acts of dishonesty include cheating or copying, plagiarizing, submitting another persons' work as one's own, using Internet sources without citation, fabricating field data or citations, "ghosting" (taking or having another student take an exam), stealing examinations, tampering with the academic work of another student, facilitating other students' acts of academic dishonesty, etc.

Violating academic integrity is considered a serious offense by the University and is treated accordingly. Students violating academic integrity will receive an F for the course. In the case of more serious offenses (multiple violations; organized, widespread distribution of plagiarized materials, etc.), expulsion from the University will be recommended to the Director of Academic Affairs. Further information, including appeals processes, can be found in Policy 49-20 of the current Policies and Rules for Students handbook.