Psychology: A New Complete GCSE Course: for AQA Specification 4180

by Geoffrey Shoesmith

Overview

This book provides simple, clear, in-depth explanations of all the topics in the AQA GCSE specification 4180 syllabus but it will prove invaluable to students at many levels on many courses and to the independent reader. It can be used as a stand-alone home study course, as a classroom text, as a reference text or just for pleasure for those who love to think about what makes people tick. Psychology describes up-to-date research as well as some classic psychology studies and even debunks oneor two psychology research myths. It leads the reader through all the topics in the syllabus as a teacher would in a classroom setting. Topics are presented as a series of lessons followed by Check Your Understanding sections, which are designed to help you check and retain the information in each lesson. An assessment record provided at the end of the book will help you keep track of your progress. Lessons are interactive with many opportunities to jot down your thoughts and reactions, reflect on how a topic relates to your own experience, discuss with other people and become more involved with the material presented. Students can pinpoint the topics they are studying for GCSE by using the table mapping the GCSE specification againstthe lessons in this book. For those studying outside formal classrooms there are guidelines about how best to approach your studies. The book assumes that readers have no previous knowledge of psychology and among the topics covered are: - Conformity and Obedience - would you press a button to kill someone just because you are told to do so? Many people would, it seems. - Sex and Gender - do girls and boys, men and women behave so differently? If so, why? - Memory - how does memory work and how accurate is it? - Non-Verbal Communication - do we reveal our true feelings in our body language? - Development of Personality - what exactly is Anti-Social Personality Disorder? - Prejudice and Discrimination - are we bound to discriminateagainst people who are unlike us? - Learning - how to remove your fear of spiders/snakes/flying/open spaces or anything else using the principles of learning. - Aggression - is aggression born into us? Is it in our hormones? Or do we learn to fight? - Research Methods and the Ethics of Psychology - psychology is based on evidence, not just ideas. But what type of study constitutes good evidence and how should we treat the people in our studies?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780718893286
Publisher:	The Lutterworth Press
Publication date:	11/27/2014
Edition description:	Revised ed.
Pages:	340
Product dimensions:	7.01(w) x 10.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Geoffrey Shoesmith is a chartered psychologist with over 20 years' experience of teaching psychology from GCSE to degree level.

Table of Contents

"List of Figures, Tables and Illustrations
Welcome to Psychology: About This Book
Key Studies
Integrating Research Methods Lessons
AQA Specification Mapped Against Lessons
Assessment Record

AQA 3.1 Unit 1 Making Sense of Other People
Memory
1. Processes of Encoding, Storage and Retrieval
2. The Multistore Explanation of Memory
3. Features of Each Memory Store
4. The Reconstructive and Levels of Processing Explanations of Memory
5. Explanations of Forgetting: Interference and Context Explanations
6. Explanations of Forgetting: Brain Damage
7. Eyewitness Testimony

Non-Verbal Communication
8. Non-Verbal Communication and Paralinguistics
9. Eye Contact
10. Facial Expression
11. Body Language
12. Personal Space

Development of Personality
13. Personality and Temperament
14. Eysenck’s Type Theory
15. Antisocial Personality Disorder (APD)

Stereotyping, Prejudice and Discrimination
16. Definitions and Explanations
17. Ways of Reducing Prejudice and Discrimination

Methods of Investigation
18. The Hypothesis and Scientific Methods
19. The Experiment

Methods of Control, Data Analysis and Data Presentation
20. Experimental Designs
21. Target Populations and Sampling
22. Calculation of Mean, Mode, Median, Range and Percentages
23. Graphical Representations, Including Bar Charts

Ethical Considerations
24. Ethical Issues and Ways of Dealing With Them

AQA 3.2 Unit 2 Understanding Other People
Learning
25. Principles of Classical Conditioning
26. Principles of Operant Conditioning
27. Application of Conditioning Procedures to Phobias
28. Application of Conditioning Procedures to Change Unwanted Behaviour

Social Influence
29. Conformity
30. Obedience
31. Social Loafing
32. Deindividuation
33. Bystander Intervention

Sex and Gender
34. Sex Identity and Gender Identity and The Psychodynamic Theory of

Gender Development
35. The Social Learning Theory of Gender Development
36. The Gender Schema Theory of Gender Development Aggression
37. Biological Explanations of Aggression
38. The Psychodynamic and Social Learning Theory

Explanations of Aggression
39. Ways of Reducing Aggression

Methods of Investigation
40. Survey Methods, Questionnaires and Interviews
41. Observation and Case Study
42. The Correlation and Scatter Graphs

Index"

Editorial Reviews

This book is clear and succinct, well suited for teenagers within a school environment; but it can also be used as a stand-alone book for independent study. It possesses well-structured lessons with key concepts comprehensively described and illustrated. The assessment questions, with suggested feedback, are particularly helpful. I am sure this will become an invaluable resource in my role teaching GCSE Psychology to adults.Penny Hart, Head of Psychology, Farlington School, West Sussex

From the Publisher