Psychology 169b Page 8
Fall, 2017
Psychology 169b
Disorders of Childhood
Fall, 2017 Prof. Joseph Cunningham
Tuesday, 9-12 Brown 317 (ext. 63304) Office Hours: Thur 8-10:00 am
Location Brown 115 email: Office Hours: M, 2-3pm, Th,230-330pm,and by appt.
Course Objectives
This course reviews the major approaches to understanding child psychopathology within the context of typical development, drawing on empirical research, case study, fiction, poetry, journalism, and memoir. It surveys clinical disorders of infants, children and adolescents in terms of etiology, assessment, diagnosis and treatment across development. Students will gain a wide-ranging and in-depth understanding of the relations between normal development and disorder, and the contributions of biology, maturation, family life and peer interactions to children’s adaptation and maladaptation.
Learning Goals
Specific learning outcomes include:
1.) Review typical developmental challenges and achievements across childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood, and explore clinical disorders and developmental delays within that context.
2.) Appreciate the unique and interactive contributions of genetic, biochemical, temperamental, maturational, learning, familial, and peer contributions to both typical and maladaptive patterns of development.
3.) Understand empirical models of diagnosis, treatment and outcome assessment as distinct from the traditional medical model, and employ that understanding to propose an empirical study of some aspect of diagnostic comorbidity.
4.) Translate your learning about empirical and clinical findings into an appreciation of the everyday experience of families and children with disorders.
5.) Apply your understanding in all of these domains to the support of children and families in your everyday lives.
Texts:
Dorris, M. (1987). A yellow raft in blue water. New York: Warner.
Dorris, M. (1989). The broken cord. New York: Harper Row.
Friedman, Carl (1996). The shovel and the loom. New York: Persea Books.
Paley, V.G. (2004). A Child’s work: The importance of fantasy play.
Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Parritz, R.H. & Troy, M.F. (2018). Disorders of Childhood: Development and Psychopathology, 3rd Ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage.
Weekly assignments for these texts are provided below. Assignments for Latte-posted readings are also provided below, and additional readings may be announced in class. Completion of the reading assignments prior to their listed date for discussion in class is essential for your understanding, participation and enjoyment. Be advised that the reading load in this course is heavy and the overall work load is well above average.
Schedule:
Changes in the following timetable are likely and will be discussed in class.
Class Meeting Topics Readings
9/5 Worldtham Elementary School, 2000, PSYC 169 Syllabus
1st day of Kindergarten
9/12 The Experience of Childhood and Parenthood Readings on Latte
9/19 Models of Development, Psychopathology, Dorris, Yellow Raft And Treatment Parritz&Troy (P&T),
Ch.1&2
9/26 Principles and Practices of Developmental P&T, Ch.3; Friedman, Psychopathology Shovel & Loom
10/3 NO CLASS --- ‘Deis Th
10/10 Assessment, Classification P&T, Ch. 4
and Treatment Dorris, Broken Cord
10/17 Assessment, Classification P&T, Ch. 4
and Treatment Paley, A Child’s Work
10/24 Family Project Presentation; P&T, Ch. 5 & 7 Disorders of Early Development and Attachment; Autism Spectrum Disorders
10/31 Family Project Presentation; P&T, Ch. 9
Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity
Disorder
11/7 Family Project Presentation; P&T, Ch. 6
Intellectual Developmental Delay/
Learning Disabilities
11/14 Family Project Presentation; P&T, Ch. 8, 11, 13
Internalizing Syndromes:
Anxiety Disorders & Eating Disorders
11/21 Family Project Presentation; P&T, Ch. 12 Internalizing Syndromes:
Internalizing Syndromes: Mood Disorders
11/28 Family Project Presentation; P&T, Ch. 10 & 14 Externalizing Syndromes: Conduct
Externalizing Syndromes:
Oppositional Defiant Disorder,
Conduct Disorder, and Substance Abuse
12/4 Case Conference: No Readings
Crisis Intervention/Primary Prevention
(Reserve Readings will be available on Latte)
Projects and Evaluation:
Several additional reading assignments, small writing projects or out-of-class exercises may be announced in class throughout the semester. They will usually be read or referred to in class to provide a foundation for group discussion.
Your grade will be made up of three components:
Class Participation/Weekly Commentaries 25%
Family Project Presentation 35%
Research Proposal 40%
Class Participation:
Everything we do in this course is designed to improve your ability to listen to, understand and support children and families. That requires listening to, understanding and supporting each other, which requires not engaging with electronic social networks during class. I hate to turn my phone off, and I hate to disconnect my browser. But I do so for clients, and I do so for class, and so will you.
Your active involvement in discussion is essential to the success of the course. Your participation grade will incorporate all of the following —attendance, listening, understanding and integration of other’s comments, understanding and integration of readings, spoken and written contributions. Written contributions will include occasional assignments specified in class and two regular forms:
1) For each weekly reading assignment you will bring to class a typed hardcopy of a commentary generated by your reading. No handwritten or late-submitted commentaries will be accepted. In the event of absence, your commentary must be submitted by e-mail prior to start of class. At the close of each class meeting, you will supplement your commentary with a brief handwritten paragraph about how it was impacted by class discussion and/or the family project presentation. These will be graded on a check-minus/check/check-plus gradient and returned in the next class.
2) After each family project presentation (with the exception of your own group presentation), you will be asked to provide the presenting group with some feedback. You will write a brief paragraph describing your view of the strengths and weaknesses of the presentation, accompanied by suggestions for improvement. Note: These evaluation paragraphs will not themselves be graded and will not be used to grade presentations. Their sole purpose will be to provide constructive feedback for each group.
Family Project:
Within the next several weeks, this course will provide you with a new identity. Sorry, but yes, you will still have to talk to that weird cousin in your real family. And no, it doesn’t come with a new and improved GPA. Your new self will serve the purpose of joining several of your peers as members of a family which experiences a specific childhood disorder. Your group will research the relevant literary, scientific and clinical literature (submitting a list of your references to me for feedback no later than one month before your presentation date) and prepare a comprehensive overview of the disorder for presentation in one of the seminar meetings during the second half of the semester.
The bulk of your family project presentation will be a dramatic depiction of your family’s experience of a particular disorder over time, in which each student portrays one or more characters. Due to the small number of people in each group, each group member may have to play more than one role. You will prepare multiple drafts of your script over the several weeks leading up to your presentation date. Your penultimate draft script must be submitted to me for feedback no later than three weeks before your presentation date.
Your play should run no longer than an hour, and most groups elect to stage their presentation in a dorm lounge area. To conclude your presentation, we will return to the classroom where you and your fellow group members will take questions from the class as a panel.
The family project presentation grade will reflect the overall quality and integration of coverage in your presentation, including the initial set of scientific, clinical and humanistic references that you submit by the deadline, and your incorporation of those aspects and of typical developmental aspects child and family strengths and shortcomings in your final script and performance. All members of your presenting family will share the same presentation grade.
Research Proposal Project:
Each student will prepare a 7-10 page research proposal which compares and/or contrasts some data-based aspect of two different disorders in such a manner as to design a study which could improve our understanding of one or both of the disorders. The aim of the paper is to for you to generate an empirically testable hypothesis that proposes a new way to explain or understand some aspect of one of the disorders. You should develop such a hypothesis by tracing some suggestive pattern of similarity and/or difference in the existing evidence about an aspect of one disorder in relation to that same aspect in another disorder. You should clearly explain the specific pattern of similarity or difference in the data that led you to your idea as part of describing your hypothesis. Then you should go on to describe the experiment you’d have in mind to test your hypothesis.
For example, anxiety and depression were once thought of as distinctive disorders until people began to notice that SSRI medications, initially prescribed for treatment of depression, appeared to provide relief for both. That led to improved models of anxiety based on research showing that it shared some of the same underlying neurotransmitter deficiencies as depression.
The assignment's structure is designed to help you learn how we advance our understanding by looking for connections between disorders that have yet to be fully exploited in clarifying the fundamental nature of one of the disorders. It reflects the notion that one of the reasons comorbidity is so prevalent in childhood psychopathology is that existing categories of disorder may well be missing important underlying dimensions of behavior which have more to do with what's going on than the extant models of the disorders have thus far included.
The paper's structure should reflect the standard research proposal in APA format:
Abstract – Should be brief (< 150 words). Should identify the data-based pattern connecting the two disorders, the hypothesis being tested, a brief overview of method (including participant characteristics and sample size), and the expected contribution to improving our understanding of one or both disorders.
Introductory Paragraph – Should tell the reader what the paper is about and should narrow your subject to a single, central idea that you want readers to gain from your study. Specifically, you should briefly note the existing pattern of data in the literature that sets up your hypothesis, the purpose of your proposed research, and what your hypothesis does to improve our understanding of one or both disorders.
Literature Review/Hypothesis(es) – The specific studies reviewed should include the most current peer-reviewed sources on the topic and should lead the reader through the reasons you selected your two disorders. You should explain the specific patterns of similarity and/or difference in the data-based research findings that led to, and provide the foundation for, the hypothesis(es) you develop. The literature review should culminate in a clear hypothesis(es) that is (are) supported by the data pattern you reviewed and show promise for going beyond our current understanding.
Method – Describe your Participants, indicating how they will be selected, your Independent Variables (IV) and levels (e.g. if you have reason to expect a sex difference, Sex would be an IV and M/F would be the levels of that IV), and the Dependent Variable (DV) measures you will use, briefly explaining why those measures are appropriate for your study. Then provide a step-by-step description of your Procedure, that is, how the data will be collected. You may want to consult the Method section of the studies you reviewed for the most useful formatting of this section.
Interpretation of Results/Discussion – Describe the pattern of findings that would support your hypothesis(es), linking those potential outcomes to the original hypotheses, the potential for improving our understanding of the specific disorder(s), and the challenge of understanding comorbidity in general. You do NOT need to get into the specific statistical procedures you would employ to analyze your data.
References – Include all of the sources cited in your proposal, and only the sources cited in your proposal.
If you have not taken Psyc 52 (Research Methods), you should contact me immediately to discuss the extra preparation you will need to begin this project. Everyone is required to e-mail me with a summary of the research findings you are considering as the basis for your hypothesis no later than mid-semester (Friday, 10/20). The paper grade will reflect the quality of both the conceptual content and the clarity of the writing. A hard-copy of your proposal is due in my Brown 125 mailbox by 5PM on Thursday, 11/30, five days before our last class meeting. That is a firm deadline. Given the time it me to review your proposals and the Registrar’s grade submission deadline, no extensions can be provided. Late submissions will result in a reduction of one grade-level per day.
More detailed information about each component of the Projects will be discussed in class.
If you are a student with a documented disability on record at Brandeis University and wish to have a reasonable accommodation made for you in this class, please see me immediately.
You are expected to be honest in all of your academic work. The University policy on academic honesty is distributed annually as section 4 of the Rights and Responsibilities handbook (http://www.brandeis.edu/studentaffairs/srcs/rr/RR13_14.pdf). Instances of alleged dishonesty will be forwarded to the Dean of Students Office for possible referral to the Student Conduct Process. Potential sanctions include failure in the course and suspension from the University. If you have any questions about my expectations, please ask.
Four-Credit Course (with three hours of class-time per week)
Success in this 4 credit hour course is based on the expectation that students will spend a minimum of 9 hours of study time per week in preparation for class (readings, papers, discussion sections, preparation for exams, etc.).