PSY 261
Motivation

Syllabus

View Motivation Calendar

Course Goals   Course Text   Grading Scale   Course Policies   Instructor Access

Course Description
Motivation is a special-topics course for upper-division majors studying psychology. It requires PY-261 (Learning) as a pre-requisite or concurrent enrollment. Topical coverage in this course will typically include conceptual and historical foundations for motivational theory; ethological and physiological foundations of motivated behavior -- including maternal behaviors, animal migration, homeostatic body and energetic functions, and sexual behavior; activation -- ranging from sleep to stimulus seeking; stress; learned drives, incentives, and motives; cognitive and social sources of motivation; and dimensions of emotional expression as they relate to motivation.

Goals
As a result of this course, a successful student will be proficient in identifying the multiple factors in behavioral activation, regulation, and direction, including: 1) genetic factors; 2) physiological and neural factors; 3) environmental factors; 4) cognitive factors; and 5) emotional factors. Students will recognize major researchers or theorists and will correctly associate them with their respective contributions, including their research methods and outcomes.

Required Textbook
Petri, H. L. 1996. Motivation: Theory, Research, and Applications (4th Ed.). Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole Publishing Company.

Activities and Their Relevance to Evaluation
Classroom activities range from lectures and discussions to workshops. In workshops, students will work both in teams and individually to construct comprehensive "study guides" for the course. Study guides will take the form of annotated and illustrated "concept cluster" mappings based upon a meta-data coding system to be developed within the course. These will be developed and maintained as individual "portfolios" to be submitted periodically, and will eventually account for approximately 20% of total final grades. The remaining 80% of the course grade is determined by three in-class association and/or essay tests and a final.

Testing: and Grading
We will have three tests and a final of approximately equal value, with the total of the four accounting for approximately 80% of the total final grades. All tests will be association and/or essay format. The grading is based on percentage of total points earned divided by total number of points available within the course, with percentages translating into letter grades as follows:

Grading Scale

96-100 A

94-95 A-

92-93 B+

89-91 B

87-88 B-

84-86 C+

76-83 C

73-75 C-

71-72 D+

67-70 D

65-66 D-

A Final Word on Policy ­ Cheating and/or Plagiarism
It is the policy of this course that any cheating and/or plagiarism will subject you to an automatic F for the entire course and a reporting of the incidence to appropriate administrative processes that may result in your dismissal from Rollins.

Discalimers
This Syllabus is a projection of my best intentions in conducting this course, and circumstances almost always arise which require some alterations of goals, content, assignments or schedule. I, therefore, reserve the right to change any element of this Syllabus at any time by a simple verbal announcement of these changes during class.

INSTRUCTOR ACCESS

Dr. Roger Ray
Johnson Center - Room 105
By Appointment
direct: 646-2278
or via Lynda, Secretary: - x2227
rdray@rollins.edu