PSY 341K (40230) --- Categories and Concepts

T, Th 2-3:30 PM, SEA 2.224

Spring 2003 Syllabus

homepage: http://love.psy.utexas.edu/concepts/index.html
Click here for a week by week class schedule.

Who	Office	Office Hours	email
Bradley Love	SEA 5.202	T, Th 5-6 PM	love@psy.utexas.edu
Jody Hendrix	SEA 3.312	T, Th 11-12:30	jhen@mail.utexas.edu

Prerequisite: Psychology 301 with a grade of C or better, Psychology 418 or an equivalent statistics course with a grade of C or better, and upper division standing.

Enrollment limitations:

General Course Description:

Readings will largely consist of journal articles and book chapters written by leading researchers. These readings will be distributed through a web page as pdf files available for downloading.

Format of Classes:

Requirements:

Particpation will make up 40% of your class grade. While rating participation is somewhat subjective, the grade will be based on the following system: 4 or less strikes is an A, 6 or less is a B, 9 or less is a C. A strike is missing a class, forgetting to turn in questions before class, or not participating in a class. If you are sick or going to be out of town, you can email your questions to Jody and me so that you only receive one strike for missing class. There is some purposeful cushion built into this system, so we aren't going to worry about medical or other excused absences unless you have a serious problem that causes you to miss more than a week of class. Let's hope no one experiences such a situation.

There will be two take home essay exams each consisting of five questions. Each question will require a 3/4 to 1 1/2 page response. Hopefully, these exams will be enjoyable and will be like commentaries or reaction thought pieces for you. These exans (which are really like homework assignments) will make up 20% of your grade. You need to work on these alone and not in groups.

Students will write a grant proposal for a research project in categories and concepts. You will propose a couple of studies that address an important and novel research problem in categories and concepts. Like any proposal, you should cover the relevant research on the topic, motivate a key problem, offer a solution or hypothesis, and describe a series of coherent studies that bear on the problem. The proposal should be around 10 pages long. Here's an example proposal. Here's an example proposal from a grad student. Here is a skeleton outline of a grant proposal.

Prior to writing your paper, you will hand in a brief description of your idea followed by an outline. Midway through the semester, students will submit an initial draft. At the end of the semester, students will submit a revised copy and the class will convene a grant panel meeting in which we will evaluate all of the proposals. It should be fun to see what everyone ends up doing. This whole project will account for 40% of your class grade.

Another requirement of class is to check your email somewhat frequently for course announcemnts. Email Jody if your preferred address is not your UT address or if you would like course emails directed to another account.

Policy on incompletes.

Textbook

Additional Materials

The grades ended up being on the high-end because of the strong participation (attendance, questions, etc.) of most students. In general, people improved over the course of the semester (see exam grades). The class's writing in particular improved a lot.

Many of the proposals were very well written. Unfortunately, the other aspects of the proposals were somewhat of a disappointment. Despite the outlines, meetings, and revisions, a lot of the proposals did not test a clear idea that was *relevant* to our basic understanding of categories and concepts and motivated by past research in categories and concepts. In general, the proposals that were the strongest were the ones that followed the feedback given and sought additional feedback. Some proposals got tagged because they ignored feedback provided by Jody and me. For example, if it was recommended that you look at a specific article or correct a methodological problem and you didn't, your grade suffered (that shouldn't be surprising). I'll place the proposals outside my door if you want to pick them up.

Again, the grades overall are very high. Nevertheless, there is always one or two students who are dissatisfied and look towards the TA and Professor and not themselves. Given how lax participation was graded, there really isn't anyone on the cusp of a better grade. If you would like the grading rationale explained, we can talk about it, but only after you read through your paper and sleep on it. No emails or meetings before Monday (at the earliest) please.

One question people had was whether Jody and I would both read the proposals. We did and largely agreed. The differences between our two perspectives were not sufficient to alter anyone's final grade (I actually ran this through the spreadsheet).

Hopefully this lengthy message will take care of grading questions. I hope you all have a nice summer. Thanks.

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secret code; exam 1; exam2; exam3; exam average; proposal; participation; final grade; letter grade

7 2 2.75 3 2.58 2 4 2.92 B
938 3 2.75 4 3.25 2 4 3.05 B
1110 2 2.25 3.75 2.67 4 4 3.73 A
1279 2.75 3 3.25 3 2.25 4 3.1 B
1357 3.25 4 3.25 3.5 3 4 3.5 A
1390 1.75 2.25 3.25 2.42 2 4 2.88 B
1974 3 4 4 3.67 3.25 4 3.63 A
2677 2 3 3.25 2.75 3.75 1.25 2.55 B
2709 2 3 3.75 2.92 3 4 3.383333333 B
3369 4 3.75 4 3.92 3 4 3.583333333 A
4683 3.25 4.25 4 3.83 4 4 3.966666667 A
6865 3.75 2.75 4 3.5 3.25 4 3.6 A
9419 2 3 2.25 2.42 2.25 2.75 2.5 B