I believe that teachers are the foundation of scientific progress. Science, in part, is about repeatable demonstration; it espouses observation and thoughtful reflection. A scientist considers the general body of knowledge, gleans insight from a set of recently collected, sometimes novel data, and then may attempt to reframe convention. Knowledge grows. When I teach, I try to engage my students in a distinctively scientific process: the empirical demonstration of ideas, followed by forthright production of questions. These questions often beget answer-seeking behaviors. As a teacher, I strongly believe that it is my duty to foster the development of rational inquiry in my students because asking questions and seeking answers are necessary and obligatory components of science. Simply put, we need our students to ask more questions.

For me, the most wonderful and amazing facts in nature are those that describe how and why we do what we do—our quirks and our quibbles, our triumphs and our defeats. I believe that psychology is an extraordinarily capable field that can bridge the gap between the traditional humanities and the natural sciences because the only constant across these disparate domains is the human variable: we are the creators and we are the observers. Psychology is nothing less than our best attempt to understand ourselves. I believe that by teaching psychology, I am participating in an immensely important component of the scientific-scholarship cycle—the part that reinforces current knowledge and drives the development of pertinent new questions. I really believe that teaching is at the center of science; when teachers lay out the canvas of current knowledge, they are obligated to point out the holes and frays, the gaps and inconsistencies. Teaching, through material elucidation and inspiration of questions, serves to widen and strengthen our shared canvas.

You can download a detailed statement of my teaching philosophy as a .pdf 

classes I have taught

Psychological Statistics (Spring 2012; Fall 2011 PSY 207)

This statistics course presents an introduction to the most common statistical procedures utilized in modern behavioral science research. The course offers students an opportunity to develop a strong background in fundamental data analysis and it provides a quantitative framework for skeptical, scientific thinking. Course coverage includes basic research design, sampling, correlation, regression, hypothesis tests, prediction, effect sizes, probability theory, descriptive statistics, parametric and non-parametric inferential statistics (z tests, t tests, analysis of variance, chi square), graph reading, historical trends, and interpretive issues such as how to identify inappropriate use of statistical figures and jargon in popular media and beyond. The knowledge gained in this course will allow students to understand why statistics are an essential component of psychological science and how to apply computational statistical techniques to scientific decision making when interpreting research reports in professional journals and popular media. You can download the syllabus for my statistics class as a .pdf 


Situated and Distributed Cognition (Fall 2010 PSY 488)

How are perception, action, and knowledge linked together in human cognition? Situated and distributed cognition is a unique and diverse area of study within cognitive science that seeks to investigate the mind as embedded in its environment, extended in time and space, and embodied in its bodily actions. The course reveals how humans rely on social rules, environmental artifacts, and other persons to retrieve and act upon knowledge. Current issues in science, technology, and human‐computer interaction are assessed from a distributed and situated perspective. The topics covered in this course allow students to understand how situated cognition differs from other contemporary views of cognition, what advantages and disadvantages it presents for scientific research, and how it can be applied to current issues in psychology and beyond. You can download the syllabus for my distributed cognition class as a .pdf