Curriculum | M.Sc. Clinical/Counseling Psychology | Semester I

ology

Animism, religion and science

Science in Indian and Greek thought

Experimental physiology, brain functions and methods

Empiricism and associationism

·         To develop an insight how in different parts of the world people craved for the knowledge of the man and its activities.

·         Describe the comparative work of Indian and Greek philosophers.

·   How religion, dogmatism and science are related.

·   Travelling through two great schools of thought in eastern and western world.

·   Showing some big developments in Europe leading to early emerging thoughts in pre-historic Psychology.

·     Small group discussion

·     Students’ seminar

·     Demonstrating through historic maps and portraits of the forefathers.

·     Developing the timeline.

·     Laboratory work for practical skills.

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Psychophysics – Weber, Fechner, Helmholtz

Structuralism – Wundt, Titchner

Behaviorism – Watson, Skinner; Gestalt – Wertheimer, Kohler

Psychoanalysis – Freud

·     Demonstrating the Weber law and classical methods of psychophysics.

·     Signifying the main events that established Psychology as a separate discipline.

·     Introducing the concept of school, system, approach and perspective.

·     Detailing three major thoughts with contributions of their leaders and the way growing to separate approaches.

·      Highlighting importance of psychophysical traditions for sensory Psychology and laboratory experimentation.

·      Taking three early school and systems with a comparative look as well focusing on propounders.

·      Laboratory demonstration of laws and the verification.

·      Trying out classical psychophysical methods for some sensations.

·      Role playing of founders of schools and followers.

·      Practicum for acquiring skills in experimentation.

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Functionalism – William James, Angell, Harvey Carr

Phenomenology and Humanism – Maslow and Rogers

Cognitive Neuroscience – Modern psychology, recent advances

Evolutionary Psychology – Theory of evolution, genetic basis of behavior, and ethology.

·     Explaining why there had been multiplicity of schools and systems.

·     Comprehending the developments in science as well in society leading Psychology to new frontiers.

·     Further giving some explanatory concepts why do we so behave through natural history.

·         Highlighting the humane aspect of human nature and need of new psychosocial thoughts.

·         Developments in physical sciences and information technology merging with neuropsychology.

·         The origin of man and biological basis of behavior.

·      Biographies of main founders of schools.

·      Charting the timeline of modern psychology.

·      Visit to some field areas with observations on animal behavior.

·      Practical work in field and laboratory.

·      Visit to a department of radiology for familiarization of scanning techniques.

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ology

Nature of Cognitive Psychology, Cognitive processes

Influences in the study of Cognitive Psychology, The Cognitive Revolution, Current trends

Paradigms in the study of Cognitive Psychology: Information Processing Approach, Connectivistic Approach, Evolutionary Approach, Ecological Approach

Cognitive neuroscience: nature, different techniques: ERP, PET, CT, MRI, FMRI

·      Enumerate the paradigms to study cognitive psychology based on information processing theories and neuroscience

·      Describe the techniques to study neuroscientific basis of cognition

·         To develop perspectives in the areas of study in cognitive psychology.

·         Students interaction,

·         Audio-visual aids

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Perception: Nature, Gestalt Approach, Bottom up and Top down processes, Neuroscientific aspects

Attention: Nature and types, Selective Attention: Filter Theory, Attenuation Theory, Late-Selection Theory, Schema Theory

Sensory Memory, Short-Term Memory, Capacity, Coding, Retention Duration and Forgetting, Retrieval of Information, Working Memory, Executive Functioning

Long term memory-nature, Serial position curve, Coding in long term memory, types of Long term memory, Encoding and retrieval in Long term memory

·         Describe how the information is processed through senses and thinking abilities of attention and memory

·         Form the basis of learning in cognitive psychology through processes of attention

·         Students interaction,

·         Audio-visual aids

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Language Comprehension and Production; Language and Cognition: Modularity Hypothesis, The Whorfian Hypothesis.

Thinking and Problem Solving: Classic Problems and General Methods of Solution: Generate-and-Test Technique, Means–Ends Analysis, Working Backward, Backtracking, Reasoning by Analogy;

Reasoning: Nature and types, Approaches to the Study of Reasoning: The Componential Approach,

The Rules/Heuristics Approach, The Mental Models Approach,

Decision Making: Nature and Phases, Cognitive illusions: Availability, Anchoring, Sunk Cost Effects, Illusory Correlation, Hindsight Bias, Confirmation Bias, Overconfidence

·         Describe the nature of thinking as a process and problem solving through different perspectives

·         Describe reasoning, its nature and types and theories

·         Describe decision making, its nature and phases

·         Students interaction,

·         Audio-visual aids

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ology

Nature, purpose and scope of psychological research

Pure vs applied research; Experimental vs correlational research

Epidemiological research, ethnographic research

Hypothesis, variables, sampling, experimental bias and its control

·         Enumerate the basic classes of researches like pure, applied, epidemiological, correlational, experimental, ethnographic etc.

·         Describe the nature of hypotheses, variables, and sampling methods, including the possible biases in experimentation

·         Discuss about the types of researches in psychology

·         Brief about basic elements of research like hypotheses, sampling, variables and biases in researches

·         PBL: Find and describe one research from literature regarding different types of researches

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Basic single factor designs: between- and within-group designs

Advanced multifactor experimental designs: factorial designs, main effects and interaction effects

Correlational design, longitudinal design

Quasi-experimental design; repeated measure design, survey research

·         Enumerate the basic concepts of correlational and longitudinal researches

·         Describe the concepts and significance of quasi-experimental and survey researches

·         Describe the concept of multifactor designs by mentioning the significance of interaction and main effects

·         Elaborate upon the basic principles and concepts of correlational, longitudinal, quasi-experimental, and survey researches

·         PBL: Perform a mini-research by taking data on any variables of interest using one of the research designs

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APA Code of ethics, guidelines for use of humans, informed consent

Communicating research results: writing research proposals and reports, presentations and posters

Reading, reviewing and replicating research

Using internet and computer softwares for research

·         Outline the ways of communicating research like writing proposals, reports, presentations, and posters

·         Provide a sketch of how to read, review, and replicate researches

·         Make use of internet and common computer programs to facilitate in research work

·         Provide a brief overview of methods of communicating research results like writing reports, presentations, posters, proposals

·         Guide in skills of reviewing, reading and replicating researches

·         Instruct about making use of internet, databases, software programs in facilitating researches

·         PBL: Read a research and prepare a presentation on basic components of research

·         Perform review of literature on a variable using PubMed database and gather abstracts of 10 studies

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ology

Biopsychology – definition and approach

Relation with other disciplines of neuroscience and divisions of biopsychology

System’s approach in body and various systems of human body.

Methods of biopsychology – imaging techniques, electrophysiological methods

·         Have a comparative picture with other approaches in Psychology.

·         Know the structure and function of human body as a system.

·         Have an idea of gross systems in human body.

·         Introduce basic methods used to study the subject matter.

·         Presenting a comparative angle with other related disciplines such as physiological psychology, psychophysiology and neuropsychology etc.

·         Providing a basic knowledge of the structure and function of the major systems of human body.

·         Familiarizing with some imaging techniques used to study the structure and function systems.

·         Getting the basic knowhow of some basic electrophysiological techniques such as EEG,EMG and GSR.

·         Demonstration through charts and models.

·         Visit to museum of  human anatomy and dissection hall.

·         charting out the knowledge of self system functioning.

·         Practical skill acquisition of electrophysiological methods.

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General layout of the nervous system – divisions

Spinal cord and brain – structure and functions

Neural conduction – neurons, electrical potential, synaptic transmission, neurotransmitters

Sensory system – vision, audition, somatic sensation, chemical senses

·         Having basic knowledge of gross neuroanatomy.

·         Get understanding of the functioning of neurons and synaptic transmission.

·         Know the electrochemical processes and neurotransmitters.

·         Know the way environment is represented in the form of neuraltransduction through major sensory receptors.

·         Detailing out the role of spinal cord in the processing of inward and outward information.

·         Taking the brain as main controlling center for bodily processes including behavior.

·         Taking all the major sensory systems in human body as transacting with the external environment.

·         Using charts, figures, virtual images and models to have basic understanding of structure and function.

·         Mixing the knowledge of basic psychophysics and sensory processes for developing a synthetic point of view.

·         Practical exposure of the concepts through visit to a neuroanatomy department.

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Hunger, eating and health – theories and human obesity

Hormones and sex – neuroendocrine system and sexual development

Mechanisms of learning and memory, Amnesias

Sleep – stages, disorders, sleep deprivation and sleep reduction

·         Have an idea of eating disorders and some issues of feeding.

·         Get fair idea of the development of sexual characteristic and gender alongwith realizing the importance of hormones in behaviour.

·         Understand the neural basis of knowledge processes and memory disorders.

·         Understand the phenomenon of circadian rhythm, waking and sleep cycle.

·         Describing the reproductive process, development of sex and gender through the hormonal mechanism.

·         Explaining the phenomena of learning and memory with neural substrates, its permanence and issues of forgetting.

·         Taking neuropsychology of memory with case studies of amnesia.

·         Describing the states of consciousness with arousal, waking, sleep and their physiological basis.

·         PPT with detail diagrams of neural structures relevant to various motivations.

·         Familiarizing with land mark experiments on  neural basis of learning and memory.

·         Taking some case study of disorders with focus on obesity, sleep disorder, amnesia from the community by the students.

·         Case presentation and visit to psychiatry and neurology unit.

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ology

Charting a timeline of 100 major events in psychology

A study of two-point threshold of two parts of the body.

Study of just noticeable difference of lifting weights

Measuring strengths and virtues / word association test

·         Perform and replicate some very early experiments of Psychology.

·         Enumerate main character strength of positive side of human nature.

·         Analyse dynamic side of human psyche.

·         Exposing different sources of time lines in emergence and development of Psychology.

·         Introducing basic experimentation and concepts of variable and constants.

·         Sharing the findings of classical experiments.

·         Experimenting with instruments and recording.

·         Analysis of data.

·         Group sharing of results.

·         Report writing.

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Trail making test

Assignment on memory retention techniques

Experiments in problem solving (Dunker’s (1945) Candle problem for functional fixedness; 2 String Problem; Water Jug experiment by Luchin (1942, 1959)

Written assignment of types of heuristics

·         Having knowledge of tapping the process objectively.

·         Demonstrate the way to solve problems, seeking alternatives and even errors.

·         Getting to enlist various common strategies often picked up for solving problems.

·         Familiarizing with common experiments cited in cognitive psychology text.

·         Collecting studies to familiarizing with various problem solving strategies to see the process actually.

·         Putting the cognitive material to test with standard parameters.

·         Using instruments and application of information technology for conducting experiments of cognitive process.

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Find and describe one research each from literature regarding different types of researches

Perform a mini-research by taking data on any variables of interest using one of the research designs

Read a research and prepare a presentation on basic components of research

Perform review of literature on a variable using PubMed database and gather abstracts of 10 studies

·         Acquiring skills to plan study and execute it.

·         Perform a library review exercise for the development of research idea.

·         Getting a training into the use of various websites, search engines and retrieving relevant information.

·         Exposing the major issues in conducting research in field and laboratory.

·         Designing and planning basic and applied research at introductory level.

·         Exposing with various methods of data collection and sources of earlier researches.

·         Practical exposure of laboratory and field methods.

·         Critical analysis of the problems identified by the student in a small group.

·         Using soma package programs for analyzing data.

·         Project report preparation.

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Preparing a model of the part of the brain

GSR/EMG – a report on recording

A case study of amnesic patient

Preparing a sleep-waking checklist

·         Reproduce the imagery into material form about the brain.

·         Record biological phenomena.

·         Acquire skill to prepare a case study of a patient and tracing the etiology and symptoms of memory.

·         Prepare observational chart of daily activities.

·         Explaining and describing some of the basic peripheral processes under the skin or muscles.

·         Introducing neuropsychological features of memory.

·         Familiarizing through circadian rhythm and the states during sleep and waking cycle.

·         Laboratory experimentation

·         Visiting and selecting a case from psychiatry and neurology.

·         Case presentation and discussion.

·         Interviewing and recording.

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