Behavioral ScienceCurriculum Overview

William T. Greenough, PhD

October 5th, 2006

Setting the stage

• MD-Patient relationships– What is effective communication?– The biopsychosocial model– Styles of relating– Professional boundaries– Issues of compliance– Rules for handling difficult doctor-patient relationships

• Healthcare systems and Ethics– WHAT ACCOUNTS FOR EXPENDITURES ON HEALTH CARE? – LEGAL PRINCIPLES CENTRAL TO HEALTH CARE LAW AND POLICY– CURRENT BIOETHICAL DILEMMAS

Human Development

• Contexts of Development– Key Facts about Children in America– Social-Contextual Approach to Development

• Child Abuse in Context

• Prenatal Development– 3 Stages of Prenatal Development

• Major achievements of each stage

– Critical periods– Teratogens

Human Development (cont’d)

• Social & personality development in childhood– Major Theories of Social Development

• Psychoanalytic Theories• Social Learning Theory

– Styles of parenting and discipline

• Cognitive development in childhood– Piaget’s Stage Theory– Information Processing– Theory-theory Approach

Human Development (cont’d)

• Adolescence– Fundamental Changes– Important Contexts– Important Psychosocial Changes– Suicide

• Adult development – Erikson’s Psychosocial Stages of Adulthood– Marriage– Aging– Suicide

Experimental Psychology

• Basic Experimentation– Research Methods– Experimentation– Clinical relevance– Measurement and diagnosis

• Perception– Perceptual pathways– Characteristics of Perception– Context effects on Perception– Change blindness

Higher Cognition

• Learning– Biological constraints on Learning– Varieties of learning

• Habituation, Classical and Instrumental Conditioning

• Memory– Structure

• Short Term Sensory Store, Short-term Memory, Long Term Memory

– Process• Encoding, Storage and Retrieval

– Forgetting and Amnesias

• Decision Making– Cognitive Heuristics and Decision Making– Factors Leading to Cognitive Bias– Probabilistic Reasoning in Medicine

• Genes and Behavior – Genetics and Behavior– Genetics of Behavioral Disorders

• Substance Abuse – Drugs of abuse– Abuse vs Dependence– Effects of use & withdrawal

• Aggression and Abuse – Child maltreatment– Domestic violence– Rape– Determinants of aggression & abuse

Introduction to Psychopathology• Part 1

– Defining abnormal behavior– Freud’s view of personality– Modern view of abnormal behavior

• Part 2– Unipolar mood disorders– Bipolar mood disorders– Epidemiology and Biology of mood disorders– Risk of suicide

• Part 3– Schizophrenia

• Symptoms & diagnosis– Other psychotic disorders– Treatment modalities

Cultural Competence (need Instructor)

• Working Definitions

• Legal Mandates

• Health Disparities

• Clinical Encounters

• This is a new lecture and will be changing with time

Stress, Sleep Disorders

• Stress and Medical Disorders

• Circadian Rhythms

• Sleep and EEG

• Sleep Disorders

Human Sexuality

– Terms and distinctions– Female Anatomy – Male anatomy– Sexual response– Reproductive hormones

– Organizational actions– Activational effects: Cyclicity and sex

– Sexual Dysfunction– Illness and Injury– Drugs that influence sexual function– Contraception

Neuropsychology andNeuropsychological Assessment

• To review function of some major brain regions

• To understand differences in findings using brain damaged and intact individuals

• To gain an overview of the types of tasks that allow predictions of brain-behavior relationships

• To familiarize self with diagnostic tests used to assess function

Brain Plasticity

• To understand the role of brain plasticity in:– Normal Development

– Developmental Disabilities

– Recovery from brain damage

– Typical and pathological aging

END:Behavioral ScienceFaculty:•William Greenough: Course Director•Brian Ross, Psychology (Experimental Psychology)•Michael Wilson, Guest (Psychiatry)•Donna Korol, Psychology (Biopsychology)•Karl Rosengren, Psychology (Developmental Psychology)•Robert Rich, College of Law (Legal/Ethical issues)•Joe Goldberg, Medicine (Health Care Systems)

Aaron Grossman, Teaching Assistant

Behavioral ScienceFaculty:•William Greenough: Course Director•Brian Ross, Psychology (Experimental Psychology)•Michael Wilson, Guest (Psychiatry)•Donna Korol, Psychology (Biopsychology)•Karl Rosengren, Psychology (Developmental Psychology)•Robert Rich, College of Law (Legal/Ethical issues)•Joe Goldberg, Medicine (Health care systems)

Aaron Grossman, Teaching Assistant

Course Objectives: Examples

•Many of the greatest health risk factors today are behavioral, the realm of Behavioral Science•Self-injurious behaviors such as smoking, alcohol and drug abuse, poor dietary and exercise habits, now constitute the largest controllable risk factors for mortality•Psychiatric disorders: major cause of disability•Behavior can put others at risk (e.g., ARND)•Physician’s responsibility to inform and advise patients at risk or putting others at risk

Course Objectives: Examples

•Other behavioral issues important in Medicine•Stress is a serious medical issue (CardioVascD)• Compliance (taking medicine, following medical advice, regular preventative medicine)• Sexual function (taking a sexual history)• Is my child “normal”? Development and Aging• Stress-related or affected disorders• Lifestyle (Tobacco, Diet, Exercise, Alcohol, Sleep)