Susan Nolan, presenting at the Northwest Conference on Teaching Introductory Psychology, offered some suggestions on diversifying the images in your presentations – and I’d add diversifying name used in your exam questions – to ensure that all students see people and names that are both familiar to them and not familiar to them. I teach on a diverse campus where our students or their parents have come from all over the world. I use my students’ names in exam questions. Last term, I had one student, as she handed in her exam with a big grin said, “This is the first time I’ve ever seen my name on an exam!” Nolan suggested visiting Wikipedia’s most common surnames page. Choose a name, and then, if you’re looking for a photo to use on a presentation slide, search that name in Google images. Be sure to click on “search tools” and then under “usage rights,” choose “labeled for noncommercial reuse.” Alternatively, you can use a fake name generator, like, well, FakeNameGenerator.com. Choose the gender you’d like or leave it set to random. Choose your “name set,” such as “Arabic.” Click “Generate.” When I just ran it for Arabic, it generated Hafsah Yakootah Khouri. I can use that name in an exam question, or I can do a Google Images search for an image I can use on a presentation slide. Again, be sure to click on “search tools” and then under “usage rights,” choose “labeled for noncommercial reuse.” Do you give your students case studies of fictional people? Fake Name Generator is a terrific site for creating a fake person. Not only does it generate names, it will generate an entire fake identify, including address (that’s what the “country” field is for), phone number, birthday, MasterCard number, occupation and company, height, weight, blood type, favorite color. ... View more

On April 11, 2016 Richard Ransom, the founder of Hickory Farms, died at the age of 96 (Walsh, 2016). In a masterful use of the norm of reciprocity Hickory Farms stores offered samples before it was popular to do so. Today it’s commonplace; not so in the 1950s and 1960s. "The women didn’t bother asking customers if they wanted a taste – they just cut off bite-size pieces and held them out to people, Robert Ransom [Richard’s son] recalled. Shoppers felt obligated to take and eat what they were offered, and after tasting meats and cheeses every few steps around the store, they felt obligated to buy something" (Walsh, 2016). Does giving a free sample actually make a difference in sales? You bet. Friedman & Rahman (2011) compared four conditions delivered in a fast-food restaurant: no greeting/no gift, greeting/no gift, greeting/free yogurt, greeting/free key chain. The greeting of customers didn’t matter. What had the most impact was giving a customer a free gift, and, no, it didn’t matter what that free gift was. Those who received a free gift (yogurt or key chain) spent 46% more on their purchase than those who did not receive a free gift. If I were just starting a business like Hickory Farms, I’d give out free samples, too! Friedman, H. H., & Rahman, A. (2011). Gifts-upon-entry and appreciatory comments: Reciprocity effects in retailing. International Journal of Marketing Studies, 3(3). doi:10.5539/ijms.v3n3p161 Walsh, M. W. (2016, April 16). Richard K. Ransom, founder of Hickory Farms, dies at 96. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/17/business/richard-k-ransom-founder-of-hickory-farms-dies-at-96.html ... View more

After introducing students to the concept of correlations, it may help students to see a scatterplot to understand what the correlation coefficient means. Give students an example of correlation. For example, Cornell, et.al. (2013) found a correlation of .32 between the number of dropouts from 289 Virginia high schools and student perceptions of teasing and bullying. At this website, enter .32 in the “r” box and enter 200 in the “n” box (289 of course would be better, but the site limits the number of data points to 200.  Press enter. In pairs or small groups, ask students to describe the graph, and then ask a volunteer to share their description. (Students may explain that the number of dropouts is plotted along the x axis and the student perceptions of teasing and bullying are plotted along the y axis. As perceptions increase, so do number of dropouts.) Explain that Cornell, et.al. (2013) also found a correlation of .46 between the percent of students who qualify for free and reduced price meals and academic failure rate. Ask students to predict what will happen to the points on the scatterplot when you enter .46 into the “r” box. Again, ask students to explain what the scatterplot means to a partner, and then ask for a volunteer to share their description. Give one last example from Cornell, et.al. (2013). They found a correlation of -.42 between the percent of students who qualify for free and reduced price meals and the size of the high school. Ask students to predict what will happen to the points on the scatterplot when you enter -.42 into the “r” box. Again, ask students to explain what the scatterplot means to a partner, and then ask for a volunteer to share their description.    Finally, ask students to predict what will happen to the data points when you enter 1 in the “r” box. Now that students have a handle on what is happening in scatterplots, invite students (perhaps as an assignment), to visit http://guessthecorrelation.com. Here, players try to guess the correlation based on the scatterplot. You get three lives. If your guess is off by more than .1, you lose a life. If your guesses are good, you earn lives and coins. The data collected are used for research; you can read about that on the “About” page. Unfortunately, the site only gives scatterplots for positive correlations. Cornell, D., Gregory, A., Huang, F., & Fan, X. (2013). Perceived prevalence of teasing and bullying predicts high school dropout rates. Journal of Educational Psychology, 105(1), 138-149. doi:10.1037/a0030416 ... View more

Winston Moseley died on March 28, 2016 at the age of 81. His obituary appeared in the New York Times on April 4 th . Moseley was the catalyst for an event that everyone who has taken Intro Psych since the mid-1960s remembers, but I’m not surprised if you don’t recognize his name. The event is known for the victim, not the killer. In 1964, Winston Moseley murdered Kitty Genovese. “His life behind bars had been relatively eventful. Mr. Moseley was condemned to die in the electric chair, but in 1967, two years after New York State abolished most capital punishments, he won an appeal that reduced his sentence to an indeterminate life term. While at Attica Correctional Facility, in 1968, he escaped while on a hospital visit to Buffalo, raped a woman and held hostages at gunpoint before being recaptured. He joined in the 1971 Attica uprising; earned a college degree [bachelor’s in sociology] in 1977; and was rejected 18 times at parole hearings, the last time in 2015.” The obituary explains that this would have been just another murder among the 635 others that year in New York City had it not been for a front-page New York Times article published two weeks later. The story’s angle was apathy – that 38 people witnessed the whole thing yet did nothing. But that’s not quite what happened. “None saw the attack in its entirety. Only a few had glimpsed parts of it, or recognized the cries for help. Many thought they had heard lovers or drunks quarreling. There were two attacks, not three. And afterward, two people did call the police. A 70-year-old woman ventured out and cradled the dying victim in her arms until they arrived. Ms. Genovese died on the way to a hospital.” For more, see last month's blog post on Kitty Genovese. ... View more

Patty Duke, who portrayed a young Helen Keller in The Miracle Worker in the play and later in the movie, died on March 29, 2016. Her obituary in The Telegraph discussed her less-than-pleasant relationship with her guardians. For example, “For 18 months before the audition for the Broadway production of The Miracle Worker, the Rosses spent some time each day treating their protegée as if she were deaf and blind, banging pots and pans behind her until she no longer reacted and making her do household chores blindfold.” This is quite an example of habituation. “[S]ome time each day” for a year and a half Duke’s guardians made sudden, loud noises. Sure enough, she eventually would not respond to those sounds. If you have the time, you can do a quick classroom demonstration. Start the demonstration by asking students to write down something, like the names of five friends. As students look down to write, slam a book on a table. Ask students, “Raise your hand if you jumped.” Briefly tell your students who Helen Keller was and show a short clip from The Miracle Worker. Now ask your students to consider the challenges faced by Patty Duke playing someone who is both deaf and blind. “If you were Patty Duke, what could you do to prepare for this role so that you wouldn’t respond to sudden, loud noises?” After students share their ideas, reveal how Duke’s guardians prepared her. ... View more

I’m fortunate to have small classes (max 38), and so my students and I get to know each other very well. With in-class exams it’s been years since I’ve caught anyone cheating. Of course it’s possible that some students are cheating, and I’m just not seeing it. Without doubt some have gotten away with it. But I prefer to believe that the mutual respect that I foster over the course of an 11-week quarter reduces cheating. But I also have my students sign their names at the top of their exams. A fascinating set of experiments (Shu, et.al., 2012) found that when participants were given an opportunity to cheat while reporting their own results on a task or, in a naturalistic setting, reporting their car’s mileage at a used car dealership, they were less likely to overstate their numbers if they signed their names at the beginning of the reporting event rather than at the end or not at all. The proposed mechanism behind this is self-awareness. Being aware of ourselves – as a signature does – reminds us of what moral beings we are. The more moral we’re feeling, the less likely we are to cheat – or so the thinking goes. Does a signature at the top of an exam reduce cheating in a classroom setting? I don’t know. I didn’t have the foresight to look at average exam scores before and after I started asking for signatures, and now I don’t even remember when I started doing it. But I do know it’s a simple enough thing to implement. If you decide to add a signature line to your exams, consider testing its effectiveness. I’d love to see your results! Shu, L. L., Mazar, N., Gino, F., Ariely, D., & Bazerman, M. H. (2012). Signing at the beginning makes ethics salient and decreases dishonest self-reports in comparison to signing at the end. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 109(38), 15197-15200. doi:10.1073/pnas.1209746109 ... View more

The coverage of epigenetics in Intro Psych textbooks appears to be slowly on the rise. And with good reason. If you're not familiar with epigenetics, this 9-minute student-friendly video is a nice introduction Video Link : 1576 For a more scholarly introduction to epigenetics, this 2016 article from Child Development will get you up to speed. In Intro Psych, your textbook may give an overview of the topic wherever it covers genetics and revisit epigenetics again during coverage of psychology disorders. Research is stacking up. Our experiences influence the turning on and off of genes that are linked to psychological disorders. For example, "Exposure to stressful or traumatic life events, especially early in life (early life stress (ELS)), is one of the strongest risk factors for a number of psychiatric disorders, ranging from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) over depression to bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Over the past decade, an ever growing body of evidence indicates that exposure to stressful life events can lead to long lasting changes in a number of systems including the endocrine system, the immune system and brain structure and function" (Provencal & Binder, 2015). If a cause of psychological disorders is related to epigenetics, the effectiveness of treatments may also reside in epigenetics. Electroconvulsive therapy, for example, may alter epigenetic tags (Jong, et.al., 2014). Psychiatric drugs may also work this way (Boks, et.al., 2012). For Intro Psych, the specifics of epigenetics is probably not that important, but a broad overview and the implications of the research are certainly worth the time. References Boks, M. P., de Jong, N. M., Kas, M. J. H., Vinkers, C. H., Fernandes, C., Kahn, R. S., … Ophoff, R. A. (2012). Current status and future prospects for epigenetic psychopharmacology. Epigenetics, 7(1), 20–28. http://doi.org/10.4161/epi.7.1.18688 Jong, J. O., Arts, B., Boks, M. P., Sienaert, P., Hove, D. L., Kenis, G., . . . Rutten, B. P. (2014). Epigenetic effects of electroconvulsive seizures. The Journal of ECT, 30(2), 152-159. doi:10.1097/yct.0000000000000141  Lester, B. M., Conradt, E. and Marsit, C. (2016), Introduction to the Special Section on Epigenetics. Child Development, 87: 29–37. doi: 10.1111/cdev.12489 Provencal, N., & Binder, E. B. (2015). The neurobiological effects of stress as contributors to psychiatric disorders: Focus on epigenetics. Current Opinion in Neurobiology, 30, 31-37. doi:10.1016/j.conb.2014.08.007  ... View more

Earlier this week in my Intro Psych course, we were knee-deep in the social psych chapter when a student asked about Kitty Genovese. The standard story reported in most Intro Psych textbooks turns out to be not quite the whole story. While we know that the bystander effect exists and we know what factors increase the likelihood of the bystander effect occurring, there's much more to Genovese's murder than 38 uncaring people. I took a deep breath and gave some context to the tale that has become a part of our cultural consciousness. To expand your own background I recommend starting with the Manning, Levine, and Collins September, 2007 American Psychologist article, The Kitty Genovese murder and the social psychology of helping: The parable of the 38 witnesses. For a deeper exploration of what happened that night in 1964, check out Kevin Cook's 2014 book Kitty Genovese: The murder, the bystanders, the crime that changed America​. If the social psych chapter is coming up faster than you can read, take an hour and watch his 2014 book talk at the Kansas City Public Library. Video Link : 1560 ... View more

Contributed by Mark Gluck, author of Learning and Memory. Featuring Dr. Andrew Peter Mallon, CEO and Director of Research, Calista Therapeutics, and contributed by innovative teachers. Currently, my primary interest in connection with Learning and Memory is the discovery and development of new treatments that cure the diseases of learning and memory, either by protecting or regenerating damaged CNS cells, in diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease, or by enhancing the capacity of the CNS to learn, in diseases like autism. Previously, I taught Learning and Memory for many years, whilst an Assistant Professor (Adj) at Brown University. In my view, the best lessons that can be taught are those that fundamentally inform students about the nature of their own psychology and how it works for and against them without their awareness. My two favorite classroom exercises explore two critical aspects of learning: conditioning and learned helplessness. In my classroom exercise on conditioning, I paired the ingestion of a very sweet, sugary substance (US) that elicits salivation (UR) with a distinctive sound (CS). I have used various sounds as the CS, including a dog-training clicker or saying ”test time” in my inimitable Scottish accent. The pairing can be performed during a normal lecture, and conditioning can quickly be established. Then, after the sugar is removed, the retention and extinction rate of the salivation response (CR) can be assessed in individuals. The association can be extinguished by pairing wasabi with the CS, but in the absence of intentional extinction, I have found that the CS–CR association can last weeks. For me, the real-life lesson from this observation is that it is equally possible to establish an association between a pleasant stimulus and a person: If you (CS) want to be liked by another person, you can pair your presence or your interaction with them with an agreeable US, such as a nice smile, eye contact, humor, friendliness, a compliment, or a bunch of flowers, chocolate, or other small gift. It is a reliable way to enhance one’s interactions with other people and can be remarkably effective. I used the standard impossible anagram experiment to induce learned helplessness in half of my class as a rapid way of demonstrating the power of that pathological psychological effect; however, I follow it up with a discussion that helps students differentiate pathological learned helplessness from the necessary realization that in some cases failure is inevitable. Learned helplessness is widely considered to be an important element of depression, and it is critical for students to understand it and to learn techniques to halt the downward cycles into learned helplessness that can stymie the treatment of depression. It is also important to distinguish between pathological learned helplessness, in which the person submits to failure in an achievable endeavor, and the reasonable recognition that some goals truly are unachievable. In the example I cite to demonstrate learned helplessness, a male student asks a young lady to the prom, is refused, asks another and is again refused, and becomes despondent and never asks another. I contrast that with the example of jumping off tall buildings while flapping one’s arms in the hope of flying, an endeavor in which one should submit to failure. The key to truly understanding learned helplessness lies in distinguishing what is really possible from what is impossible. ... View more

Written and contributed by Mark Gluck, author of Learning and Memory. Addicted to Love? Thinking about the object of his desire, Sam’s heart starts to pound, his palms get sweaty, and he feels excitement and anticipation. Denied access, he becomes irritable, has trouble sleeping, and develops an overwhelming obsession that swamps all other interests. Based on the above description, Sam might be a cocaine addict. Or he might just be passionately in love. Humans viewing pictures of their beloved show increased brain activity in areas including the dorsal striatum, the VTA/SNc, and the orbitofrontal cortex (Aron et al., 2005; Xu et al., 2010). These are some of the same brain areas activated by addictive drugs such as cocaine and amphetamine, and they are different from the brain areas activated by sexual arousal, indicating that romantic love is more than just a drive to obtain sex (Fisher, Aron, & Brown, 2005). Viewing pictures of a romantic partner can even produce pain relief, apparently by activating reward centers in the brain that overrule the simultaneous processing of pain (Younger, Aron, Parke, Chatterjee, & Mackey, 2010). If romantic love activates the same reward circuits as cocaine, can it be just as addictive? Individuals experiencing intense romantic infatuation can display behaviors reminiscent of drug seeking: pursuit of the beloved to the exclusion of other activities, obsessive and intrusive thoughts, and even impulsiveness and poor decision making—leading, for example, to crimes of passion (Frascella, Potenza, Brown, & Childress, 2010). On the other hand, just because romantic love shares some brain circuitry with cocaine and can elicit some of the same behaviors doesn’t necessarily justify calling love an “addictive substance.” Not everything that elicits reward-seeking behavior or that provokes withdrawal symptoms qualifies for that label. (You seek out water when you’re thirsty, and you experience distress if you go too long without; yet would you consider yourself “addicted” to water?) Many experts believe that the depression and grief that accompany a breakup are a normal part of life— not evidence of an addictive disorder. Nonetheless, some individuals do display excessive devotion to their beloved and experience severe withdrawal symptoms after romantic rejection, including clinical depression and (in rare cases) suicide or homicide. It is possible that, just as some individuals can try cocaine and walk away while others become pathologically addicted, so too some individuals can survive a painful breakup while others remain trapped in a state of loss. Debate continues regarding whether such individuals should be diagnosed with a pathological addiction (Reynaud, Karila, Blecha, & Benyamina, 2010). As research elucidates the brain substrates of drug addiction and suggests therapies (including medication) to reduce the cravings associated with drug withdrawal, should we consider using the same medications to help reduce cravings following romantic rejection? If you’ve ever had your heart broken by a failed romance, would you have taken advantage of such a treatment if it existed? ... View more

Written and contributed by Mark Gluck, author of Learning and Memory. It has long been assumed that sleep, beyond its role in rest and refreshment, also has a facilitating effect on learning and memory. After all, who doesn’t recognize the experience of working fruitlessly on a problem to the point of exhaustion, and then coming up with a sudden solution following a night of sleep? It is only over the last two decades that the effect of sleep on cognition has been studied in depth by the scientific community. This research has led to a growing understanding of how sleep affects learning and memory. A typical night of sleep includes cycles of alternating sleep stages, each characterized by a different profile of brain activity. In one of these stages, rapid-eye-movement (REM), or paradoxical, sleep,  the brain seems as active as when awake. This is the stage in which most dreams appear. Another stage, slow-wave sleep (SWS), or deep sleep, is characterized by highly synchronized brain-neuron activity and is the stage in which it is most difficult to wake the sleeper up. Recent research has combined sophisticated experimental designs, neuroimaging, and single-cell recordings to discover the relative impacts of the different sleep stages on various cognitive functions. It shows that SWS is mostly important for the consolidation of declarative memory, as well as for rule learning, spatial navigation, and insight. REM sleep, on the other hand, exerts its greatest effect on procedural memory. Some of the mechanisms by which sleep contributes to these functions are also becoming clear. During SWS, the hippocampus, a brain region involved in episodic and associative learning, ”replays” some of the waking experiences acquired during the previous day. The replay allows the new memories to be reorganized into a more efficient structure and also contributes to their assimilation into the general knowledge store of the individual. This reorganization is reflected as better performance the following day. Many questions are still unanswered. For example, the mechanism by which REM sleep facilitates learning and memory remains somewhat less characterized in comparison to that of SWS. However, the rapid advancements in this field hold out promise that the years to come will bring a fuller account of why the third of our lives we spend sleeping, a seemingly wasteful behavior from a learning–memory perspective,  is in fact not wasted at all. FURTHER READING Stickgold, R., & Walker, M. P. (2005). Memory consolidation and reconsolidation: What is the role of sleep? Trends in Neuroscience, 28, 408–415. Diekelmann, S., & Born, J. (2010). The memory function of sleep. Nature Review Neuroscience, 11, 114–126. ... View more

Yesterday author Albert Bandura joined Michael Krasny of The Forum to discuss his latest book, Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm and Live With Themselves.  In the interview, Dr. Bandura takes a look at how people rationalize committing inhumanities and why some people seem to lack moral accountability. In his theory, Dr. Bandura identifies eight methods that people use to disengage morally and still feel good about themselves.  The first, and in Dr. Bandura’s opinion likely the most powerful, is moral justification – using worthwhile ends to justify inhumane means.  As an example, Dr. Bandura points to recent atrocities committed by ISIS in the name of Allah where religious ideology “justifies” the means. But what about people who refuse to cross over the line and do not commit such acts?  Those people show moral courage; they have a sense of common humanity and also have empathy and compassion for the plight of others.  In his book, Dr. Bandura also emphasizes the power of humanization and highlights a story from WWI during which the Allied and German forces were in the trenches about to launch a campaign on Christmas Eve.  The soldiers decided to come together in a one-day truce. Exchanging rations and pictures of their families and children, the soldiers humanized themselves.  When the truce was over, they had a sense that their enemies were good people and were presented with a choice -- they chose to shoot over the trenches. To hear more about Dr. Bandura’s theory, stream or download the full interview: http://www.kqed.org/a/forum/R201603031000 Learn more about Dr. Bandura's text, Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm and Live With Themselves: http://www.macmillanhighered.com/Catalog/product/moraldisengagement-firstedition-bandura ... View more

Next week I’ll cover the social psych chapter in Intro Psych. I’ve been thinking of some quick and easy ways to get students to do some deeper thinking around the social psych concepts covered in the textbook. In all cases, I’ll use think/pair/share – ask students to take a minute to think and jot down a response, take a minute to share their response with a neighbor, and then ask for a few volunteers to share their responses with the class. If you use a classroom response system, like Socrative, ask volunteers to type in their responses. Do these as you go or at the end of class as a recap. “You see a person trip and fall down steps. If you have fallen prey to the fundamental attribution error, what would you say caused the person to trip?” “You want to borrow $20 from a friend. If you were to use the foot-in-the-door technique, what would you ask your friend first? “You want to borrow $20 from a different friend. If you were to use the door-in-the-face technique, what would you ask your friend first? “You are working on a group project. The group leader is fostering groupthink. What is the group leader saying?” “You are the leader for a group project. You want to avoid groupthink. What are you saying?” “You are at a local sporting event. The fans of the local team are exhibiting ingroup bias. What are they doing or saying?” “You are standing on a street corner with dozens of other people as you watch two cars crash into each other. You notice that you and your fellow witnesses are in the midst of experiencing the bystander effect. What are you thinking in that moment that keeps you from helping?” “You are in a car accident. A crowd has gathering on the sidewalk, but the bystander effect has them frozen. What can you do or say to increase the likelihood of someone helping?” ... View more

Check out this Op-Ed from Psychology Today by Albert Bandura, author of Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm and Live With Themselves. Dr. Bandura draws on his agentic theory to examine the mechanisms by which individuals in all walks of life commit inhumanities that violate their moral standards and still retain a positive self-regard and live in peace with themselves. Read the Op-Ed: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/thought-action-efficacy/201602/how-people-commit-inhumanities Learn more about Dr. Bandura's text, Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm and Live With Themselves: http://www.macmillanhighered.com/Catalog/product/moraldisengagement-firstedition-bandura ... View more

Those who write/draw comic strips are often astute observers of human behavior. That makes the funny pages a gold mine for psychology examples. (Here’s another blog post I wrote about a comic strip illustrating the spotlight effect.) Last week (February 16, 2016), Scott Adams of Dilbert fame gave us a wonderful example of the door-in-the-face technique. When a coworker’s babysitter cancels, she asks Dilbert if he likes kids. He assures her that he is not interested in watching her kids. She replies, “I was going to ask you to adopt them.” There’s the door-in-the face. Dilbert’s replies, “Absolutely not. The best I can is watch them tonight.” One of my favorites comes from Mark Tatulli’s Lio (November 14, 2009). Lio is known for having a different group of friends than most kids. Including in his group are ghouls, goblins, and, yes, even death. In this particular comic strip, Lio loudly rips open a bag of “Monsta Treats.” In the next panel we see a monster towering over Lio, soaking him with dripping saliva. Ask students, in pairs or small groups, to identify the unconditioned stimulus, unconditioned responses, conditioned stimulus, and conditioned response. Circulate around the room clarifying as needed. Bring the class back together and identify each. Next ask what generalization would look like. And then ask what would need to happen to bring about extinction. Hilary Price in her Rhymes with Orange comic (August 21, 2013) gave a nice side-by-side comparison of positive and negative reinforcement. In the first panel a middle schooler is working on homework, and an off-panel parent says “If you finish this homework, I will let you watch a show.” In the second panel an adult is typing on a computer, and the adult’s thought bubble reads “If I finish this paragraph, I will let myself pee.” Ask students, again in pairs or small groups, to identify the behaviors being reinforced, and then to identify which is positive reinforcement (first panel) and which is negative reinforcement (adult) and explain why. If you have a favorite comic strip that illustrates some psychological comment, please leave a link to it in the comments! ... View more