Be the Change
Create a 6–9 minute podcast on a contemporary topic in psychology, including an analysis of historical and societal influences, impact on future social thinking, and a plan for how you (and others) can be the change.
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Introduction
“Even simple behaviors are complex at their core” (Geher, 2021). We now turn to timeless debates in psychology; they are part of the history of the field and remain influential even as theories and research change and grow over time.
As you read through debates and current trends in psychology, consider: How might these conversations inspire future psychology learners and help direct them towards different professional pursuits? Ultimately, some of you may pursue graduate school and some of you may pursue different part-time or full-time positions. Our journeys are inspired by different theories and histories within psychology, and, though we all end up on a different path, we share a love for psychology and for helping others.
How will you leave your mark in psychology? We should all strive to “be the change” in one way or another—how can we have a positive impact on the lives of ourselves, those we love, and our communities around us?
In the last assessment, you will create a podcast and reflect upon a contemporary focus in psychology - its social significance, the historical and societal influences that led us there, and its continuing impact on social thinking. You'll end with a plan for how you can “be the change” in the future to improve the human experience related to this contemporary area of psychology.
Reference
Geher, G. (2021, January 24). 5 timeless debates in psychology. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/darwins-su...
Be the Change - Podcast
For this assessment, you will reflect upon different concepts discussed throughout the course, their historical relevance and intersection with today's psychology, and why you need to be part of the positive change moving forward. Submit a 6–9 minute podcast or audio file where you connect one HISTORICAL school of thought's founding figures and ideas with one contemporary school of thought's ideas.
Assessment Preparation
Step 1: Select one contemporary focus in psychology:
- Environmental psychology.
- LGBTQIA+ psychology.
- Black psychology.
- Feminist psychology and intersectionality.
- Decolonizing psychology curriculum/research.
Step 2: Select one historical school of thought that you believe helped to somehow inspire or contribute to your contemporary focus selected in Step 1:
- Functionalism.
- Structuralism.
- Psychoanalysis.
- Behaviorism.
- Cognitive.
- Gestalt.
- Humanism.
Step 3: Select one of the timeless psychology debates that may fit in from “5 Timeless Debates in Psychology” from the Timeless Debates reading list:
- Nature versus nurture.
- Materialism versus constructionism.
- Person versus situation.
- Consistency versus change across development.
- Cultural universals versus cultural variability.
Step 4: Locate four peer-reviewed journal articles that align to your contemporary focus. Be sure that at least one article represents diversity, equity, and inclusion. To accomplish this goal, find at least one article that either comes from an international journal, uses a non-Western population, or represents clearly the experiences of an underrepresented group in the literature. Note: Two articles may be from our course readings, but the other two should be from outside of course readings.
Assessment Instructions
For this assessment, create a podcast or audio recording. Your final product should be 6–9 minutes in length. Use the Assessment 4 Podcast Preparation Guide [DOCX] to help you prepare your script prior to recording your podcast.
- Describe the contemporary topic of interest.
- Evaluate its social significance.
- Analyze the historical and societal influences that have led to this new area of psychology via reviewing research from four peer-reviewed journal articles.
- Explain how the older school of thought influences the present-day field of psychology and specifically your contemporary topic of interest.
- Include at least one theorist name within this discussion!
- Explain how one of the five timeless debates from Geher (2021) fits with the contemporary topic of interest.
- Explain other historical events and/or movements that may have inspired interest in this topic area.
- Explain how the older school of thought influences the present-day field of psychology and specifically your contemporary topic of interest.
- Explain how this new school of thought may guide social thinking in the future.
- Create a plan for how you (and others) can help be the change in the future to improve the human experience in this contemporary area of psychology.
- Consider individual, community, and global scales.
Submission Instructions
There are two deliverables: Submit both your audio file or link and a reference page listing your sources.
Length: 6–9 minutes.
Oral communication: Must be clearly spoken and paced.
Resources and citations: Use a minimum of four peer-reviewed journal articles. Two may be course readings. One must represent diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts. Citations may be stated orally to give due credit. Format reference list according to current APA guidelines. See Academic Writer.
Competencies Measured
By successfully completing this assessment, you will demonstrate your proficiency in the following course competencies and rubric criteria:
- Competency 1: Explain the major events, schools of thought, and cultural influences that have affected the development of the science of psychology.
- Explain the connection between an older school of thought, present-day psychology, and your contemporary topic.
- Explain how one of the timeless psychological debates fits with the contemporary topic of interest.
- Explain other historical events or movements that may have inspired interest in this topic area.
- Competency 2: Evaluate the social significance of contemporary topics in psychology.
- Describe the contemporary topic of interest and its social significance.
- Competency 3: Analyze psychological theory and scholarly literature in history, systems, and contemporary topics.
- Analyze scholarly research related to historical and societal influences leading to this new area of psychology, with at least one study being from an international source or with a non-Western and/or underrepresented sample.
- Competency 5: Articulate future directions on an individual, community, and global scale to promote positive change.
- Articulate multiple ways in which this new school of thought may guide social thinking in the future.
- Create a plan for how to be the change in the future to improve the human experience in this contemporary area of psychology.
- Competency 6: Communicate in a manner that is scholarly, professional, and consistent with expectations for professionals in the field of psychology.
- Deliver oral podcast appropriate to the audience with clear, organized delivery.
- Use APA style formatting for citations and reference list with only minor errors.
- Address assessment purpose with well-organized delivery, incorporating appropriate evidence and tone in grammatically sound sentences.
Timeless Debates and Future Change
Timeless DebatesUsing your Timeless Debates reading list, learn more about the following topics:We can explain any behavior in many ways; these are explanations that psychologists like to debate—and have been debating for decades. Consider the five core psychological debates presented in Geher's (2021) article, “5 Timeless Debates in Psychology". Debates continue to evolve over time and pick up nuances. The second article in your reading list, Sasaki and Kim's (2016 article “Nature, Nurture, and their Interplay: A Review of Cultural Neuroscience”) shows how the nature vs. nurture debate has gained nuance and fused with another debate—cultural universals vs. variability. Cultural neuroscience is a new and exciting field to explore.What's Changed and What Will Continue to Change?
Psychology will continue to evolve in the years to come. Review the next three articles in your reading list to gain an appreciation for this change across time and consider further how the field will continue to change moving forward. Read about how psychological science has changed over the last 25 years by visiting the Association for Psychological Science website. Then, read Halpern's (2017) article, Whither Psychology and de Freitas Araujo's (2017) article, Toward a philosophical history of psychology: an alternative path for the future.Current Movements and a Call to Action
Current Movements and a Call to Action
As we come to the end of this course, let's consider some current movements that will likely help to define psychology's future.Looking back, looking forward, what comes next? What can we expect next year, or in the next century? What new schools of thought will emerge? The following articles explore and question some of the many possibilities. As you read, consider the potential of psychology to implement positive social change.In your textbook, review:- Benjamin, L. T., Jr. (2023). A brief history of modern psychology (4th ed.). Wiley.
- Chapter 10, “A Psychology of Social Action and Social Change”.
- Current Movements reading list.
Advocacy
Review this media piece to learn more about the meaning of social justice, advocacy, and what you can do to be a part of the positive change.- Interview With Dr. Paylo: Advocacy at Multiple Levels.
DEI and Writing Resources
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Using your Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion reading list, complete the following readings:When looking at the history of psychology as a field, one critique is that perspectives were historically limited. In particular, older research and publications centered the voices of White authors and particularly males. Systematic inequality existed within research. Learn more by reviewing the article by Roberts et al. (2020), Racial inequality in psychological research: Trends of the past and recommendations for the future.To encourage systemic change in our approach to psychological science, we will be asking you to incorporate resources in your work that represent an eye towards diversity, equity, and inclusion. Learn more about how these terms are defined by reviewing the APA's framework and resources in your reading list. Henrich et al.'s (2010) article will further introduce you to why psychology samples, historically, have often been referred to as ‘WEIRD’.- Note - The linked Henrich et al. file in the library provides discussion from other researchers and authors after the article. The primary article is pages 61-83. You are welcome to review the additional discussion afterwards if you would like.
Writing Skill: Synthesis
With so many perspectives on any topic, learning how to synthesize those perspectives together in your writing is an important skill. As you collect information on a topic and evidence to support various points in your writing, consider how you will weave these different pieces together in a way that makes sense and reads smoothly. This will require you to incorporate multiple of the other writing skills you've already learned about, including writing with purpose, summarizing, and organizing. Learn more about Developing Synthesis and then dig deeper into when synthesis is used and related examples and approaches by checking out the Writing Center's resource, The Meaning of Synthesis. You'll want to synthesize in any piece of writing when combining multiple sources together to make your arguments or support your key points - be sure to use this skill when working on your assessments in this course.APA Style: Paper Formatting
Just like APA style has particular guidelines for citations and references, so too does it have particular guidelines for how you format your overall paper. This formatting includes a dedicated title page, page headings and numbers, set margins, paragraph indentation, and recommended font selections. As you work on your papers in this course (and other psychology courses), review the APA style guidelines here and apply the formatting details to your work. Use your APA Style Paper Formatting reading list for guidelines on these elements.Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles
As you recruit sources for your assessments, you'll be asked to find peer-reviewed journal articles to support your work. Peer-reviewed journal articles are a particular type of scholarly publication that serve as firsthand evidence and thereby add credibility to your writing. An article being peer-reviewed means that it is not just edited for typos or the like before publication, but it is reviewed by (usually) multiple experts in the field who often require a number of revisions before publication and help validate the credibility of the source before it ever reaches the physical page. Watch the video, What are Peer Reviewed Articles and then jump over to How Do I Find Peer-Reviewed Articles? to explore where to find peer-reviewed journal articles using our Capella library.Critical Thinking: Implications and Consequences
Researchers take their knowledge, old and new, and harness it to impact positive change. If you've been reading the Discussion section of peer-reviewed journal articles, you've seen how psychologists mention this in their own research. They discuss the implications (what follows logically from their claims) and consequences (what follows from their actions) of their work, and suggest future directions for both research and the ‘real world’. When you work on your assessments, you'll be considering how you can help make positive change. To learn more about implications and consequences, review the section on ‘Implications & Consequences’ on the Analytic Stage of Thinking page on Campus.Research Methods
Research Methods
Historical approaches to research methods are discussed with the readings, including early laboratories and experimental approaches. Quantitative approaches to research were emphasized in psychology's early years. As the hot topics of interest shifted in psychology, a field traditionally full of quantitative articles full of statistics became a field with an increasing balance of quantitative articles and qualitative articles. A qualitative approach is often thought to better represent the lived experiences of different populations, via using approaches like interviews and focus groups to gain firsthand perspectives.Learn more via reviewing the article in your Qualitative Research reading list; consider how additional qualitative research in this field can richen our understanding of the human mind and behavior.Directly compare quantitative and qualitative research here:- Research Methodologies Comparison Table.