Professor: Francine Rosselli, Ph.D.

Office:  104 Judd Hall

Phone:  685-2318

email: frosselli@wesleyan.edu

Office Hours: Tuesday 12-1; By appointment

Lectures: Tues/Thurs 10:30-11:50   Judd 116

Labs: Mondays  10:00, 12:00, 3:00, & 4:30 in SC74

Texts:    

Copies of all texts have been placed on reserve in the Psychology Library.

In addition to the texts, you should have a calculator with you for lecture, lab, and all exams.

Course Website: Some course materials will be available online at http://frosselli.web.wesleyan.edu/wes201.

T.A.’s: We are fortunate to have several teaching assistants (T.A.’s) for this course. These students will be leading the laboratory portion of the course. You will receive a separate handout listing the names of your T.A.’s, their contact information, and their lab section(s).

Objectives: Statistics provide the foundation for empirical research in psychology and they enable researchers to answer questions about all aspects of human behavior. The purpose of this course is to help you learn the important concepts that you will need in order to understand and interpret statistics in the context of psychological research. This knowledge should also help you become a better consumer of statistics in your daily life. In this course, you will learn what statistics are, how they are used, how they are reported in research, and how they should be interpreted. Although learning how to compute statistics will be important, the course will also stress understanding of both basic statistical concepts and the logic underlying the use of statistics in psychology.

Format: Each week will include two lectures and one lab meeting. Lectures will meet Tuesdays and Thursdays in Judd Hall room 116 from 10:30 to 11:50. Lectures will typically cover topics in one or two chapters of the text. The lectures are designed to explain and develop text material and to provide concrete examples to enhance understanding. Occasionally, there may be material introduced in lecture that is not in the text. It is strongly recommended that you attend all lectures and read the assigned chapters.

The lab sessions will be devoted to learning to use SPSS, a statistical analysis software package. SPSS is available in the following public labs: HAS, CS, ST, & PAC. Lab time will also be used for collecting, reviewing, and distributing assignments, clarifying lecture material, working through examples of material covered in lecture, and reviewing for exams. All labs will meet on Mondays. Lab request forms will be collected during one of the first class meetings and lab assignments will be distributed during the subsequent class meeting. You must submit all assignments to the TA for the lab section to which you are assigned. The other TA’s will not accept your work – please do not ask them to do so.

Grades: Course grades will be based on three in-class exams (15% each, 45% total), a cumulative final exam (20%), homework assignments (10%), SPSS assignments (10%), and a final SPSS project (15%).

Letter grades will be assigned according to the following scale:

A+ = 97-100%; A = 94 -96%; A- = 90-93%; B+ = 87-89%; B = 83-86%; B- = 80-82%; C+ = 77-79%; C = 73-76%; C- = 70-72%; D+ = 67-69%; D = 63-66%; D- = 60-62%; F = 0-59%

Exams: There will be three non-cumulative in-class exams occurring at roughly equal intervals during the semester. Exams will emphasize both concepts and calculations. Each exam may consist of a combination of multiple choice, short answer, and computational questions. In addition, a cumulative final exam will be given during finals week. Questions on this exam will be similar to, though not exactly the same as, questions from the three regularly scheduled exams. You will be provided with most of the necessary formulas and statistical tables. Please be sure to bring a calculator to each exam. Please note the dates of the exams and do not enroll in this course if you cannot take the exams as scheduled. 

THERE WILL BE NO MAKE-UP EXAMS. THERE WILL BE NO MAKE-UP EXAMS. THERE WILL BE NO MAKE-UP EXAMS. THERE WILL BE NO MAKE-UP EXAMS. THERE WILL BE NO MAKE-UP EXAMS.

Homework Assignments: The Gravetter & Wallnau (2000) text contains practice problems at the end of each chapter. You will be assigned a number of these problems as homework each week. Homework assignments are listed in the lab schedule and must be submitted to your TA at the beginning of lab each Monday. Incomplete or late assignments will not be awarded full credit. Seriously deficient or late assignments will receive no credit.

Answers to the odd-numbered problems in your text can be found in Appendix C. Try to solve each problem on your own before resorting to the answers. Because the answers are given in the text, homework assignments will be checked to see that you made an honest effort to solve each problem. This means that you must show all your work for each problem -- turning in a page with just the answers is not acceptable. Each assignment should be clearly labeled with your name and the chapter number.  

SPSS Assignments & Final Project: In addition to the homework assignments, you will be asked to complete assignments using SPSS. There will be seven smaller assignments plus a larger final project. The lab schedule lists the due dates for these assignments. The specific assignments will be distributed in class. All assignments must be type-written and submitted to your TA at the beginning of lab each Monday. Late assignments will be severely docked.

Academic Integrity: By enrolling in this course you agree to abide by the Wesleyan Honor Code. While you are encouraged to discuss homework and SPSS assignments with your classmates, please remember that submitting another person's work as your own constitutes plagiarism and is a violation of the Honor Code. Make certain that all work submitted for a grade (e.g., assignments, exams, etc.) is your own original work. Academic dishonesty will not be tolerated. If you cheat during an exam or plagiarize work (published or unpublished), you will be referred to the Honor Board with the recommendation that you receive an F in the course.