PSYCHOLOGY OF PERSONALITY (PSYC 3300) Section 001 Summer 2012 Classroom Rawl 101 Instructor Dr. Michael Baker Class MTWRF 11:30 AM 1:00 PM Times Office Rawl 322 Office Weekdays from 10:30 11:30 AM Hours Also available at other times by appointment. Phone (252) 328 6059 Please note: Communication via e mail is preferred. E mail bakermich@ecu.edu (please include PSYC 3300 in subject line) Twitter @PsychologyBaker (http://twitter.com/psychologybaker) Course Facebook http://www.facebook.com/ecu.personality.social.summer2012.baker Page Required Larsen & Buss. (2009). Personality Psychology: Domains of Text Knowledge About Human Nature (4th ed). McGraw Hill. ISBN: 978 0073370682. A copy of this text is on reserve at the circulation desk in Joyner Library and can be checked out for three hours at a time. An Online Learning Center for this textbook can be accessed for free at: http://catalogs.mhhe.com/mhhe/viewproductdetails.do?isbn=0077275721 (Registration Required) Note: Except for changes that substantially affect grading, this syllabus is a guide for the course and is subject to change with advance notice. Any changes will be announced in class. IMPORTANT: This syllabus will remain available on the Blackboard course website throughout the semester. If you would like a paper copy of it, please let me know in person or via e mail and I will gladly provide one for you. Course Description and Objectives Content: This course is designed to provide you with an introduction to the field of personality psychology. A list of the topics to be covered can be found in the course schedule on the last page of this document. Methods: Objectives for this course include developing a working knowledge of past and present research and theory in the field of personality psychology and learning about the research methods associated with research in personality psychology. Broader Impact: Psychology majors will benefit from being able to apply the knowledge gained in this class to their future professional pursuits. Both majors and non majors will benefit from a better understanding of their social world.
Instructional Style Although this is a lecture based course, I strongly encourage students to ask questions if they are not confident in their understanding of a given topic. When questions are presented to the class for discussion, students are expected to do their best to respond. Aside from participating during our normal class time, you are expected to read the sections in the textbook either before or after they are covered in class. Some students prefer to read the book prior the lectures so that they can get additional clarification regarding the topics from the readings. Other students prefer to be introduced to the material in class and then get additional details from the textbook. Either way, it is important to use your textbook. Most of our lectures will follow the textbook fairly closely in order to make it easy for you to match material that you learned in class with the coverage in the text. You can see which chapter(s) we will be covering on any given day by using the course schedule at the end of this syllabus. Finally, I encourage you to continue to think about the material from this course during your daily life and to share your thoughts and observations with me and the rest of the class. You should do this by using the social networking resources that are available to the class on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/ecu.personality.social.summer2012.baker) and Twitter (@PsychologyBaker or http://twitter.com/psychologybaker). Please limit your posts to information that you sincerely think is relevant to the course. For example, if you see something in the campus newspaper or on an episode of a TV show or on a movie or news program that you think is a good example of a concept that we covered in class, you should share it online. You are also welcome to share observations from experiences in your personal life (e.g., things that you ve observed when walking around campus or interacting with your friends or family). However, you should always be careful and sensitive about what you share and make sure not to share any personal information that would embarrass you or anyone else. You should also be respectful in any comments that you make on other people s posts. Any comments or posts that I deem to be offensive or abusive (e.g., racist, sexist, homophobic, etc.) or confrontational will be deleted at my discretion. Student Evaluation & Testing There will be a total of four exams consisting of three unit exams and one cumulative final exam. Unit exams will consist of approximately 50 multiple choice questions and will be worth 20% of your final grade. The cumulative final exam will consist of 100 questions, 50 multiple choice questions from the last unit covered and 50 fill in the blank/short answer questions from the material that was covered over the course of the entire semester, and will be worth 40% of your final grade. Exam content will be drawn from both the lectures and the textbook. A study guide for each exam will be made available on Blackboard. Exam Make up Policy Exam dates are not negotiable. You may make up a missed exam if you missed it due to an excused absence. It is YOUR responsibility to contact me within three days of missing an exam in order to explain why you missed it and arrange to make it up. The best way to do this is to contact me via e mail or to come to my office hours. If you fail to
contact me within three days of a missed exam, you will receive a grade of zero for that exam. Any exams not taken by the day of the final exam will be assigned a grade of zero. Course Grades Your final letter grade for the course will be based strictly on your performance on the exams and will be determined using the scale below. Any requests for inflated grades will be ignored. Please note that I use standard rounding procedures when calculating final grades (e.g., 89.45% is the cutoff point for an A.) Grading Scale A: 90% 100% B: 80 89% C: 70 79% D: 60 69% F: 59% or lower Starfish Retention Solution Starting in Fall 2011, East Carolina University began using a software package called Starfish Retention Solution in an attempt to increase the student retention and graduation rate at ECU. Instructors who use this system can give kudos or flags for their students depending on how the students are performing in class. Kudos are given in order to praise students for excelling in their coursework whereas flags express concerns about low grades, attendance problems, or disruptive behaviors. This information is then shared with the student via e mail and notifications are also sent to the student s academic advisor and the Pirate Tutoring Center in Joyner Library. The point of this system is to make sure that students and those who can help them are made aware of any problematic trends as early as possible. I typically give kudos to praise students who earn a grade of A on any exam and raise warning flags for students who earn grades of D or F. The people who see these notifications will not see the exact grade that you earned but they may contact you to provide advice. Attendance and Lateness Policies Attendance will not be taken regularly in this class. However, you can expect your grade to reflect your general level of attendance. Some exam questions may be drawn from lectures, and can NOT be found in the textbook. Therefore, your grades on the test will likely suffer if you do not attend class. Attending class on time is STRONGLY encouraged as class will begin promptly at the assigned time. If you need to arrive late or leave early, please do so as quietly as possible so that the class will not be disrupted. Excused Absence Policy Students who miss exams or other coursework may make them up if their absence is excused. There are two ways for an absence can be excused. 1) It may be a universityexcused absence that is authorized by the Dean of Students. Please see the appropriate section of the 2011 2012 ECU Undergraduate Catalog for more information on this type of excused absence (http://www.ecu.edu/cs acad/ugcat/regulations.cfm#attendance). 2) Absences that are not official university approved absences will be excused at the discretion of your instructor. A documented circumstance that is beyond your control (i.e. car wreck, illness, plane flight delay) is most likely to be excused.
Notes Taking good notes is very important to success in this class. The notes will not be posted on Blackboard so it is important that you attend class so that you will be able to take notes yourself. If you miss a class for any reason then you may review the notes during my office hours. If you miss a class due to an excused absence then I will e mail a copy of the notes for that day to you upon request. Mass distribution of the notes via e mail or social network for any reason (for profit or not) is strictly prohibited. Violations will be considered to be acts of academic dishonesty and will be prosecuted accordingly. To clarify: you may share notes with individual classmates but you may not sell or distribute notes by sending out mass e mails via Blackboard or other online systems. If you miss a day of class, please do not send out a mass e mail request for those notes. Instead, try to get them either from your instructor during office hours or from a fellow classmate via an individual request. Office Hours Please feel free to meet with me during my office hours. If you are unavailable during my regular office hours, you may schedule an appointment with me via e mail (bakermich@ecu.edu). If you are having difficulty understanding the course material or the exams, if you missed a lecture or need to review or ask questions about the material that was covered, or if you would like to go over your exams or talk about grades, my office hours are an ideal time to discuss these issues with me. Unless otherwise noted by an announcement, I will always be in my office (Rawl 322) during this time. These are open office hours so you do not need to make an appointment if you would like to meet with me during my regular office hours. Policy on Disruptive Academic Behavior East Carolina University is committed to providing each student with a rich, distinctive educational experience. To this end, students who do not follow reasonable standards of behavior in the classroom, or other academic setting may be removed from the course by the instructor following appropriate notice. Students removed from a course under this policy will receive a grade of drop according to university policy, and are eligible for a tuition refund as specified in the current tuition refund policy. Academic Integrity The ECU Student Handbook (http://www.ecu.edu/cs studentlife/policyhub/handbook.cfm) contains important information on Academic Integrity and what you need to know about possible violations. Academically violating the Honor Code consists of the following: Cheating: The actual giving or receiving of any unauthorized aid or assistance or the giving or receiving of any unfair advantage on any form of any academic work Unauthorized aid or assistance or the giving or receiving of unfair advantage on any form of academic work. Plagiarism: Copying the language, structure, ideas, and/or thoughts of another and passing (adopting) same as one s own original work. Falsification: Statement of any untruth, either verbally or in writing (either spoken or written), regarding any circumstances relative to academic work.
Attempts: Action toward the commission of any act that would constitute an academic violation as defined herein(that is, cheating, plagiarism, and/or falsification) shall be deemed to be a violation of the Honor Code and maybe punishable to the same extent as if the attempted act had been completed or consummated (Attempting any act that if completed would constitute an academic integrity violation as defined herein) Violations of the honor code will be prosecuted in accordance with the procedures listed in the Student Handbook. Students with Disabilities East Carolina University seeks to comply fully with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Students requesting accommodations based on a disability must be registered with the Department for Disability Support Services located in Slay 138 ((252) 737 1016 (Voice/TTY)). For more information, go to http://www.ecu.edu/cs studentlife/dss/ Policy Regarding Severe Weather and Other Emergencies A time may arise when severe weather or another emergency event prevents a regularly scheduled class meeting from taking place. University emergency information can be found on the ECU homepage. It is usually highlighted with a red bar that will specify the alert. http://www.ecu.edu or go to http://www.ecu.edu/alert or by calling the emergency hotline: 252 328 0062. Contingency Plan for Continuity of Instruction Instruction will continue should the university be closed for face to face instruction. In such an event, students will still be responsible for reading the relevant material that would have been covered in class that day. Lecture slides and streaming video of the lectures will be made available as soon as possible via blackboard in the event of such an emergency. Relevant notifications will be sent out via e mail if such an event occurs. GPA Hours at ECU (identified in Transcript in Banner Self Service) plus transferred credit hours Retention requirements Old Retention New Retention Requirements Effective with Requirement All Fall 2011 grades courses taken at ECU All courses taken at ECU 1 29 semester hours 1.6 GPA 1.8 30 59 semester hours 1.8 GPA 1.9 60 74 semester hours 1.9 GPA 2.0 75 or more semester hours 2.0 GPA 2.0 Please discuss the retention requirements, entrance to major requirements, and your goals with your academic advisor.
Course Schedule (Note: This schedule is subject to change if necessitated by unforeseen circumstances.) Date Material Tuesday, May 15, 2012 Syllabus & Chapter 1: Intro to Personality Psych Wednesday, May 16, 2012 Chapter 2: Measurement and Research Design Thursday, May 17, 2012 Chapter 3: Traits & Trait Taxonomies Friday, May 18, 2012 Chapter 4: Theoretical & Measurement Issues Monday, May 21, 2012 Chapter 5: Traits Over Time; Review Session Tuesday, May 22, 2012 Exam 1 Wednesday, May 23, 2012 Chapter 6: Genetics Thursday, May 24, 2012 Chapter 7: Physiological Approaches Friday, May 25, 2012 Chapter 8: Evolutionary Perspectives Monday, May 28, 2012 NO CLASS (Memorial Day) Tuesday, May 29, 2012 Chapter 9: Psychoanalytic Approaches Wednesday, May 30, 2012 Chapter 10: Contemporary Psychoanalytic Issues; Review Session Thursday, May 31, 2012 Exam 2 Friday, June 01, 2012 Chapter 11: Motivation Monday, June 04, 2012 Chapter 12: Cognition Tuesday, June 05, 2012 Chapter 13: Emotion Wednesday, June 06, 2012 Chapter 14: The Self Thursday, June 07, 2012 Wrap Up & Review Session Friday, June 08, 2012 Exam 3 Monday, June 11, 2012 Chapter 15: Social Interaction Tuesday, June 12, 2012 Chapter 16: Sex & Gender Issues Wednesday, June 13, 2012 Chapter 17: Culture Thursday, June 14, 2012 Chapter 18: Stress, Coping, Adjustment, and Health Friday, June 15, 2012 Chapter 19: Personality Disorders Monday, June 18, 2012 Chapter 20: Future Directions Tuesday, June 19, 2012 Review Session Wednesday, June 20, 2012 Cumulative Final Exam