Classes

Circuits and Symptoms

Semester: 

Spring

Offered: 

2015

This class will explore the biology of psychological illness. We will ignore artificial diagnostic labels, examining instead the core symptom domains that have plagued humans since the beginning of recorded history. A strong emphasis will be placed on biological mechanisms. In particular, the class will focus on mapping dysfunction in large-scale brain circuits to cognitive, affective, social, and motivational symptom domains, and on understanding how genes and environments act and interact to predispose these symptoms by shaping brain function and development....

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Psych 18: Abnormal Psychology

Semester: 

Fall

Offered: 

2014

Introduction to the study of psychological dysfunction. Focuses on abnormal behavior as it relates to the definition, etiology, and treatment of major forms of psychopathology, including depression, anxiety, phobias, PTSD, OCD, addiction, autism, schizophrenia, and psychopathy. This course will emphasize critical evaluation of the causes and mechanisms of mental disorders, with special attention paid to recent neuroscientific and genetic research on the neurobiology of psychopathology....

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PSY 2060: Reward and Self-Control

Semester: 

Spring

Offered: 

2013
What's stopping you from doing absolutely everything that your devious heart desires? The ability to flexibly control our behavior - particularly when it comes to rewarding things like food, sex, and drugs - has huge consequences for our long-term happiness and success. Though we are reasonably good at this as a species, dramatic individual differences in the capacity for self-control are readily apparent. In this class, we will examine the cognitive construct of self-control, its neurobiological underpinnings and sources of individual variation, and relationships to psychopathology.