PSYC-FPX1010 introduces psychology's major subfields — cognitive, developmental, social, clinical, biological — giving students a genuine map of the discipline before later coursework narrows into specific areas.
Surveying psychology's major subfields
PSYC-FPX1010 covers the foundational theories and questions driving each major psychology subfield, building a broad conceptual map of the discipline as a whole.
The scientific method applied to psychological questions
The course covers how psychology applies scientific methodology to study genuinely difficult-to-measure phenomena like thought, emotion, and behavior.
Key topics in PSYC-FPX1010
- Major psychology subfields and their foundational questions
- The scientific method applied to psychological research
- Major historical perspectives in psychology
- Biological bases of behavior
- Introduction to research methods in psychology
- Everyday applications of psychological principles
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Worked example: applying scientific method to a psychological question
- Everyday belief: An informal, unsystematic assumption about why people behave a certain way
- Scientific approach: Formulating a testable hypothesis and designing a study to actually gather evidence rather than relying on assumption alone
- Lesson: Psychology's credibility as a genuine science comes from applying systematic, testable methodology to questions people might otherwise only speculate about informally
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Frequently asked questions
Just because thoughts and emotions can't be directly observed doesn't mean they can't be studied systematically — psychologists develop indirect but rigorous ways to measure them, through behavioral observation, self-report measures with established validity, and physiological indicators, and then apply the same core scientific principles (forming testable hypotheses, controlling for confounding variables, replicating findings) used in other sciences. PSYC-FPX1010 introduces this scientific approach early because it's what distinguishes psychology as a genuine science from purely informal speculation about why people think, feel, and behave the way they do.
Psychology is a genuinely broad discipline encompassing many distinct subfields — cognitive, developmental, social, clinical, biological, and more — each with its own theories, methods, and central questions, and a student who specializes immediately without first understanding this breadth may not have the conceptual foundation to understand how their eventual specialty relates to and draws on other areas of psychology. PSYC-FPX1010 surveys this breadth first because it gives students better context for making an informed choice about which specific area of psychology genuinely interests them for further study.