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SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES ON DIVERSITY AND LEADERSHIP LEADERSHIP 390-01/ PSYCHOLOGY 359 FALL 2011 INSTRUCTOR: Dr. Crystal Hoyt OFFICE HOURS: BY APPOINTMENT EMAIL: [email protected] OFFICE LOCATION: Jepson 132 PHONE: 804-287-6825 COURSE TIMES AND LOCATION: Tuesday, Thursday 10:30am-11:45am, Jepson 101 COURSE WEBSITE: http://blackboard.richmond.edu READINGS: Two books and a number of research articles are assigned for this course. The readings may change slightly and other readings may be assigned during the semester. The assigned readings provide the background and context for classroom lecture and discussion, therefore, you should read the readings before the class period during which it is discussed. You are not required to read the readings labeled optional. Discussion leaders may choose to incorporate these optional readings into their presentation.  Steele, C. (2010). Whistling Vivaldi: And other clues to how stereotypes affect us. New York: NY. W.W. Norton & Company.  Kristof, N. D., & WuDunn, S. (2009). Half the sky: Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide. New York: Random House. DESCRIPTION AND GOALS OF THE COURSE: Generally, the goal of this course is to understand how diversity affects social relations with an emphasis on leadership. To this end, we will examine diversity through the lens of social psychology by examining individual and collective dynamics in pluralistic settings. The primary focus in this course will be to familiarize students with basic research on intergroup relations, prejudice, stereotyping, and discrimination, so that they can: (1) evaluate and analyze the scientific merit of this research, and (2) apply this research to real world situations—e.g., reflect on the effect of social identity on achievement, performance, mental health, physical health, etc. We will focus on the causes, correlates and consequences of stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination. In addition to understanding the effects and theoretical origins of many problems associated with diversity, we will also address approaches to ameliorating these problems. COURSE REQUIREMENTS Your grade in the course will be determined by performance on the following course requirements: 1. CLASS PARTICIPATION, DISCUSSION POINTS, UR EVENTS: This course is predicated on the active participation of all members. You are expected to attend all classes, arrive on time, and fully engage in discussions and activities. The emphasis is on quality of class participation rather than quantity. Each unexcused absence will penalize your final grade. Excused absences (such as illness, team trips, or family emergencies) must be documented with a doctor’s or dean’s letter. The class discussions and activities are highly dependent upon the assigned reading for the day. You must come to class fully prepared to discuss the assigned readings; thorough participation will also contribute to a strong2 evaluation of class participation. In order to facilitate critical thinking and discussion, you will be asked to post two discussion points on BlackBoard (Discussion Board) by 6pm the evening before class. Writing these discussion points should 1) help you start thinking about the readings before you come to class and 2) help me or the discussion facilitators determine what issues you are interested in. Thus, please put some thought into them. Interesting discussion points often 1) address problems, ideas, issues that tie together a number of readings/perspectives, 2) meaningfully criticize some aspect of the readings, 3) discuss how the ideas under study pertain to real world phenomena and question their implications and applications or 4) suggest future research inspired by the readings. You will be graded on the following scale: check = above threshold, check-minus = below threshold. Sure fire ways to get a check minus are to only have one discussion point, submit your discussion point after the 6pm deadline, reveal knowledge of only part of the readings, writing something that is so wrong I think you could not have read the article or so incomprehensible I have no idea what you said. Finally, you will be asked to attend and comment on University of Richmond events that occur outside of class time 2. DISCUSSION LEADERS: Many of the class meetings will consist of discussions of the assigned readings led by team leaders. Each member of the seminar will sign up to lead seminar discussions during the semester. The discussion leaders should identify the most important issues and questions in the readings, highlighting examples of situations in which these issues arise, presenting the authors’ arguments about these issues, and identifying criticism of the work to help guide class discussion. The facilitators are not to resolve these issues, but use them to encourage further discussion of these issues. In addition, to allow for flexibility to accommodate student interest discussion leaders will also identify another article not covered in the readings that illustrates a key insight related to the topic. For this exercise, the student leaders will describe the design of the study(ies) and will ask the class to make predictions and formulate a rationale for these predictions before revealing the study results. Leaders must let me know which article they chose to incorporate by Friday of the week preceding their presentation. In addition, discussion leaders are encouraged to incorporate media, movie clips, newspaper articles and other related current events as examples. Possible Discussion Question Topics/Issues - What issues remain confusing or need clarification? - What are the strengths and weaknesses of the research both in terms of the methods and the validity of them? - Discuss alternative explanations for the findings. Do the explanations provided by the researchers make sense to you? Are there other explanations that seem equally compelling? - Under what conditions would different results be found? What are the "boundary conditions" of these ideas/findings? How might other variables (e.g., race, gender, status) qualify or change these findings? - Discuss linkages across the readings. How does the research that you are reading relate to previous topics that we have discussed? How are the themes represented in these readings similar or different to how they have been presented in other class readings? - How can


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U of R LDST 390 - Syllabus

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