Students are studying Edexcel AS Psychology which is divided into two major units encompassing Social and Cognitive Psychology and Understanding the Individual, respectively. In the Social Approach, much emphasis is given on learning about obedience and prejudice. Research methods and theories are studied with particular attention to the controversial study of American psychologist, Stanley Milgram, where research participants were made to believe that they were administering potentially fatal shocks to people. The study focused on how and why people come to obey commands.  Social Psychology will help the student gain insight into how others around us impact on our behavior.  At the same time, a clearer understanding of why prejudice occurs and how it can be defeated and eliminated will be one of the practical benefits of the course.

The Cognitive Approach section of the first unit deals with how and why we remember or don’t remember.  The core area of study is memory and research studies and theories relating to memory. Students are given the opportunity to conduct a study of some aspect of memory. The textbook provides an in-depth review of a study involving students on a diving holiday in Scotland that kept forgetting information collected on the dive.

A significant benefit from learning in this area is that students gain a better understanding of how to create more durable new memories that will not be so easily forgotten.

The second major unit, Understanding the Individual, is broken into three separate areas of interest:

• Psychodynamic
• Biological
• Learning Approaches

Freud is at the center of the Psychodynamic section regarding how personality develops. “Little Hans” is studied and students are provided the opportunity to evaluate the relevance of Freudian psychology including emphasis on dreams in today’s world. The Biological Approach is all about how genes and hormones play a part in influencing us as well as how biological sex and psychological gender are related. The focus is on understanding the biological basis of human behaviour. The Learning Approach takes a look at what is involved in the learning process. Three familiar types of learning are examined and students will come to understand better how one has learned what one has learned in a lifetime. The learning of behaviour is the central issue of this approach. This section has practical application to the workplace environment and how one functions within such an environment.

Psychology is one of those areas of academic interest and effort that can be used in all manner of ways in the future by those who have studied and learned it. Not only do you learn about yourself, but you also learn about others and the insight gained can be put to work both socially and professionally throughout the course of one’s life.