Undergraduate Course: Debates in Current Personality (PSYL10120)
Course Outline
| School | School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 4 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 10 |
ECTS Credits | 5 |
| Summary | In personality psychology, as elsewhere, many fundamental questions appear to be open for debate. This course will offer advanced students an interactive forum for learning about some of these questions along with some possible contradicting answers to them.
The first week's session will be a lecture introducing four topics to be covered and debated in the following sessions (see below). The following four sessions will comprise debates on these four topics. Students will be randomly assigned into eight groups such that each week two groups will have to debate on one of the topics, defending contradicting views. During the last third of each of these four sessions, each student will write a 100-150 word summary defending either of the positions held by the debaters of the week, which is to consolidate the learned material. Each summary will then be independently peer-marked by two other students at the end of the session, which is to further consolidate the material (the peer-marks will not be used for the course marks, but will be returned to students for feedback).
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| Course description |
Not entered
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Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | Degree major in Psychology and passes in psychology courses at least to the equivalent of junior honours level in Edinburgh.
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| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2018/19, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 40 |
| Course Start |
Block 3 (Sem 2) |
| Course Start Date |
14/01/2019 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
100
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Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 2,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
98 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
20% participation (4% for each lecture).
40% debate participation, engagement and argumentation. Each student will participate in one debate; the dates will be randomly assigned in the first lecture. Assessment will be carried out by the course organiser on a scale from 0 to 40.
40% critical essay (maximum length 1500 words) at the end of the course on one of the debated topics (excluding the topic on which the student debated), weighing evidence for both sides of the debate.
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| Feedback |
Not entered |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Understand that some of the most fundamental questions of personality psychology are still open for debate.
- Know some of the opposing views on the covered outstanding topics of personality psychology.
- Be more skilled in argumentation in both written and verbal manner.
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Reading List
Indicative but not exhaustive bibliography
Deary, I. J. (2009). The trait approach to personality. In P. J. Corr & G. Matthews (Eds.), The Cambridge handbook of personality psychology. (pp. 89 - 109). New York, NY US: Cambridge University Press
McCrae, R. R., & Costa, P. T. (2008). Empirical and theoretical status of the five-factor model of personality traits. In B. Boyle, G. Matthews, & D. Saklofske (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of personality theory and assessment: Volume 1 - Personality theories and models (pp. 273 - 295). London: SAGE
Cervone, D. (2004). The Architecture of Personality. Psychological Review, 111, 183 - 204. doi:10.1037/0033-295X.111.1.183
Cramer, A. O. J., van der Sluis, S., Noordhof, A., Wichers, M., Geschwind, N., Aggen, S. H., Borsboom, D. (2012). Dimensions of Normal Personality as Networks in Search of Equilibrium: You Can¿t Like Parties if You Don¿t Like People. European Journal of Personality, 26, 414 - 431. doi:10.1002/per.1866
Mischel, W., & Shoda, Y. (1998). Reconciling processing dynamics and personality dispositions. Annual Review of Psychology, 49, 229 - 258. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.49.1.229
Roberts, B. W., Wood, D., & Smith, J. L. (2005). Evaluating Five Factor Theory and social investment perspectives on personality trait development. Journal of Research in Personality, 39, 166 -184. doi:10.1016/j.jrp.2004.08.002
Ozer, D. J., & Benet-Martínez, V. (2006). Personality and the prediction of consequential outcomes. Annual Review of Psychology, 57, 401 - 421.
doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.57.102904.190127
Roberts, B. W., Kuncel, N. R., Shiner, R., Caspi, A., & Goldberg, L. R. (2007). The power of personality: The comparative validity of personality traits, socioeconomic status, and cognitive ability for predicting important life outcomes. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 2, 313 - 345. doi:10.1111/j.1745-6916.2007.00047.x
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Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Not entered |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Rene Mottus
Tel: (0131 6)50 3410
Email: rene.mottus@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Ms Stephanie Fong
Tel: (0131 6)51 3733
Email: S.Fong@ed.ac.uk |
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