Courses of the
Infant Development Research Center
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Interdisciplinary Minority Student Research Training Program
We have an active interdisciplinary minority student research training program in early development that includes both undergraduate and graduate students. Students conduct research in their primary lab while receiving exposure to research in one or more secondary labs of the SFRC. Students attend our colloquium series (which involves reading research articles by each speaker and interacting with each speaker), enroll in an interdisciplinary research/theory course during one or more semesters taught by one or two of the core faculty (where students integrate current issues, concepts and theory in developmental science with their own research focus). Fifty undergraduate students and seven graduate students participated during the past two years. Undergraduates receive early research exposure, affiliate with individual projects, receive a graduate mentor, and prepare a poster presentation, and in some cases manuscript publication. Graduate students pursue theses, dissertations, grants and publications. Our students have received a variety of research scholarships for their outstanding performance: four undergraduates received APA minority student scholarships for individual research projects (PRIME; Psychology Research Initiative Mentorship Program), one undergraduate received an NIH Minority Access to Research Careers (MARC) award, and four graduate students and one undergraduate received NIH Research Initiative for Scientific Enhancement (RISE) awards to fund their training.
DEP 4937/DEP 5936: Integrating Theory and Research Experience in Developmental Science
This is an interdisciplinary, seminar style upper division undergraduate and graduate course. Students will explore current issues, theory, and methods in the development of attention, perception, cognition, and social development in infancy though reading current literature, class discussion, and hands on experience conducting research in the Infant Development Lab, Developmental Psychobiology Lab, or other Infant Center lab. Topics may include the development of intersensory perception, self perception, autism, categorization, memory and emotion. Emphasis is on the use of multiple levels of analysis. Prerequisites include one developmental psychology course, statistics, and participation in the Infant Development Research Center. Students take this course along with PSY 4916 where they will receive concurrent experience conducting research in a Center research lab on the topics of discussion in the seminar. Permission of the instructor is required (new students welcome). Please call Dr. Bahrick at the Infant Lab (305) 348-3988.
DEP 3115: Development in Infancy: The Basis of Human Knowledge
This upper division undergraduate course provides a comprehensive study of the history, theories, research methods, and selected topics in infant perceptual, cognitive, and social development. Current methods, theories, and empirical findings concerning such topics as the development of object and event perception, space perception, speech perception and early communication, intersensory perception, and object concept development, and social development will be examined. This course will emphasize the role of research and theory in our knowledge about infant perceptual, cognitive, and sociasl development. The primary goals of the course are for students to come away with a) a new appreciation of how theories shape the way we see the world, b) their own “synthesized” theoretical perspective about human development, c) a deeper understanding of research methods and how to evaluate the “facts” science generates, and d) a basic knowledge of what scientists currently know about how infants perceive and understand the world.
PSY 4002: Introduction to Biopsychology
This undergraduate course examines a variety of topics in the domain of biopsychology and explores how their understanding contributes to a better understanding of behavior. These topics include organization and development of the nervous system, sensing and moving, maintaining homeostasis, biological rhythms, emotions, learning and memory, thinking and consciousness, and disorders of the brain and behavior. While the primary emphasis of the course is to develop a better understanding of the complex relationship between the nervous system and behavior, we also explore such topics as psychoneuroimmunology, the roles of evolution and development in nervous system structure and function, the biological foundations of consciousness, and the importance of comparative psychology to advances in biopsychology.
PSY 5058: Biological Basis of Behavioral Development
This graduate level course surveys recent advances in the biological sciences (genetics, developmental biology, neuroscience, evolutionary biology) that inform the study of behavioral development. In particular, the course focuses on the interdisciplinary science of developmental psychobiology, which attempts to integrate developmental biology and developmental psychology to further our understanding of individual development. A primary emphasis of the course is on the development of behavior, including perception and cognition. A prominent goal of the course is to foster appreciation of the importance and value of interdisciplinary research to basic and applied applications of developmental science.