Psychology Majors Research Articles

Promoting writing as a core competency for psychology majors: Challenges and opportunities.

Promoting writing as a core competency for psychology majors: Challenges and opportunities.

Understanding of Psychological Literacy: Comparative Insights From Undergraduates in China and the United Kingdom

Background Psychological literacy has attracted considerable attention globally. However, no study has focused on this concept in China, where interest in psychology is growing. Objective The present study aimed to investigate perceptions of psychological literacy in a sample of undergraduate psychology majors from Chinese public universities, and compare findings with previously reported data from the United Kingdom. Method Participants completed a survey in which they rated eight core attributes of psychological literacy across the dimensions of awareness, development, confidence in explaining, and importance in their future career. Results Students gave the highest ratings to the importance of psychological core attributes in their future careers and understanding the application of theory, but the lowest to the development of attributes and understanding the role of theory in research. Comparisons with the United Kingdom sample revealed culturally specific differences of potential interest. Conclusions Findings from this work can inform the refinement of undergraduate psychology programs in China, and help calibrate standards in support of international mobility of Chinese students for postgraduate study outside of the home country. Teaching implications Psychology educators in China should consider providing more opportunities for students to gain awareness of their own development and engage in research firsthand.

Correlations of Personality Traits and Romantic Relationship Satisfaction

This study investigates how personality traits correlate with satisfaction levels in romantic relationships among Psychology majors enrolled at the University of Cebu Main Campus during the Academic Year 2022-2023. Employing a quantitative research approach, a descriptive correlational design was utilized to establish connections between personality traits and levels of relationship satisfaction, enabling prediction and explanation of variable relationships. The research addresses conflicting findings on the influence of personality traits on successful romantic relationships, particularly emphasizing trait similarity versus the "Opposites Attract" notion, alongside considerations of emotionality, maladaptive tendencies, self-esteem, and partner perspectives. Methodological variations in self-report assessments versus multiple-source and observation-based approaches have contributed to inconsistent results in previous investigations.

Teaching Construction of Neuroanatomy Curriculum for Applied Psychology Majors

Teaching Construction of Neuroanatomy Curriculum for Applied Psychology Majors

Ideological and Political Construction of Positive Psychology Course in Psychology Majors of Teacher Education —Exploration Based on the “Knowledge, Belief, and Action” Model

Ideological and Political Construction of Positive Psychology Course in Psychology Majors of Teacher Education —Exploration Based on the “Knowledge, Belief, and Action” Model

Writing across the curriculum: A longitudinal assessment of psychology majors’ writing development.

Writing across the curriculum: A longitudinal assessment of psychology majors’ writing development.

Supplemental Material for Writing Across the Curriculum: A Longitudinal Assessment of Psychology Majors’ Writing Development

Supplemental Material for Writing Across the Curriculum: A Longitudinal Assessment of Psychology Majors’ Writing Development

Newcomers and the innovative group process: An experimental investigation of convergence in collaborative problem solving.

During collaborative small group problem-solving, a group member with a minority perspective has a notable influence on the majority's perspective. However, the type of interactions with such a member could influence a stalemate, and the relationships between internal and task conflicts and the convergence process remain unclear. This study comprised two experiments focusing on the influence of minorities who act as "newcomers" among 231 university psychology majors. Using multiple conversational agents as the experimental tools, Experiment 1 revealed that a newcomer who presents a new perspective promotes the majority's perspective change, compared to when such a member has been in the group from the beginning. Experiment 2 demonstrated that such an effect occurs when most of the internal conflict and the task phase facilitated the newcomers' influence. The findings indicated that the minority member advantage increases when they are a newcomer; thus, they have a stronger influence on the perspective-taking process. The same effect occurs when the newcomer intervenes in majority task conflicts and internal cognitive loads. Thus, this study provides new implications for research on minority influence in laboratory experiments using virtual agents for small-group studies. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Quantifying the Pervasive: How Widely Held Are Psychological Misconceptions Among Undergraduate Students?

Psychological misconceptions are widely held ideas that contradict current psychological research (Bensley et al., 2020). Belief in such myths contributes to introductory psychology students’ overconfidence of their prior knowledge (Bensley et al., 2015), limiting student engagement and comprehension. The present study sought to identify the prevalence and extent of community college students’ belief in psychological misconceptions in hopes of guiding educational efforts to combat these notions. Students completed an online questionnaire in a proctored environment (most typically while seated in a computer lab or classroom having Wi-Fi available), in which they were presented 14 myths and asked to label them as true or false. After rating each myth, participants were prompted to rate their confidence in their previous answer. The three main hypotheses were 1) there would be a negative correlation between the number of college psychology courses students completed and their myth belief scores, 2) psychology majors would endorse fewer myths than non-psychology majors, and 3) students who believe psychology is a science would believe in fewer myths. The first two hypotheses were not supported. However, there was a significant correlation identified for the third hypothesis. The generalizability of these findings is limited by a disproportionate number of female participants and a lack of ethnic and age diversity. Future research should replicate this study with a more diverse pool of participants. These findings suggest that instructors design interventions to target myths in the psychology courses they teach.

Exploring Achievement Behaviors in Non-Major Statistics Course: An Expectancy-Value Perspective and Thoughts for Practice

Statistics education is increasingly important to our society with enrolment increases of 16% in introductory statistics courses and 85% in upper-level statistics courses. Research has demonstrated many factors related to students’ behaviors and outcomes in statistics courses such as past achievement, attitudes, and effort. We sought to model these factors together to better understand how introductory statistics students’ attitudes were related to students' achievement behaviors and what student characteristics mediated such relationships. Structural equation modeling with data from N=301 students in an introductory statistics course for psychology majors revealed that majors with higher GPAs had more interest, enjoyment as well as utility value for statistics, and these variables were in turn related to expectations for success or achievement behaviors. Females had lower interest in statistics, and this was related to lower expectations of success. The findings highlight the need to increase interest and enjoyment and utility value for non-majors studying statistics. Recommendations for how to adapt the statistics classroom to that end are discussed.

Introducing Gen Z psychology majors: Why they choose to major in psychology (and what they expect to learn).

Introducing Gen Z psychology majors: Why they choose to major in psychology (and what they expect to learn).

An Interdisciplinary Learning Community of Education and Psychology Majors

The researchers conducted a qualitative case study to describe the experiences (over the course of a semester) of an interdisciplinary team of three special education and three psychology undergraduates who participated in a relational learning community and a graduate student who designed and facilitated this learning community. An Associate Professor and special education researcher oversaw and co-facilitated the project. The design of the learning community promoted the building of rapport and trust among the group members and the progress of the group toward a common goal of incorporating principles from psychology to develop teaching strategies for students who are struggling in math and experiencing severe math anxiety. Gathering more frequent and individualized feedback would have helped the learning community facilitator make some key adjustments earlier in the project, but the incorporation of rapport building activities that supported trust and collaboration among the group was supportive of group progress toward a common goal. We learned key lessons about how to design and implement a learning community that can be applied to the field of education, interdisciplinary collaboration, and other contexts.

Investigating rater–student interaction, gender bias, and major bias in the assessment of research seminar presentation

The study aims to investigate the severity of raters toward examinees' performances and to analyze biases subject to genders and academic majors based on the rater–examinee interactions. Data were collected across a 13-week research seminar course in English. Six raters were selected to rate 33 examinees using 18-item criteria. The many-facet Rasch measurement was utilized to analyze rater–examinee interactions and bias factors. The results confirmed that the instrument is reliable and valid. This study depicted the interaction between raters and other facets using a variable map, where the raters exhibited different levels of severity/leniency in scoring students' performances in oral presentations at the research seminar course. The result based on the Rasch analysis also confirmed that gender and academic majors contaminated rater assessment. Bias interaction between raters and student gender was detected, and Rater 6 displayed bias based on gender due to the tendency to give higher scores to female than male participants with a target contrast of 2.05 logits. Bias interaction between rater academic majors and student academic majors was also identified among raters with linguistics and psychology majors.

Busting Myths to Increase Critical Thinking in Psychology Majors

Background Increasing students’ ability to think critically allows them to engage more fully with psychology material. Objective The current study used a critical thinking assignment called PsychBusters to examine critical thinking and interest in psychology in two sections of introductory psychology designated for first-year psychology majors. Method The experimental section completed two PsychBusters presentations including a poster presentation. The control course section also completed poster presentations but did not do the PsychBusters assignment. For both sections, critical thinking skills and levels of interest in psychology were measured at the start and end of the semester. Results Students in both sections maintained a high interest in psychology across the semester. The section that worked on the PsychBusters misconception assignment had similar critical thinking skills as the control at the start of the semester but had higher scores at the posttest. Conclusion Assignments that direct students to focus on critical thinking may not improve one's interest in psychology. However, class assignments that hone critical thinking skills should be integrated into psychology courses with the aim of improving students’ reasoning. Teaching Implications The development of critical thinking skills in psychology majors should start early in the curriculum.

Utility of the Teacher Behavior Checklist beyond Psychology Majors: Replication with Brazilian Physical Education Students

The Teacher Behavior Checklist (TBC) is a worldwide valued instrument to measure teachers’ performance. Nonetheless, the studies about TBC in Brazil are still scarce, with samples mainly composed of psychology and civil engineering students. The aim of this study was to replicate the research by Keeley et al. (2010) to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Brazilian version of the TBC with a new sample. Participants were 107 undergraduates from physical education courses from a Brazilian public university. Participants used the TBC to evaluate three types of teachers: the worst they had ever had, a regular one, and the best one. The order of evaluation of teacher types did not interfere with the response patterns, but as expected, statistically significant differences were found among the three types of teachers. Additionally, the two-factor model of the TBC was confirmed through Confirmatory Factor Analysis, providing additional evidence of construct validity. However evidence to advocate in favor of a one-factor solution was also found. McDonald’s Omega results provided evidence of reliability. These findings support the use of TBC in the formative evaluation of teachersin Brazil.

Teaching Undergraduate Psychology Majors about Dog Training Opens Doors for their Future

The COVID-19 pandemic brought significant changes to the world both for humans and pets. The uncertainty and social isolation led twenty percent of American households to adopt a pet, and the ASPCA [1] has released new data suggesting that 90 percent of the dogs adopted during that time are still in their homes. As the crisis improved, the impact of the isolation and subsequent return to work resulted in dogs whose limited socialization experiences and inexperience with being left alone became apparent, and more owners began reporting behavioral problems, especially separation anxiety [2

Leaks in the Workforce Pipeline: Understanding Barriers to Pursuing Mental Health Careers among Undergraduate Psychology Students

Background Mental health workforce capacity has faced significant challenges which have only been exacerbated by COVID-19. Undergraduate students provide a robust entry point of a workforce pipeline, but many do not end up in mental health careers despite high levels of interest in this area. Objective The purpose of this study was to identify career barriers and related factors that might explain why few students enter the mental health workforce. Method We surveyed undergraduate psychology majors ( N = 230) from a large university about their career interests, career perceptions, vocational identity, perceived barriers, and post-graduation plans. Results About half of participants were interested in a mental health career but endorsed high levels of barriers, most of which are financial. Vocational identity predicted plans to attend graduate school after controlling for covariates. Conclusion Despite strong interest in mental health careers, students perceive significant barriers, and only those with the strongest identification with this career are likely to overcome these barriers. Teaching Implications: Psychology faculty can help to address gaps in career knowledge and better support students being well-versed in regional issues and career-related information, such as loan repayment programs.

아동학대 트라우마 성인의 성장 경험에 관한 자문화기술지

Objectives This study presents an in-depth description of the growth and development process of the researcher who experienced traumatic child abuse by an alcohol-abusing primary caregiver through career exploration and healing and recovery by becoming a late learner in the counseling psychology major from an emic perspective.
 Methods To this end, an autobiographical cultural technology magazine was applied to conduct a qualitative research method to talk about life experiences such as child abuse that the researcher himself experienced, The researcher's individual experience was explained by approaching psychotherapy based on developmental psychology and counseling psychology.
 Results The results of the study are as follows. First, the researcher was traumatized by child abuse from an alcohol-abusing primary caregiver; second, the formation of an unstable attachment with the primary caregiver, which was unsafe and unprotected, had a negative effect on the researcher's life from childhood to adulthood; third, in a situation where the researcher could not expose his trauma due to blood relationship with the primary caregiver, it became a long-term trauma; and fourth, emotion regulation and psychotherapeutic approaches were necessary through awareness and discernment of the adult survivor of the child abuse to achieve growth and recovery after the hardship.
 Conclusions Understanding the nature of child abuse trauma through auto-ethnography gives insight into the long-term effects of child abuse and the growth and recovery process after the hardship of the late learner majoring in counseling psychology and provides therapeutic intervention methods to traumatized adult survivors and their families.

Improving Undergraduate Psychology Students’ Understanding of the Graduate School Application Process

Background More students with a bachelor’s degree in psychology are seeking graduate studies, though many lack knowledge about the admission process. Objective We created a brief educational presentation to increase student knowledge of the application process, positive outcome expectations for obtaining a master’s degree in psychology, and intention to apply. Method We recruited N = 55 undergraduate psychology majors at a public university in Texas. We randomly assigned participants to either a 52-min written or video version of the educational presentation. Results Repeated measures analysis of variance revealed that participants increased their positive outcome expectations for a master’s degree in psychology and increased their perceived knowledge of the application process. Our qualitative content analysis revealed improvements in participants’ objective knowledge of what to include in a curriculum vitae and personal statement, who to ask for a letter of recommendation, and what resources exist for funding graduate school. Conclusions Professors could consider using evidence-based, brief educational presentations in mentoring undergraduate students on career goals including graduate study in psychology. Teaching Implications Additional training may be required to help educational professionals to incorporate evidence-based career planning during key stages of students’ undergraduate psychology study.

A descriptive analysis of the perceptions of graduating psychology majors: Reasons for choosing the major, valuable experiences, and suggestions for change.

A descriptive analysis of the perceptions of graduating psychology majors: Reasons for choosing the major, valuable experiences, and suggestions for change.