Bring the Pain

Research methods and statistics are a part of nearly every undergraduate psychology curriculum. They get dedicated courses of their own as well as coverage within other courses. In this episode we step back and reflect on how they should fit into an undergraduate curriculum and how we should be teaching them. Can and should we try to teach them important concepts without the underlying math? How do we integrate methodology into “substantive” teaching about psychology theories and findings? What should we do with the knowledge that many, probably most of our students will never calculate a correlation coefficient or run a t-test after they graduate? How idealistic versus pragmatic should we be about teaching these topics and what we’ll actually get across? Plus: We respond to a letter from a new-ish grad student about mentoring an undergraduate who is writing their first paper. 

The Black Goat is hosted by Sanjay Srivastava, Alexa Tullett, and Simine Vazire. Find us on the web at www.theblackgoatpodcast.com, on Twitter at @blackgoatpod, on Facebook at facebook.com/blackgoatpod/, and on instagram at @blackgoatpod. You can email us at letters@theblackgoatpodcast.com. You can subscribe to us on iTunes or Stitcher.

Our theme music is Peak Beak by Doctor Turtle, available on freemusicarchive.org under a Creative Commons noncommercial attribution license. Our logo was created by Jude Weaver.

This is episode 61. It was recorded on June 19, 2019.

This is How We Do It

Many academics have flexibility in when, where, and how they get work done. In this episode we talk about the work habits we’ve developed to be productive, and the ones we’ve tried on that didn’t fit. What are the differences between working in an office, at home, at a cafe, or elsewhere? How do you create routines and protect your time to get things done? Is it better to work with other people or alone? How do you recognize when the advice that works for everybody else doesn’t work for you? Plus: With some help from sociologist Jill Harrison, we answer a letter from a first-generation college student who’s now in a Ph.D. program and having a hard time talking to family about what that’s about.

Links:

The Black Goat is hosted by Sanjay Srivastava, Alexa Tullett, and Simine Vazire. Find us on the web at www.theblackgoatpodcast.com, on Twitter at @blackgoatpod, on Facebook at facebook.com/blackgoatpod/, and on instagram at @blackgoatpod. You can email us at letters@theblackgoatpodcast.com. You can subscribe to us on iTunes or Stitcher.

Our theme music is Peak Beak by Doctor Turtle, available on freemusicarchive.org under a Creative Commons noncommercial attribution license. Our logo was created by Jude Weaver.

This is episode 60. It was recorded on May 31, 2019.