Affect and Self-Esteem

Mon & Wed, 12:40 - 2:00 PM
318 Berkey Hall

This course will examine the nature of human emotion or affect and its impact on the development of individuals, relationships, families, and cultures through the lens of psychological theory. We will also examine the development of psychological health through exploring affect as the critical mediator of both stress and self-esteem. The exploration of powerlessness-affect-stress cycles will illuminate an important personal as well as social dynamic. The development of personal identity and interpersonal competence will be studied along with a focus on multicultural issues. We will consider the experiences of particular cultural groups and minorities that are defined by gender, race, ethnicity, religion, and sexual orientation.

The course will be divided into five basic units: powerlessness-affect-stress cycles; shame and self-esteem; identity development; conscious regulation and release of affect; and power and shame in interpersonal relations. In each unit, students will engage in a series of psychological experiments by functioning as both subject and experimenter. These psychological "self experiments" will engage students directly with course concepts and affect principles by translating them into tools which, in turn, create psychological skills.