Welcome back to Social Psychology.
In our last video, I introduced our wonderful teaching staff, discussed a few
unique aspects of the course, defined social psychology, and ended with a brief
demonstration of hindsight bias, or the "I knew it all along" effect.
In this video, I want to talk a little bit about how the course is structured,
and offer some rules of the road,
just to make sure that our journey together is a positive one,
like "Don't park on the yellow brick road!"
And in just a few minutes, I'll share some exciting news about a feature of our
course that I think you'll like.
But first, let's talk about how the course is structured.
Each week, we'll have a few lectures and related videos,
along with some assigned reading.
Sometimes the readings will focus on the same topic as the lectures, but
more often, they'll cover material beyond the lectures so that we get the broadest
possible coverage in the short amount of time that we have together.
When the lecture and readings do focus on the same topic,
the readings will typically be assigned after the lecture,
so it's important to follow the order of lectures and
readings given in the course syllabus, and of course, to keep up.
You'll get much, much more out of the course than if you skip around,
or if you do a reading before the lecture it's supposed to follow.
The course will have five different assignments.
The first, called the Random Assignment Assignment,
will step you through a brief tutorial on
random sampling and random assignment,
and then ask you to use the Randomizer form from Research Randomizer,
a Social Psychology Network partner site, to generate your own random sample and to
randomly assign individuals in the sample to one of several experimental conditions.
In the second assignment, those of you who join Social Psychology Network
will create your own page in the network and
receive feedback from other class members on the social impression you make.
What do other people think of you when they first see your page?
And how can you use psychology to improve the impression you make,
whether it's on employers, friends, romantic interests, and so forth?
For those of you who don't join the Network,
I'll offer a variation of the assignment in which you create a résumé, or
curriculum vitae, and get social feedback from other class members on that.
For the third assignment, all you need to do is post five times in the class
discussion forums—an assignment that some of you have already begun.
These posts can be questions, comments,
responses to other students, links to outside resources—really,
anything that contributes positively to your learning or the learning of others.
In the fourth assignment, you'll take a web-based
interview in which the system remembers every answer you give,
and asks you personalized questions about your diet and lifestyle choices.
The interactivity of this interview goes way beyond a regular web survey
to let you see what interview technology might look like in the future.
Finally, the Day of Compassion assignment challenges you to use social psychology
for the greater good by living 24 hours as compassionately as possible,
and asks you to reflect on certain aspects of the experience.
The assignment will be peer graded,
and here's where it gets interesting.
Students who complete at least four out of the five assignments,
receive a very high score on their Day of Compassion essay,
and make sure their account settings allow me to reach them
will be eligible for a Day of Compassion Award
as a kind of incentive to complete the course,
learn about social psychology, and use it for the good of society.
I'll describe the award in detail later in the course,
but let me just say a few words about it now.
The first time that the award was given, the winner was Balesh Jindal,
a wonderful soul from New Delhi,
India, whose Day of Compassion focused on preventing sexual abuse in her community,
and part of the award was an expense paid trip to Northern California
where she had the opportunity to personally meet the Dalai Lama—
a symbol of compassion to many people.
The meeting was sponsored by Stanford University's Center for
Compassion and Altruism Research and Education,
and the work was later immortalized
when Coursera decorated its building with a drawing they made of Balesh and
a quote from her about the Day of Compassion assignment.
The second time the award was given, it included free airplane tickets, food,
and accommodations to meet another world famous symbol of compassion:
anthropologist Jane Goodall, who joined me in presenting the award to Habi Zhang
from Chengdu, China, who used social psychology
to save a neighbor's child from being beaten,
and after taking this course,
decided to pursue a graduate degree in public policy.
This time around, the winner will receive a free trip to meet
another worldwide symbol of compassion,
with details on the person, date, and location to be determined.
We'll make every effort to choose a date
and a place that works for the winner,
or if that proves impossible, one of the ten
class members receiving Honorable Mention
will have a chance to take the trip.
So, you have a great opportunity to learn about social psychology and use it for
the good of others.
I'll say more about each of the assignments when the time comes.
The other part of the course
that's required for learners who want a certificate
is the final exam,
which will cover the readings, lectures, and other assigned videos.
The exam will include multiple choice and true-false questions,
and be machine graded so that you can see your score
right after submitting your answers.
If you purchase the course,
complete all five assignments,
and pass the final exam,
you'll earn a signed Course Certificate.
And if you complete some additional work
that I'll mention later in the course, you'll receive a certificate with honors!
Let's pause for a pop-up question, just to make sure this information is clear.
