After finally finishing the bottle of pinot that was knocking about in the back of the fridge (because, lets face it, I couldn't leave it unfinished) I managed to knuckle down and get stuck into study week one, which didn't actually take me that much time. The first week is basically just guiding you through the structure of the course and what topics are being covered and why. There's a lot to take in, as the course material points out (rather repetitiously!!) psychology is extremely broad and multi-faceted (a course buzzword I think!), meaning there is an extensive range of topics to cover, as well as the different approaches and perspectives (am I right in thinking that approaches and perspectives are the same thing??) to each topic, as well as the range of different methods than can be used within each perspective. So yes, a lot to get your head around and my mind is already whirling-and I haven't even started the main body of the course yet!
The materials are, as always with the OU, excellent and well put together. The examples offered by the course are really interesting-the Milgram experiment was fascinating, i've already covered this experiment briefly when I was doing A-Level psych, but the DVD rom clip of the experiment really helped to bring it to life. The introduction to the chapter was short and sweet, albeit slightly repetitive, and the audio complimented the chapter by going into the course structure a little deeper (I shall refrain from passing comment on the dodgy elevator music used on the audio-whatever floats you boat! But I think a little Tears for Fears may have been more appropriate).
The chapter touched lightly upon the different types of data used in research-behaviour, inner-experience, material data and symbolic data-and general info about hypotheses (or claims) and how/when they are formed and brief info on participants for research studies, a 'sample' which can then be divided into control group and experimental group, as well as inroducing variables. I'm hoping that variables get more mention later on the course as I found it hard to get my head around them!! Also different methods were looked at, distinguishing between quantitative and qualitative data, and different methods of gaining this data such as interviewing, observations and psychological testing, meaning and language content analysis and brain imaging.
The most important part of the chapter is on ethics, which features in TMA01 (noooo, TMA mention already!). The chapter contains an abridged version of the BPS' ethics code, and suggested that the general gist of ethics was to ensure that the benefit of research findings outweighs any potential risk to participants (like the Murray experiment, which was a tad on the harsh side and led to one of his participants letter bombing scientist's houses as the thought they were trying to brainwash people. Nice).
Four ethical principles outlines were:
- respect
- competence
- responsibilty
- integrity
each with their own subsection on how psychologists can adhere to these outlines which I shall go into in more detail as it gets closer to the TMA.
Another theme running through the chapter was a brief history of psychology, conveying the message that, even now, people are still adopting and building upon previous knowledge in psychology, enforcing the view that psychology is fast paced and ever changing, and that no one perspective is 'right', but the perspectives blend together to enforce/oppose each others work, sometimes banging heads along the way.
Right, thats all for these weeks entry. Writting this has enable me to go back over my notes and the material to try to cement it in my brain. Only time will tell is it works!
Until next time!!
Candy flee
