Psychology 2135A 650 SU22

Cognitive Psychology

If there is a discrepancy between the outline posted below and the outline posted on the OWL course website, the latter shall prevail.

Western University

London                             Canada

Department of Psychology

Summer Distance 2022

Psychology 2135A 650 Cognitive Psychology

 

  • Calendar Description

An introduction to empirical, computational, and theoretical approaches to the study of human cognitive processes. The topics surveyed include perception, attention, memory, concepts, language and problem-solving. The course will show how these diverse psychological processes are related to and influence one another. 4 lecture hours, 0.5 course

  • Antirequisites

Psychology 2010A/B, 2180E. Antirequisites are courses that overlap sufficiently in content that only one can be taken for credit. If you take a course that is an antirequisite to a course previously taken, you will lose credit for the earlier course, regardless of the grade achieved in the most recent course

  • Prerequisites

A mark of at least 60% in 1.0 credits of Psychology at the 1000 level. Unless you have either the requisites for this course or written special permission from your Dean to enroll in it, you may be removed from this course and it will be deleted from your record. This decision may not be appealed. You will receive no adjustment to your fees in the event that you are dropped from a course for failing to have the necessary prerequisites

  • Course Information

Instructor: Toka Zhu, MSc; tzhu9@uwo.ca

Office Hours: by appointment

Teaching Assistant: N/A

TA Office & Hours: N/A

Delivery Method: Online (asynchronous)

Students who are in emotional/mental distress should refer to Health and Wellness @Western https://www.uwo.ca/health/ for a complete list of options about how to obtain help. Please contact the course instructor if you require material in an alternate format or if you require any other arrangements to make this course more accessible to you. You may also wish to contact Student Accessibility Services (formerly known as Services for Students with Disabilities) at 519-661-2147.

  • Course Operation

This is a distance course with asynchronous online lectures and material as noted in the course schedule. Each week’s materials will be posted on Wednesday of that week.

Important course information will be posted on OWL, and this is the main method of communication. It is the student’s responsibility to check the course site regularly for important course information. If you miss a course component (quiz, test, etc) when the information for that course component is available on OWL, then you will receive a grade of zero on that course component.

  • Office Hours and Zoom

I hold weekly office hours by Zoom on Monday from 11:30 - 1:00. You must be logged into Western’s Zoom account to participate. The link is available on OWL and here  https://westernuniversity.zoom.us/j/93176128313, Passcode: 280522. These meetings are for one-on-one meetings. You can join the waiting room and I’ll meet with people first come first serve.

  • Reading and Notes
    • Textbook

There is one recommended textbook for this course. Cognition, 8th edition, by Daniel Reisberg is available at the University bookstore, Amazon, and elsewhere. The purchase of this text is not required but I encourage you to have access to a textbook. You may use other texts or earlier editions of Reisberg’s book for the same purpose.

  • Course Notes

Notes and slides from each class will be available on the course website (OWL). A copy of the slides will be available along with the lecture recording for note taking and review. Students may share their own notes on the OWL site or other note sharing sites. Your notes are your intellectual property, you can share as much or as little as you feel comfortable.

  • Course Objectives

An introduction to empirical, computational, and theoretical approaches to the study of human cognitive processes. The topics surveyed include perception, attention, memory, concepts, language and problem-solving. The course will show how these diverse psychological processes are related to and influence one another. The primary mode of instruction is online lecture and discussion. Assessment consists of multiple-choice exams.

  • Student Learning Outcomes

Upon successful completion of this course, student should be able to:

  • Describe key concepts, principles, and overarching themes relevant to cognitive psychology. This outcome will be assessed via multiple choice exams.
  • Identify concepts and current states of knowledge in both the natural science and social science aspects of cognitive psychology. This outcome will be assessed via multiple choice exams.
  • Engage in a critical scholarly discussion on a psychological topic using evidence to support claims. This outcome will be encouraged and developed via class discussion.
  • Critically evaluate the presentation of scientific ideas and research in the popular media. This outcome will be encouraged and developed via class discussion.
  • Apply psychological principles to the understanding of everyday problems. This outcome will be encouraged and developed via class discussion.
  • Evaluation
    • Quizzes

There are 4 online quizzes according to the schedule below. Each quiz will be available on OWL from 11:00am – 11:00pm (for 12 hours) on the day it is scheduled. The quizzes are timed but not proctored. You can take the quiz any time during the posted time. Once you begin you will have 15 minutes to complete the quiz.

  • Exams

There are two exams in the course as shown in Section 6. The exams timed but not proctored The midterm exam will be available from 11:00am – 11:00pm (for 12 hours) on the day it is scheduled. You can take the exam any time during that time period, but once you begin you will have two hours to complete. You should begin the exam no later than 9:00pm in order to have the full two hours.

The final exam will be held online, date TBA.

Each exam will cover the material preceding and will be of multiple choice format.

If you require or receive accommodation for extra time on course work please connect with Services for Students with Disabilities as soon as possible and let me know so that I can make accommodations. Each exam is worth 45% of the final grade, the exams together are worth 90% of the final grade.

  • Make Up Policy

If you are unable to take a quiz or exam as scheduled, you must obtain permission from your academic dean via your counsellor in order to make up the exam or use an SRA. See Section 11 for information on seeking accommodations. Please note the Western policy that instructors are not permitted to receive documentation directly from a student, whether in support of an application for medical grounds, or for other reasons. All documentation required for absences that are not covered by the absence reporting policy must be submitted to the Academic Counselling Office of a student’s home faculty. The current policy on student absences is available here. Information on accommodation appeals and medical certificates is available here.

Once I receive the verification of your eligibility for a makeup exam a make-up exam will be scheduled some time after the final exam. Any exam not taken or made up will be scored as “0”. A makeup quiz with alternative questions (not the same questions as the scheduled quiz) will be available online in the same week after the scheduled quiz expires.

  • Final Grade

The final grade will be calculated according to the components shown in the breakdown. No grades will be rounded.

Component

Breakdown

Quizzes (4)

10% of final grade

Exams (2)

90% of final grade
  • Senate Policy

The expectation is that course marks will be distributed around the following averages:

Grade

Description

70%

1000–level and 2099–level courses

72%

2100–2990 level courses

75%

3000–level courses

80%

4000–level courses

The Psychology Department follows Western’s grading guidelines (see the policy here.)

Grade

Range

Description

A+

90-100

One could scarcely expect better from a student at this level

A

80-89

Superior work that is clearly above average

B

70-79

Good work, meeting all requirements, and eminently satisfactory

C

60-69

Competent work, meeting requirements

D

50-59

Fair work, minimally acceptable

F

below 50

Fail

Note that if course grades are significantly higher or lower than these averages, instructors may be required to make adjustments to course grades. Such adjustment might include the normalization of one or more course components and/or the re-weighting of various course components.

Policy on Grade Rounding: Please note that although course grades within the Psychology Department are rounded to the nearest whole number, no further grade rounding will be done. No additional assignments will be offered to enhance a final grade; nor will requests to change a grade because it is needed for a future program be considered. To maximize your grade, do your best on each assessment within the course.

  • Exam Review

Grades will be released on OWL. Exams may be reviewed by making an appointment with the instructor. The instructor will NOT re-grade questions or award points after the grades have been released.

  • Assessment / Evaluation Schedule

Exam/Quiz

Date

Location

Content

Value

Quiz 1

June 10

Online

Weeks 1—5

2.5%

Quiz 2

June 24

Online

Weeks 6—7

2.5%

Midterm

June 28

Online

Weeks 1—7

45%

Quiz 3

July 15

Online

Weeks 9—10

2.5%

Quiz 4

July 29

Online

Weeks 11—12

2.5%

Final

Aug 2

Online

Weeks 9—12

45%
  • Lecture Schedule
    • Section 1: The Brain, Memory, and the Mind

The first section of the course covers the history of cognitive psychology, how and why cognitive psychology developed from the earlier study of psychology, and in what direction the study of cognition is headed. We will also learn about the brain, perceptual systems, basic object recognition, and attention.

Week

Date

Topic

Readings

1

May 9

The Study of Cognition

Reisberg Ch. 1

2

May 16

Brain Science

Reisberg Ch. 2

3

May 23

Visual Perception/Recognizing Objects

Reisberg Ch. 3 & 4

4

May 30

Attention

Reisberg Ch. 5

5

June 6

Knowledge Representation

Reisberg Ch. 9

-

June 10

Online Quiz 1, Weeks 1—5

Reisberg Ch. 1—5, 9

6

June 13

Memory: Encoding and Storage

Reisberg Ch. 6

7

June 20

Memory: Retention and Retrieval

Reisberg Ch. 7

7

June 20

Memory and the Brain

Reisberg Ch. 8

-

June 24

Online Quiz 2, Weeks 6—7 

Reisberg Ch. 6—8

8

June 28

Online Midterm, Weeks 1—7

Reisberg Ch. 1—9

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
  • Section 2: Higher Order Cognition

The final unit covers complex cognitive processes, such as language use and reasoning and other forms of higher order thinking. We’ll need to rely on some of the ideas from earlier classes, such as memory and attention. The exam for this section will be scheduled during final period.

Week

Date

Topic

Readings

9

July 4

Judgement and Reasoning

Reisberg Ch. 12

10

July 11

Problem Solving

Reisberg Ch. 13

-

July 15

Online Quiz 3, Weeks 9—10

Reisberg Ch. 12 – 13

11

July 18

Language

Reisberg Ch. 10

12

July 25

Consciousness

Reisberg Ch. 15

-

July 29

Online Quiz 4, Weeks 11—12

Reisberg Ch. 10 & 15

-

Aug 2-5

Online Final Exam: date TBA 

Reisberg Ch. 10, 12, 13, 15

  • Land Acknowledgment

We acknowledge that Western University is located on the traditional lands of the Anishinaabek, Haudenosaunee, Lūnaapéewak and Attawandaron peoples, on lands connected with the London Township and Sombra Treaties of 1796 and the Dish with One Spoon Covenant Wampum.

With this, we respect the longstanding relationships that Indigenous Nations have to this land, as they are the original caretakers. We acknowledge historical and ongoing injustices that Indigenous Peoples (e.g. First Nations, Métis and Inuit) endure in Canada, and we accept responsibility as a public institution to contribute toward revealing and correcting miseducation, as well as renewing respectful relationships with Indigenous communities through our teaching, research and community service.

  • Statement on Academic Offences

Students are responsible for understanding the nature and avoiding the occurrence of plagiarism and other scholastic offences. Plagiarism and cheating are considered very serious offences because they undermine the integrity of research and education. Actions constituting a scholastic offence are described at the following link.

As of Sept. 1, 2009, the Department of Psychology will take the following steps to detect scholastic offences. All multiple-choice tests and exams will be checked for similarities in the pattern of responses using reliable software, and records will be made of student seating locations in all tests and exams. All written assignments will be submitted to TurnItIn, a service designed to detect and deter plagiarism by comparing written material to over 5 billion pages of content located on the Internet or in TurnItIn’s databases. All papers submitted for such checking will be included as source documents in the reference database for the purpose of detecting plagiarism of papers subsequently submitted to the system. Use of the service is subject to the licensing agreement, currently between Western and Turnitin.com.

Computer-marked multiple-choice tests and/or exams will be subject to submission for similarity review by software that will check for unusual coincidences in answer patterns that may indicate cheating.

In classes that involve the use of a personal response system (PRS), data collected using the PRS will only be used in a manner consistent to that described in this outline. It is the instructor’s responsibility to make every effort to ensure that data remain confidential. However, students should be aware that as with all forms of electronic communication, privacy is not guaranteed. Your PRS login credentials are for your sole use only. Students attempting to use another student’s credentials to submit data through the PRS may be subject to academic misconduct proceedings.

Possible penalties for a scholastic offence include failure of the assignment/exam, failure of the course, suspension from the University, and expulsion from the University.

  • Policy on the Use of Exam Proctoring Software

When examinations and tests cannot be given in person (e.g., in courses coded as Distance Studies; in the event of a lockdown order), they may be conducted using either a monitoring platform such as Zoom or a remote proctoring service, such as Proctorio. If Zoom is used for exam invigilation, you will be required to keep your camera on for the entire session, hold up your student card for identification purposes, and share your screen with the invigilator if asked to do so at any time during the exam. The exam session using Zoom will not be recorded.*

If a remote proctoring service is used, the service will require you to provide personal information (including some biometric data). The session will be recorded. The instructor will alert you to the use of this software as close as possible to the start of the term, however, in the event that in-person exams are unexpectedly canceled, you may only be given notice of the use of a proctoring service a short time in advance. More information about remote proctoring is available in the Online Proctoring Guidelines. Please ensure you are familiar with any proctoring service’s technical requirements before the exam. Additional guidance is available at the following link: https://www.uwo.ca/univsec/pdf/onlineproctorguidelines.pdf

* Please note that Zoom servers are located outside Canada. If you would prefer to use only your first name or a nickname to login to Zoom, please provide this information to the instructor in advance of the test or examination. See this link for technical requirements: https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us  

  • Policy on Accommodation for Illness or Other Absences

Western’s policy on Accommodation for Medical Illness can be found HERE :

The full policy for consideration for absences can be accessed HERE

If you experience an extenuating circumstance (e.g., illness, injury) sufficiently significant to temporarily make you unable to meet academic requirements, you may request accommodation through the following routes:

  • Submitting a Self-Reported Absence form (for circumstances that are expected to resolve within 48 hours);
  • For medical absences, submitting a Student Medical Certificate (SMC) signed by a licensed medical or mental health practitioner in order to be eligible for Academic Consideration;
  • For non-medical absences, submitting appropriate documentation (e.g., obituary, police report, accident report, court order, etc.) to Academic Counselling in their Faculty of registration in order to be eligible for academic consideration. Students are encouraged to contact their Academic Counselling unit to clarify what documentation is appropriate.

Students must see the Academic Counsellor and submit all required documentation in order to be approved for certain accommodation. The self-reported absence form must be submitted before the exam/coursework deadline in order to be valid. It may NOT be used for absences longer than 48 hours; coursework/tests/exams/etc., worth more than 30% of the final grade; or exams scheduled in the December or April final-exam periods: http://counselling.ssc.uwo.ca/procedures/medical_accommodation.html

Students seeking academic consideration:

  • are advised to consider carefully the implications of postponing tests or midterm exams or delaying handing in work;  
  • are encouraged to make appropriate decisions based on their specific circumstances, recognizing that minor ailments (upset stomach) or upsets (argument with a friend) are not normally an appropriate basis for a self-reported absence;
  • must communicate with their instructors no later than 24 hoursafter the end of the period covered by either the self-reported absence or SMC, or immediately upon their return following a documented absence
  • Other Information

Office of the Registrar: http://registrar.uwo.ca 

Student Development Services: www.sdc.uwo.ca

Please see the Psychology Undergraduate web site for information on the following:

  • Policy on Cheating and Academic Misconduct
  • Procedures for Appealing Academic Evaluations
  • Policy on Attendance
  • Policy Regarding Makeup Exams and Extensions of Deadlines
  • Policy for Assignments
  • Short Absences
  • Extended Absence
  • Documentation
  • Academic Concerns
  • 2021-2022 Calendar References

Copyright Statement: Lectures and course materials, including power point presentations, outlines, videos and similar materials, are protected by copyright. You may take notes and make copies of course materials for your own educational use. You may not record lectures, reproduce (or allow others to reproduce), post or distribute any course materials publicly and/or for commercial purposes without the instructor’s written consent.

Policy on the Recording of Synchronous Sessions: Some or all of the remote learning sessions for this course (if scheduled) may be recorded. The data captured during these recordings may include your image, voice recordings, chat logs and personal identifiers (name displayed on the screen). The recordings will be used for educational purposes related to this course, including evaluations. The recordings may be disclosed to other individuals participating in the course for their private or group study purposes. Please contact the instructor if you have any concerns related to session recordings. Participants in this course are not permitted to privately record the sessions, except where recording is an approved accommodation, or the student has the prior written permission of the instructor.