Social Aspects of Behavior in Education

Catalog description

A critical and detailed examination of social behavior in canons of classic and contemporary theoretical and empirical work. S PSY 517 Social Aspects of Behavior in Education (3) Social aspects of behavior are fundamental to the practice of professional psychology. This course is designed to provide graduate students in the professional areas of psychology and other developed practice areas a critical and detailed examination of social behavior. Specifically, the course is also designed to illustrate how the individual and social interaction shape and are shaped by the cultures and social situations in which they exist. Students will have the opportunity to acquire and demonstrate substantial understanding of and competence in the current body of knowledge in mainstream social aspects of behavior. Topics that will be addressed are the social cognition, attribution, affiliation, attraction, and social comparison, aggression, equity, and social exchange attitudes and attitude change, conformity, prejudice and discrimination, and group dynamics. Presented within each of these topics will be: (a) the canons of classic research and theory, (b) contemporary theoretical and empirical work, and (c) recent events that show the presence of the social aspects of psychology in daily life. As a result, a focus of each topic will be on the application of social aspects to the practice of psychology and student's own research.