COURSE SYLLABUS FOR SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY

Instructor: My name is Bill Bailey, and my office is in room 321 of Harvey Hall. My phone extension is 2226; my home phone is 235-0510. My E-Mail address is BaileyB, and my Web site is http://www.uwstout.edu/socsci/bailey/bailey.html

• •My office hours are Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, 1:30-4:00 and Tuesday and Thursday, and 2:00-4:00. If these times are inconvenient for you, talk to me after class and we'll set up an alternative time.

• •I have a Web site that contains this outline as well as study questions for this course. My web site address is uwstout.edu/socsci/bailey, but it would probably be easier to find this site using the following directions.

2. Click on Academics/Research.

3. Click on Academic Units

4. You will now be in the College of Arts and Sciences home page

5. Scroll down to the Department of Social Science and click.

6. Scroll down to Sociology/Social Work (387) and click.

7. Scroll down to Instructor's Home Pages and click on my name

8. Find our course, Social Psychology SOC-250 and click on Outline, Questions, or Sample Papers.

9. If you click on questions, you now view is a list of questions organized by topic . Simply identify the appropriate topic and click on that topic, and you will have a set of questions that you can use as a study guide and for extra credit. The questions should be a help but don't encompass everything covered in the course.

• •I have created a list serve for this course so that I can e-mail timely messages to the entire class. You must sign up for this list serve by accessing your Stout e-mail account and click on "New Message"; when the new message window comes up, insert in the "To" box the following address: join-socpsych@listserve.uwstout.edu and then click "Send".

Course Purpose: This course is intended to be an analysis of everyday social behavior. Social psychology, as the term implies, concentrates on the reciprocal relationship between the personal and the social. This general area can be, and has been, examined from a number of different perspectives and viewpoints --- some from the discipline of psychology, some from psychiatry, some from anthropology, and some from sociology. We will be using a sociological perspective called symbolic interactionism. At the completion of this course the student should possess an understanding of the symbolic interactionist perspective and be able to apply this perspective to commonplace human behavior.

Course Method: The method will be lecture-discussion. I expect an active participation by all class members. At some time each week I'll question the class about assigned readings and previous class material.

Attendance: Class lectures and discussions are an important part of the course and, for that reason, attendance will be taken and poor attendance may affect your grade. Specifically, if you miss more than six classes, for whatever reasons, your course grade will be reduced one "level" (with levels being A, A-,B+,B, etc.). Note that "legitimate" absences must come from within the six permitted absences. I am serious about reducing your grade for poor attendance.

Requirements

• The readings are from (1)the Joel M. Charon Symbolic Interactionism, 3^rd edition, (2) the Spencer Cahill text, Inside Social Life, (3)a book of readings put together by textbook rental in a blue book and (3) some handouts. Note that although there are numerous Charon chapters at the beginning of the course, these are short chapters. Also note that there are study questions for all the readings and the lectures on my website, under Social Psychology, SOC-250, Questions. Simply click on the appropriate topic (see outline, below) and print the questions out for that topic.



• Quizzes: Seven quizzes will be given with a quiz being given at the end every one or two topics (see outline below). It is difficult for me to predict how long each topic will take so I'll announce the quizzes a couple of days before I give them. Of these seven quizzes, I'll count the highest six quizzes and, with the exception of the final exam, there will be no "big" exam (mid term or otherwise). Each quiz will consist of ten multiple choice questions and four short answer questions and will total forty points. All of these questions will be found/anticipated in the study question sheets mentioned above (in fact, the short answer questions will be exactly as found in the study question sheets). These quizzes should take about twenty minutes and will make up forty percent of your grade. The distribution for each quiz is found in the section identified as grades, below.



• Discussion group assignments: There will be eight discussion group assignments whereby groups will respond to a set of questions. Discussion assignment sheet will be handed out, completed by students in the discussion group, and turned in at the end of class. Some of these questions will be specific and based on the question sheets and will serve as a means of reviewing for the quiz; some of the questions will be more general and will call for the group to come up with examples of a concepts. Each completed sheet will be worth a maximum of thirteen points (with one assignment dropped) for a total of fifteen percent of your grade.

• An observation of a presentation of self

Make an observational "study" of a person engaged in a presentation of self/identity. You can make this observation in "real life" or of a presentation in the media (TV, movie, personal website, etc.). Pay attention, depending on information provided and available, to setting, body, clothing, props, stage equipment, and the manner and content of talk. In your report, detail the information provided in the presentation, and your assumption (though role taking) of the identity being presented and the responses this presentation elicited. I'll provide a sample of what I have in mind. This report will be worth forty points (see below).

• Concept vignettes

• Write one two-three page (double-spaced) vignette illustrating some of the concepts of the course. Any of the concepts may be selected but it would probably be easiest to choose some of the more substantive concepts such as presentation of self, embarrassment, stigma, deviance, mental illness, youth, adulthood, middle age, gender, or intimacy.
• Use, basically, one concept per paper and include as much conceptual detail in your paper as appropriate, given the length of the paper and the details of your vignette. Example of good vignettes from previous classes can be found on my website under "Sample Papers".
• You will most likely have to wait to write these until the topics/concepts are discussed in class and you've done the appropriate readings.

• These papers will be worth seventy-five points a piece and, combined, will constitute twelve and a half percent of your grade.
• You can hand these in any time but, in any event, by the last day of class.

• Write a (at least) two-page, double-spaced review of one of the articles in Cahill text, but not one already assigned. Include: (a)a summary of the article, (b)a conceptual tie-in to the theory and concepts of symbolic interactionism, (c)an indication of what you learned from the article, and a(d)critique of the article. These reviews will constitute twelve and a half percent of your grade and will be due Thursday, April 25^th .

• Final Exam: A comprehensive take-home essay exam will be due at our evaluation week meeting or before with the questions and instructions for the exam being distributed on Tuesday of our last regular week of classes. The final will be worth eighty points (see below).

• Extra credit: extra credit can be earned by being an active participant in class discussion (up to ten points) and by turning in completed question sheets (mentioned above). Each set of completed sheets for a topic is worth two points and you can turn in a maximum of five sets of sheets for a total of ten points.

Grades

Distribution Qzes(40%) Disc15%) Vgn(12.5%)Rev.(12.5%) Pres(6%) Final(14%)

A 90% 36 12 68 68 36 72

B+ 85% 34 64 34 68

B 77% 31 10 58 58 31 62

C+ 72% 29 54 29 58

C 65% 26 8 49 49 26 52

D+ 60% 24 45 24 48

D 52% 21 6 39 39 21 42

Total Points 240(for 6) 90(for 7) 75 75 40 80

Where: Qzes=Quizzes, Disc=Discussion assignments, Vgn=Vignette, Rev=Article review, Pres= Presentation of self observation, Final=Final exam.

Revised Outline and Reading Assignment⁽¹⁾

Topic Reading

JC SC RP

Mead and Pragmatism 3

Symbols 4,5

Interaction 8,10 12

Self 6,7

Change: career, conversion, role distance

Embarrassment 16

Stigma 18 59-73

Deviance 9

Mental Illness 33

Gender 6

Intimacy 20,

Infancy, Childhood 25

Adulthood 229-230 91-101

Middle Age, Aged

Evaluation Week Experience: Tuesday, May 13, 2:00-3:50

1. JC refers to the Joel Charon text, SP refers to the Spencer Cahill text, and RP refers to the blue-bound Reading Package.