AP® Psychology—Semester B

Sample Lesson - Introduction

Lesson 9.05: If You're Happy and You Know It, Read Ahead

Theorists in the 70s and 80s postulated that "happiness is a warm puppy". Later experts countered with: "lolcats"
(Source)

The cool thing about studying a cutting-edge science is that it isn't all dead guys, icebergs, and pigeons. There are new breakthroughs in neuroscience and biopsychology all the time, because we invented a new machine or are able to understand neurons better. New psychologists are born every day, and one might just revolutionize the way we think about cognitive processes and behavior. It could be you, young Shmooper.

One man that has made waves in this actual century (to the point of having a TED talk and everything) is Martin Seligman. He developed positive psychology. Positive psychology is the revolutionary idea that we should look at healthy behavior as much as unhealthy behavior: The idea that, just maybe, the way to help people be less miserable is to study how happy people become, and stay, happy.

Does this belong in personality theory? Sort of. Seligman started out as a learning theorist, and discovered a phenomenon called learned helplessness (which definitely belongs within the topic of personality) by making dogs really, really sad—we'll get to that in a sec. He then went on (maybe because abusing puppies can be depressing?) to focus on the positive side of humanity. Part of that is determining what makes happy people happy.

That's pretty much personality theory, right? The other part of Seligman's contribution is kind of Bandura-esque—it's the idea that society has a lot to do with what we think of as "happy." So sometimes positive psychology gets filed under "social psychology."

Ultimately, it doesn't really matter where you put it: positive psychology is the cool new thing, and there are a lot of nifty studies you can participate in right now to help positive psychology research. Let's dive in and hear all about positive psychology from Dr. Feelgood himself, Martin Seligman.

Sample Lesson - Reading

Reading 9.9.05: Clap Along if You Feel Like a Dog Without a Woof

Seligman the Man

Let's talk about the depressed doggies first. Seligman did some studies in the late 1960s in order to find out more about learning avoidance behaviors. He and a partner used classical conditioning on dogs (Pavlov style; talk about old school). They'd present a tone, then follow it with a "harmless" but painful electric shock. The dogs were harnessed so they couldn't escape the electric shock. The hypothesis was basically that the dogs would learn to be afraid of the sound of the tone and try to escape when they heard it.

So the conditioned, or shocked, doggies were the experimental group. The control group hadn't been conditioned to be scared of the tone. Seligman and his buddies put them all in a box together with a fence they could jump over to escape. No harnesses this time. When the tone sounded and the shocks started, the dogs that weren't conditioned jumped over the fence and the dogs that knew the shock was coming just sat there. They went on sitting there after the shock itself began. Why?

Because another, unintended association had been made: the harness. In all of the other experiences the dogs had had, they couldn't escape, so they learned to not even try. Seligman and his associates had accidentally given the dogs a psychological harness. Seligman called this behavior learned helplessness. And whether you feel like calling the ASPCA right now or not, you can't deny that it's a significant observation.

How many of us have integrated this idea into our self-concept? How many people say they're "bad at math" or "stink at sports" so they can just stop trying, even when they have the chance to escape that perceived personality trait? Seligman took the idea of learned helplessness and applied it to depression. Many depressed people stay in bad relationships or jobs they hate because they figure it can't get better. And when you're severely depressed, that feels like the truth.

Ok, let's lighten the mood a bit and look at happiness.

Happiness is a Double-Blind Study

One of the main criticisms of both psychoanalysis and humanism is that they aren't scientific. Both approaches may seem intuitively true, or there may be a lot of subjective, anecdotal evidence. But you can't put people in a lab and observe their unconscious or their self-actualizing tendency. Seligman, however, is a scientist who came from the behaviorist/social-cognitive school of psychology. He loves the numbers and has a whole department at UPenn getting more data. Still, compared to other current talks on psychology, his presentations tend to draw a group of more casual observers. Read through this Harvard Magazine article to see what we mean.

It's also important to look at the overall field of positive psychology to understand it more fully. Go ahead and look at Psychology Today's take on it. It's a good, basic overview of a pretty simple idea. But how can we apply it to our everyday lives? If we can really develop our own personality and therefore our own happiness, how do we go about it? Plus, there are a bunch of different kinds of happiness, right? Going to fifteen straight Burning Mans may be one person's idea of happiness, where curling up with the latest edition of Harvard Magazine might be another's.

Let's tackle that question by going to the source: Seligman's TED Talk. We suggest you pay particular attention to this one, as it might show up again (in the activity section below, for example).

Also, here's Seligman's site at University of Pennsylvania . Snoop (Shmoop?) around a bit, for more deets. And pay special attention to how the site defines positive psychology:

"Positive Psychology is the scientific study of the strengths that enable individuals and communities to thrive. The field is founded on the belief that people want to lead meaningful and fulfilling lives, to cultivate what is best within themselves, and to enhance their experiences of love, work, and play."

You can see how this program might help teachers and school administrators, right? It also smacks of humanism in the idea that people want to lead fulfilling lives—doesn't that sound like self-actualization?

In the end, what does all this mean for personality? Positive psychology is definitely in the "you make your own destiny" camp. But it focuses on education and parenting, so they totally agree that your emotional wellbeing starts early. Not much has been done with positive psychology that specifically pertains to personality, since so much of psychology today is about the whole person. So let's take a look at what this means for you as a whole person.

Sample Lesson - Activity

Activity 9.05a: Response Notebook: The Psychology of Happiness

We know you dug the TED Talk today. But, uh, what did you really think about it? Download a Response Notebook template. As you revisit Seligman's talk, take notes of the choicest quotes—quotes that reflect on psychology both as a science and as a cultural, historical, and ever-evolving field.

Once that's complete, use the evidence you collected (as well as the notes you fill in about context) to write a 400 –500 word analysis where you reflect upon what that reading reveals about the psychological field.

For example, in this case, we'd fill the top half of our sheet with quotes from Seligman's talk and contextualizing notes: when and where the talk was delivered, to what kind of audience, and some ideas of how the talk might reflect (or go against the grain of) our particular historical and social moment (our culture values around happiness, etc.).

After filling in notes about the talk's audience, purpose, and tone, we'd start getting into the big questions it asks about psychology. With Seligman, many of these are stated pretty clearly: what is happiness? Can psychology not only help people be "less miserable," but make them happy as well? How can psychological research best be applied to the question of happiness?

Then we'd get into our analysis. We'd start with an engaging hook—focusing, perhaps, on Seligman's contrasting takes on the "pleasant life" and the "meaningful life"—then carry on discussing what the lecture says about the psychology of happiness, meaning, flow, and so forth, in two or three structured paragraphs. Naturally we'd be sure to incorporate the lovely quotes we'd collected earlier in the journal.

Quotes like:

"It turns out the pursuit of pleasure has almost no contribution to life satisfaction. The pursuit of meaning is the strongest. The pursuit of engagement is also very strong. Where pleasure matters is if you have both engagement and you have meaning, then pleasure's the whipped cream and the cherry. Which is to say, the full life—the sum is greater than the parts, if you've got all three. Conversely, if you have none of the three, the empty life, the sum is less than the parts."

If we were writing an analysis of Seligman's findings on what exactly constitutes the happiest, most meaningful lives, we'd probably use at least part of this quote in order to support that claim.

You're brilliant at this by now, no doubt. So complete your graphic organizer, write your analysis in its final box, then upload your work below.

Sample Lesson - Activity

Activity 9.05b: Are You Happy?

Check out the "Authentic Happiness" page that Seligman mentioned a couple of times in his TED Talk. Create an account and participate in one of the questionnaires. Then write a brief (250 word) description of your experience, including

• the name of the questionnaire or test you took (e.g.: Strengths Test).
• a reflection on your experience (for example: "The end assessment seemed to match my idea of myself" (or even better, "my self-concept"—AP Psych lingo, y'all), or "one question I found difficult to answer was…" or "I was surprised to discover about myself from this test that...").
• thoughts about how to proceed with what you've learned about yourself by taking the test. For example, if you discovered that you have a high social intelligence in the Strengths Test, how might you work that more into your daily life? Recall Seligman's note about "recrafting" work and play to tap into one's strengths and experience flow. Try, too, to make use of some of Seligman's vocabulary: "the meaningful life," "flow," "eudaimonia," etc. 
• Reflect, too, upon which of Seligman's categories your life might currently fall into as concerns what you discover about yourself from taking the test. Say, for example, that you make a surprise discovery like a love of music. Does your love of music as currently played out look more like part of a pleasant life, a good life, or a meaningful life? How could you use your new self-knowledge to make your life even more meaningful?

You only need to do one reflection, but a lot of the tests are fun to take, and can be revealing. If you were taken with Seligman's thoughts on "the good life" and "the meaningful life," you may want to take a few more in order to learn more about yourself, and to stoke your own ideas about what would make you happy. Sometimes thinking about yourself and your own life in this way can really bring the psychological concepts we're learning about home, so go to town with these. And spend some time exploring the website—it's a valuable resource for getting acquainted with positive psychology.

When you're done, upload your reflection below.

Sample Lesson - Activity