Psychology for Psychologists

Jennings, B. and Papageorgiou, A. (2011) The Holistic Curriculum: Balancing Basic and Psychosocial Sciences with Clinical Practice. In Cavenagh, P. et al. (eds). The Changing Face of Medical Education. Oxford: Radcliffe Publishing, pp. 65–77. Coll, X., Papageorgiou, A., Stanley, A. and Tarbuck, A. (eds) (2012) Communication Skills in Mental Health Care: An Introduction. Oxford, London: Radcliffe Publishing.

Psychology for Psychologists A Problem Based Approach to Undergraduate Psychology Teaching Alexia Papageorgiou Associate Professor, University of Nicosia, Cyprus

Peter McCrorie Professor of Medical Education, St George’s, University of London, UK

Stelios Georgiades Assistant Professor, University of Nicosia, Cyprus

Maria Perdikogianni Lecturer, University of Nicosia, Cyprus

© Alexia Papageorgiou, Peter McCrorie, Stelios Georgiades and Maria Perdikogianni 2015 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, Saffron House, 6–10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2015 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.

ISBN 978-1-349-57006-5 ISBN 978-1-137-38765-3 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/9781137387653 This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

Contents

List of Figures and Tables

vi

Preface

vii

Acknowledgements

xii

1 The Development of Undergraduate Psychology Degrees and the Need for Change

1

2 Problem-Based Learning

19

3 Student Assessment in a Problem-Based Curriculum

34

4 A Psychology Problem-Based Curriculum

74

5 Sample Problem-Based Learning Cases in Psychology

141

6 Epilogue

186

References

190

Author Index

197

Subject Index

199

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Figures and Tables Figures 2.1 3.1 5.1 5.2 6.1

Mind map for Heather’s case The curriculum Mind map for Mary Gianni and Kostas Antoniou Mind map for Cheryl Jones Course management committees

23 40 145 165 188

Tables 4.1 Year one: Module name, developmental stage it covers and its duration 4.2 Year one: Themes covered in every module 4.3 Year one: The activities of a typical week during module one 4.4 An example of the themes and learning outcomes that will be covered in Year two, week one of the curriculum 4.5 Year three: Distributed in weeks 4.6 A typical week in Year three 4.7 The content of Occupational Psychology Module

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75 76 77

83 84 85 87

Preface

We would like to share with our readers our individual experiences and motivations that brought us together to create this project.

Alexia Papageorgiou My desire to study psychology and become a psychologist originated when I was 15 years old. When I began my undergraduate studies, however, the actual experience of studying psychology did not meet my expectations and I must admit that my childhood dream crumbled and led to disappointment. By the time I finished my first degree in psychology in 1992, I had serious doubts whether I wanted to become a psychologist. Upon reflection, this seemed to be the result of the way I was taught during my undergraduate degree. I continued with my MSc in Health Psychology, which again was rather disappointing in terms of how it was taught and what I learnt. I eventually found professional satisfaction and fulfilment when I entered the world of medicine as a social scientist. For the first time, I experienced the problem-based approach to learning and I felt sad that this approach was not adopted in the field of psychology. To make sure I was not being overzealous in my aspirations to implement this learning method in psychology, I carried out some research. Evidence from the research suggests that most undergraduate psychology curricula are based on knowledge rather than skills and that undergraduate psychology students experience knowledge overload and diminishing motivation to learn because the teaching of the subject does not follow psychological theories and learning processes (Goedeke, 1997; Reynolds, 1997). Finally, psychology students experience a diminishing employment record (HECSU, 2014). Instead of connecting theory and evidence to the professions of psychology, most current degrees just overload their students with a huge volume of knowledge which is taught via lectures, thus encouraging superficial learning. vii

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To make this book happen, I sought the help and expertise of my three esteemed colleagues – Professor Peter McCrorie, Dr Stelios Georgiades and Maria Perdikogianni.

Peter McCrorie I am the only author of the four who is not a psychologist. I trained as a biochemist in Glasgow, obtained my PhD in London and then moved into the field of haematology research. I have only ever worked in medical schools and soon realised that my true interest was in medical education. I was fortunate to be offered the role of Curriculum Coordinator at Barts and The London just at the time the two medical schools merged and modernised their curriculum. In the years that followed, I immersed myself in the world of medical education and effectively switched professions. In 1999, I was given the opportunity of a lifetime: I was appointed to the role of Course Director for the new MBBS Graduate Entry Programme at St George’s in London. I had effectively carte blanche to create a brand new, educationally sound, innovative four-year fast-track course in medicine for graduates in any discipline (including psychology). Exciting times indeed, made even more so when, 12 years later, St George’s franchised its medical degree to the University of Nicosia in Cyprus. I have always held the clear view that medical education is much more than just learning a lot of facts. Aside from clinical and communication skills, to me the psychosocial, ethical and biostatistical aspects are just as important in educating a “rounded” doctor, who needs to adopt a truly holistic approach to their patients. I also hold a strong and unshakeable belief that active learning, in context, is a far more successful approach to the acquisition of knowledge than just through passive and didactic lectures. It has always puzzled me that psychologists, who came up with the concept of problem-based learning (PBL), do not in fact use it in their own courses. It is used, for example, in medicine, dentistry, healthcare sciences, law, business, engineering and education, but not in psychology. When Alexia Papageorgiou approached me and invited me to be part of this book, I jumped at the opportunity. While my knowledge of psychology is very limited, I have a lot of experience in setting up PBL curricula and knowledge about the process involved. The book

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has therefore been a joint effort, one which it has been a pleasure to be involved with.

Stelios Georgiades The money and time I have invested in studying psychology, not counting the psychological impact of having to move to another country to do so, indicate my strong interest in this domain. When I graduated with a degree in psychology, my interest and determination to become a psychologist were met with the reality of an uncertain future and the anxiety of what next. The theoretical background that I was furnished with and the research and statistical skills learned in the course of my studies did not prepare me for any job. To make matters worse, the fierce competition of entering a postgraduate programme of training and the severe lack of guidelines as to what was required to embark on such a programme contributed even further to feeling helpless in facing my future. Eventually, I did manage to get a place to train as a clinical psychologist. However, the fact that I was probably the only one from my undergraduate class that got a place to train in psychology at the postgraduate level indicates the difficulty that psychology graduates face in remaining within the field of psychology. Undoubtedly, the disappointment experienced by most psychology graduates becomes worse when they realise that their degree background often contributes to finding jobs that bear no or very little resemblance to what they originally aimed for. For a number of years, although I have been very enthusiastic about my job as a clinical psychologist, I found it extremely difficult to advise young people interested in becoming psychologists to start a degree in psychology, and I am certain that at times people misunderstood this difficulty. My true intention, however, was that I did not want them to find themselves in a situation where they would be stagnant with a degree that in most cases would not help them to fulfil their desire and ambition to become psychologists. When discussing with colleagues at the University of Nicosia Medical School the possibility of applying the PBL approach to the training of psychologists at an undergraduate level, I could see immediately the advantages of this teaching approach. It will not only facilitate students to engage in more active learning, it would also facilitate the acquisition of skills that will potentially

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assist psychology undergraduates to remain within the field of psychology.

Maria Perdikogianni Having worked as a psychotherapist with adults, children and families and as a child play therapist for almost 20 years, I have always found it useful to incorporate experiences from my private work into my psychology teaching, knowing that a teaching approach based on lectures alone is stagnant and superficial. Incorporating group work and having students explore topics make learning an active process and more interesting. For these reasons, I was very enthusiastic about the PBL approach when I became a part of the faculty team at St George’s University of London Medical Programme at the University of Nicosia Medical School. Having been a facilitator of the PBL approach in medical education, I was able to observe first-hand how this group work enhanced students’ reasoning, problem-solving and decision-making skills and reinforced deep learning. Students don’t just memorise information but rather intend to understand and seek meaning, search for relationships among the material and draw conclusions based on previous existing knowledge (Hall, Ramsay & Raven, 2004; Walton, 1997). When the offer was made to apply this approach to the field of psychology, I jumped at the opportunity to become a part of this unique project. As it turned out, it proved to be a truly rewarding experience despite the hard work involved for my fellow colleagues and myself. I am grateful for being a part of this wonderful team and I sincerely hope that this book will introduce psychology students to the world of PBL and elicit the same enthusiasm as it did for me.

Alexia Papageorgiou, Peter McCrorie, Stelios Georgiades, Maria Perdikogianni In this book, we provide a PBL approach to teaching psychology in undergraduate degree courses. Research evidence from the wide use of PBL in medical education shows really impressive results. In this book, we give a detailed example of a three-year psychology degree course using the PBL method, as well as means for assessing the

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students with this new approach of learning and teaching. Finally, we provide examples of PBL psychology cases and how they unfold during the teaching week. We hope this book will serve as a trigger in changing the way psychology is taught in undergraduate degree courses. We also hope that by changing the way psychology is taught, our future generations of psychology students will feel less disillusioned with their choice of degree than some of us felt all those years ago.

Acknowledgements We would like to thank Mr Antonis Philippides for his help with designing the tables which contain the content of the course across the three years of the degree.

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