Psychology Club Movie Night

Join your fellow Psychology fans to watch Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

The film stars Tim Carey and Kate Winslet as lovers who erase their memories of each other after their relationship sours.

Professor Golden will lead a discussion following the movie.

First Year Advising Dinner -- Monday, November 9, 6:30

Our annual tradition of a special dinner meeting to help first year students select spring classes is scheduled for November 9.

The dinner provides an opportunity for first year Social Science majors to use the collective wisdom of their peers, members of the sophomore/junior/senior classes, and Social Sciences faculty members when making class selections.

Plus everyone gets to enjoy some special offerings in the dining hall -- the dining staff are putting together a few extra offerings to tempt our palates (and tempt us into eating dessert!).

Come and join us by swiping your meal plan card (or checking off your name on the list with the cashier if you are not on a meal plan) and heading over to the faculty dining hall (head to the pizza and walk up the 3 steps between the pizza and the ice cream.

Bring your questions and your ideas about what classes you want to take.

What can taking a Psychological Research Methods class teach you about H1N1?

We’ve been talking about measuring independent and dependent variables in my research methods class – I know, I know, what is so interesting about dependent variables? Well, they’re fascinating! Whenever we do research, we have to decide what variables, or factors, to measure so that we can learn something about human behavior or the human experience. And the way we decide to measure those variables or even the variables we choose to measure can drastically impact what we learn about our experiences and about human behavior.

I’m guessing that we’ve all heard news stories about H1N1 and the increased incidence of flu-like symptoms recently but have you wondered about how we know that flu symptoms are increasing?

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) tracks flu, along with other diseases, by collecting data from doctors, hospitals, state health agencies, and, unfortunately, morgues. Essentially, someone reports how many patients come in for medical health visits with flu-like symptoms. The CDC compiles all of this data and computes an estimate of the incidence of flu within the U.S. population (you can view this data by week at http://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/fluactivity.htm).

Last year, Google tried a new method of collecting data and measuring how many people get flu. Instead of relying on doctor reports, they used information collected by Google – how many people search for flu-symptoms online. This is an entirely different way of assessing the variable of how many people get the flu and could potentially yield entirely different results. But last year, and again this year, Google’s data has mirrored the data obtained by the CDC but it’s updated daily.

You can learn more about Google Flu Trends at http://www.google.org/flutrends/about/how.html and http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v457/n7232/full/nature07634.html

And, visit this year’s Google Flu results and see how many people are looking for flu-symptom information compared to this time last year at http://www.google.org/flutrends/us/.

Calling all Foodies!

Sociology Professor Drew will be taking her class to a Private Showing of the 2009 documentary “Food, Inc.” featuring Michael Pollen (author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma (2007) and more recently, In Defense of Food (2009)) next week and there are a few extra seats that are available for other interested students for the price of $5.

To view a trailer of the film, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eKYyD14d_0

Date: Wednesday, October 7.

Time: Leave campus by vans or car at 6:30, for 7:00 showing. Return by 9:30

Where: Coolidge Corner Cinema, Harvard Street (Coolidge Corner) in Brookline

To Attend: You need to register with the Social Science department to attend this trip. To register, please bring $5 to Anne Mullaney, her office is on the first floor of Plummer House (144 Woodland Street).

If you have any questions, please contact Prof. Drew (jdrew@lasell.edu) or Prof. Rosenthal (lrosenthal@lasell.edu).

Changes in the Social Science Department

This has been a very eventful summer and fall for the Social Sciences Department! We've had many changes and have a lot of exciting plans for the upcoming year.

Our biggest change this year was that two of our beloved faculty members have left the campus but, of course, they can't leave our Lasell Family!

• Professor Felice Gordis retired and moved to New York to spend more time with her grandchildren.
• Professor Sidney Trantham left to pursue clinical and teaching opportunities in the graduate program at Lesley.

We will miss them both but they are only an email away!

Another change this year is that we have a new Department Chair: Professor Lori Rosenthal. Professor Rosenthal teaches Experimental Design, Group Dynamics, Child Development and Introduction to Psychology. She also teaches two classes in the graduate program -- Organizational Behavior and Consumer Behavior. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in Social/Personality Psychology with concentrations in Statistical Analysis and Organizational and Consumer Studies. She came to Lasell two years ago from the faculty at Emerson College. Professor Rosenthal is currently conducting research on pro-anorexia websites as well as on the role of connected learning on student's educational experiences.

This year the department will be very busy. We have our Social Science Peer Mentor group underway, we will be hiring two new faculty members, we will be inducting students into our newly approved national honor society, and we will be reviewing the curriculum in each of the majors offered in Social Sciences.

Stay tuned to this blog for updates about the department as well as information about recent research and current events that relate to faculty and student interests in Social Sciences.

Dissociative Identity Disorder (also known as Multiple Personality Disorder): fact or fiction?

While I'm not a big fan of daylight savings time, one plus of waking early today was that I was able to watch "CBS Sunday Morning" and saw a very interesting story about Dissociative Identity Disorder (the clinical term for the more commonly used Multiple Personality Disorder). This type of dramatic abnormal behavior is what draws the attention of many people, psychology students in particular. Check out the story along with video by clicking the link below and then come back and let us know: is DID fact or fiction?

Unraveling The Secret of "Alters" - Doctors Are Of Two Minds About
Multiple Personality Disorder (CBS Morning Show 03/08/09)

Podcast Now Available!!!

Check out the new feature of the Social Sciences Blog: Scientific American's 60-Second Psych!

This is a great way to get current, up to the minute information about cutting edge research in psychology. It is an audio podcast and available in the right-hand side of the blog.

Listen to a few and tell us which podcasts are your favorites and which are your least favorites.

Child Mental Health News: Child Caregivers

For anyone who is interested in children/adolescents and development, this is an interesting video from the NY Times about the increase in child caregivers and the emotional and behavioral impact on them. Click on the link below to watch an interesting and brief video:

NY Times Health: CHild Caregivers Video

an interesting book review

I stumbled across this recent NY Times book review and think it has some interesting points about the history of investigations of mental institutions but it raised a lot of questions for me as well. 

Here's the title of the book and the review: 

Voluntary Madness: My Year Lost and Found in the Loony Bin by Norah Vincent

What do you think about this author's experience and approach writing this book?

Coming soon...

This will be an exciting page about the Social Sciences at Lasell College - check back soon!