AMU Psychology Career and Relationships Reflection and Discussion

Part I: What were the two most interesting things, one about your selected topic and one about the process of completing the assignment, that you learned while constructing your Annotated Bibliography and why?

Part II: What were the three most interesting aspects of this course? Why did you find these particularly interesting? What will you take away from the course that you didn’t know before and believe will prove helpful to know in the future and how do you see yourself applying your course take away?

Classmate #1:

Good afternoon Class and Professor, 

I hope you are all having a wonderful week! We have made it to the end!!! I cannot tell you all how excited I am to be finishing up my bachelor’s degree just one month shy of my first baby’s due date! Now for some much-needed time off to prepare! This feels like such a weight off my chest making it to the end of my bachelor’s degree, I hope you all are experiencing similar excitement and peace! 

Part 1: My topic for my annotated bibliography was on how media and screen time affect childhood development. One article in particular that I examined was on the pediatricians’ responsibility to educate families and children of the dangers of excessive screen time. I found this interesting because I particularly believe this should fall way more on the parents and their need to understand how electronic use can be a negative thing for their children. I see how a pediatrician can help obviously, but when it comes down to it it’s the parent’s responsibility. 

Part 2: I have learned so much throughout the past 7 weeks in this course. My absolute favorite part was completing the professional interview. We are at that point that we either know what field of psychology to pursue a master’s degree in or very close to choosing. It was very enlightening being able to speak to someone in my field of interest and to get their honest opinions on their job and the challenges they have faced.  That was just a very beneficial experience and I learned far more than I have by just researching jobs online. I also enjoyed the professional associations assignment and the assignment on all the different psychology fields. I even learned about some psychology jobs I did not realize existed and I learned what benefits come from being a member of a professional association. 

Good luck to everyone in all your future endeavors!

-Brandi Wittmer 

Classmate #2:

Hello Class,

I can’t believe we are in the final week of our last class before graduation!  This class has been extremely helpful in defining and researching the different specialties of psychology!  I really liked the career opportunities paper because it prompted me to dig deep into the specialties and get a good idea of what I want to do in the future!

Part 1:

One of the most important things about my topic, Social Media and it’s Link to Marital and Relationship Satisfaction, was how much compulsion for social media activity creates a rift in infidelity.  Essentially, when people are so focused on social media and the lives of others, they begin to envy them and “act out” because of it.  It is an interesting phenomenon that has been studied since the launch of Facebook and Myspace years ago!  The second most important thing about my topic was just how quickly social networking can become flirty which turning into emotional affairs vary quickly.  Emotional affairs are as serious as physical ones and during my research, I found that those who had higher social networking site usage engaged in higher infidelity behaviors.  While completing the assignment, I learned that social networking over usage, or addiction, can lead to psychological, social, and interpersonal problems which ultimately lead to the reduction of commitment in a relationship.  I learned that the process of constructing the annotated bibliography can take quite a bit of time because you have to search for relevant articles that hit all angles of the topic and not tiny, barely relevant ones.

Part 2:

The three most interesting aspects of this course were the career opportunities assignment, the organizations assignment, and the interview assignment.  The career opportunities assignment gave incredibly valuable information on the different specialties as I mentioned above, and the organizations assignment was interesting because I didn’t know there were so many organizations for different areas of specialty in psychology!  That will be helpful in the future to find an organization to belong to that has like interests and can help me in the specialty I choose to select.  The interview assignment was helpful because it helped me branch out and reach out to professionals in psychology and counseling careers.  While I used Ms. Oliveri, a licensed clinical social worker, I also interviewed Dr. Lunasco, a clinical psychologist, who had amazing information about different areas of psychology and how he was able to spend time in each setting as a “ride along student” to find his true calling.  The interviews will be extremely helpful in the future because the assignment gave a good base line of the questions to ask later on when seeking further education and jobs!

Classmate #3:

Part 1

This part is a little hard for me to answer, because I picked a topic I am very passionate about, which is substance use and how that affects mental health. Substance use is my area of study, and what I plan to focus on in graduate school, so many of the things I read and researched in my annotated bibliography I was already very familiar with. That being said though, I picked that topic not only from my passion, but because many people do not understand substance use, and the lasting mental health effects. So, I think this would be a great time to share two very important components in that. Substance abuse, often, does not stem from what society likes to see as a “selfish” behavior. It is not an individual wanting to partake in a substance so bad they neglect the rest of their responsibilities and life. Usually, an individual is either self-medicating because they have untreated mental issues, or, they are predisposed to addiction genes, with no knowledge, and trying a substance triggers that effect in their biological chemistry. And thus, and addiction is formed. Another thing, many tend to neglect, is the actual chemistry effects those substances have on the brain and its neurons. Substances are designed to in one way or another alter brain chemistry. When that happens, it often times can leave the user feeling depleted from their natural chemistry, because the substances have crossed the wires. When someone with a severe addiction is coming off substances, because of the lack of proper chemistry firing to their neurons, more mental health work is needed, to help them regain some of that natural chemistry, or find healthy ways to supplement it. It is remarkable to me, the amount of people that think a user can just stop using, and their brain chemistry returns to its previous state before the substances. So, many studies that I researched, focused around this main two components. 

Part 2

I really enjoyed the interview. At first I did not think I would enjoy it that much as I have never interviewed anyone before, but actually sitting down and doing it proved to be a very enjoyable experience. I do think since I know the person I interviewed that helped with anxiety. But man, the information and encouragement I gained from them about the field, and going deeper into the field, really just lit the fire and passion I already have more. Talking with someone that has over a decade of experience really gives you a good perspective. 

I also really found all the associations and information with them beneficial. Previously, I was not aware of many of them, or really what any of them offered. Exploring and researching them more showed me there are so many tools at our disposal, to not only improve our education journeys, but also our careers once we emerge into the field. So that definitely sticks out to me as one of the most beneficial things from this course. 

And lastly, and as always with all my courses, I love our discussions. This course really branched a bit differently because we were all focused on different topics and areas of psychology we are passionate about. Seeing why all of you were passionate and for the reasons that passion stems, was a really cool experience. I loved reading everyones feed back and perspectives, and how we all are striving for the same goals, just in different ways. 

Since this is my last class for my degree, I think I can really take with me a lot of the tools I have gained just from learning about some new things in this course. Preparing me more so for the career field, as well as the options I have to have support in this career, is something I was not really aware of before this course. So for me, overall, this may be one of the most beneficial and impactful courses I have taken. 

-Racheal