UVA Cog Sci

PSYC 2100: Introduction to Learning and Behavior
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Enrollment Restrictions: None
Description of course contents: The course will examine historical and current theories that explain how different types of learning provide the foundation for most, if not all forms of an organism's behavior. We will cover these theories by carefully examining the most important research experiments that contributed to our current understanding of the principles and concepts that shape our behavior. The lecture content will focus heavily on experimental findings derived from research of learning processes in human and non-human species. The concept of Learning will be explored from the perspective of theories of Classical Conditioning, Operant Conditioning, and more recent theories of the organization of behavior derived from human studies.
Instructor: Williams

PSYC 2150: Introduction to Cognition
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Enrollment Restrictions: None
Description of course contents: Cognition is the activity of knowing: the acquisition, organization, and use of knowledge. Emphasizing fundamental issues, this course introduces such basic content areas in cognitive psychology as perception, memory, language, cognitive development, and philosophy of science.
Instructor: Jaswal

PSYC 3005: Research Methods & Data Analysis I
Credits: 4 (Required lab)
Prerequisite: PSYC 1010 or any 2000-level Psychology course and one of the following math courses with a grade of C- or higher: MATH 1210 (Applied Calculus I), MATH 1212 (Applied Calculus I with Algebra), MATH 1220 (Applied Calculus II), MATH 1310 (Calculus I), MATH 1320 (Calculus II), APMA 1090 (Single Variable Calculus I), or APMA 1110 (Single Variable Calculus II). Students with transfer credit or AP credit in one of these courses (e.g., AP Calculus AB, or AP Calculus BC) are exempt from the requirement.
Enrollment restrictions: None
Description of course contents: Introduction to research methods in psychology, integrating statistical analysis. Emphasis on descriptive statistics and non-experimental research methods. Use of computers for data analysis, experimentation, and report writing. This course is the first part of a two-part series (3005 and 3006).
Instructor: Morris

PSYC 3006: Research Methods & Data Analysis II
Credits: 4 (Required lab)
Prerequisite: PSYC 3005 (with C or better)
Enrollment Restrictions: Psychology Majors/Minors and Cognitive Science Majors
Description of course contents: Second part of a two-part series. Emphasis on inferential statistics (t-tests and ANOVA) and issues in experimentation.
**This course may satisfy the College's Second Writing requirement.**
Instructor: Freeman

PSYC 3435: Educational Psychology
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: PSYC 2150 (with grade of B- or higher highly recommended) and PSYC 2700
Enrollment Restrictions: Psychology Majors/Minors and Cognitive Science Majors
Description of course contents: Psychologists have studied the processes of learning and thinking for over 100 years, and theoreticians have attempted to apply that knowledge to K-12 education for almost that long. This course will use information from cognitive psychology to examine: major steams of thought in pedagogy; data patterns in student achievement and in teacher effectiveness; subject-specific teaching strategies; and proposed reforms for American education.
Instructor: Willingham

PSYC 4006: Advanced Research Methods & Data Analysis II: Statistical Analysis and Advanced Design
*Note: This class is a substitute for PSYC 3006 and requires the referral of the Psychology Undergraduate Director.
Credits: 4 (Required lab)
Prerequisite: May require PSYC 4005 (with C or better)
Enrollment Restrictions: Psychology Majors/Minors and Cognitive Science Majors
Description of course contents: The second part of a two-part series, this course replaces PSYC 3006: Research Methods and Data Analysis II. In the second course of this series, the foundational mathematical concepts that are common to all or most quantitative methods in Psychology will be used to introduce specific data analysis techniques as special cases and to introduce some research methods. The topics for this course encompass probability theory, information theory, linear algebra, test theory, and an introduction to modeling.
**This course may satisfy the College's Second Writing requirement.**
Instructor: Schmidt

PSYC 4110: Psycholinguistics
*Note: PSYC 4110 may be used to fulfill either the Cognitive Psychology or the Linguistics area requirement, but not both. Either PSYC 4110: Psycholinguistics (Loncke) or EDHS 4300: Psycholinguistics and Communication (Loncke) may be taken for credit, but not both.
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Enrollment Restrictions: 4th years: Psychology Majors/Minors, Cognitive Science Majors, Linguistics and Communication Disorders Majors/Minors.
Description of course contents: This course will discuss how linguistic models help us to understand the psychology of language. We will focus on the emergence of language in children, acquisition and development of language, language disorders and neurolinguistics, sociolinguistics, and bilingualism.
Instructor: Loncke

PSYC 4111: Language Development and Disorders
*Note: PSYC 4111 may be used to fulfill either the Cognitive Psychology or the Linguistics area requirement, but not both. Either PSYC 4111: Language Development and Disorders (Bonvillian) or PSYC 5310: Developmental Psycholinguistics (Bonvillian) may be taken for credit, but not both.
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Enrollment Restrictions: 4th years: Psychology Majors/Minors, Cognitive Science Majors, and Linguistics Majors/Minors.
Description of course contents: This course will focus on language and cognitive development in persons with disabilities. Among the populations examined will be children with autistic disorder, children with Williams syndrome, deaf children, developmentally dysphasic children, adults with aphasia, and children with severe mental retardation. In addition to spoken language development, the course will examine the acquisition of sign communication skills.
Instructor: Bonvillian

PSYC 4120: Psychology of Reading
*Note: PSYC 4120 may be used to fulfill either the Cognitive Psychology or the Linguistics area requirement, but not both.
Credits: 3
Prerequisite: PSYC 3005 or Instructor Permission
Enrollment Restrictions: 4th years: Psychology Majors/Minors, Cognitive Science Majors, and Linguistics Majors/Minors.
Description of course contents: For psychologists who study the psychology of reading, it sometimes amazes us that most literate people do not think much about the reading process. If you ask the typical person about how reading works, a typical response is that …it just does. I look at words on a page and then the sounds come out of my mouth. You might also hear… I do not know how I do it, but for as long as I can remember I could do it. Under certain circumstances, however, a deeper level of evaluation is forthcoming and people report that it is a very complicated process. Listening to someone who has some type of reading impairment, observing young children as they are learning to read, wondering about the meaning of a passage (Did the main character insult a minor character or was it the other way around?), debating the pronunciation of a word (greasy, Roanoke, Staunton, theater, insurance), or reading a passage in a second language, readers make evaluations/decisions during the reading process. The focus of this class, Psychology of Reading, is the study of the reading process; what happens when we process the squiggles on the page to meaningful information that we can use. This includes word processing, sentence processing, speed-reading, text comprehension, etc. All of this is related to how the brain works and how we think. We will read basic/historical information from texts, review recent psychological research articles, and consider some hands-on experiences related to the reading process. The Psychology of Reading course is an interesting mix of experimental & cognitive psychology and structural linguistics, as well as psychoneurology, phonetics, anthropology, sociology, education, and so on.
Instructor: Adams

PSYC 4290: Memory Distortions
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Enrollment Restrictions: 4th year Psychology Majors/Minors and Cognitive Science Majors
Description of course contents: Although memory is generally accurate, some illusions and distortions in remembering are unavoidable. We will review both neuroscience and cognitive research on a variety of different memory problems, ranging from relatively benign tip-of-the-tongue experiences to untrustworthy eye witness testimony. Our ultimate goal will be to understand the neural basis and cognitive processes that contribute to these constructive memory phenomena.
Instructor: Dodson

PSYC 5710: Machine Learning and Data Mining
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Enrollment Restrictions: 4th years: Psychology Majors/Minors and Cognitive Science Majors
Description of course contents: While most psychological studies ask "is something different between groups?", in this course we will introduce quantitative methods to answer the question "what is different between groups?", ie., we ask which part (or combination) of our data maximizes the chances to distinguish between given groups. To make a computer answer this question, we will introduce some foundations of machine learning and play with some of these techniques.
Instructor: Von Oertzen

EDHS 4300: Psycholinguistics and Communication
*Note: PSYC 4300 may be used to fulfill either the Cognitive Psychology or the Linguistics area requirement, but not both. Either PSYC 4110: Psycholinguistics (Loncke) or EDHS 4300: Psycholinguistics and Communication (Loncke) may be taken for credit, but not both.
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Description of course contents: This course focuses on the psychological processes that underlie the acquisition and the use of language. There is an emphasis on the interaction between linguistic skills and other cognitive skills. Topics include learnability, microgenesis of speech, bilingualism and variation, and a psycholinguistic approach to breakdowns (i.e., language pathology).
Instructor: Loncke

EDLF 5500: Cognitive Psychology of Education
Credits: 3
Enrollment Restrictions: None
Description of course contents: The purpose of this course is to
comprehensively examine the cognitive information processing system and its implications for instructional design. The course will review the literature in the area of cognitive educational psychology. Specifically, the topic areas of human cognitive architecture, schema theory, cognitive load theory, and social cognition will be examined.
Instructor: Feldon

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Neuroscience

PSYC 2200: A Survey of the Neural Basis of Behavior
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Enrollment Restrictions: None
Description of course contents: One approach to understanding human behavior is to consider ourselves from a biological perspective. This course attempts to do so by examining how the brain guides behavior. The first portion is an overview of the structure and function of the central nervous system. With this knowledge, we then examine how the brain controls a variety of higher behaviors, including learning and memory, sex, emotions and sleeping.
Instructor: Brunjes

PSYC 5265: Functional Neuroanatomy
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: PSYC 4200 or BIOL 3170
Enrollment Restrictions: 4th years: Psychology Majors/Minors, Cognitive Science Majors, and Neuroscience Majors; GSAS
Description of course contents: An overview of the structure of the vertebrate nervous system with an emphasis on the mammalian brain.
Instructor: Brunjes

BIOL 4310: Sensory Neurobiology/BIOL 7310: Sensory Neurobiology
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: BIOL 3170 or PSYC 2200
Description of course contents: Examines the anatomy, physiology, and molecular biology of many sensory modalities such as vision, audition, and chemosensation. General features of sensory systems are described.
Instructor: Provencio

BIOL 4320: Signal Transduction: How Cells Talk to Each Other
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: BIOL 3000 and BIOL 3010
Description of course contents: This advanced undergraduate course explores how cells communicate with each other and respond to their environment. This area of biology is referred to as signal transduction and is the basis for most if not all normal and disease processes in humans. Therefore, significant time is spent on defining archetypal signaling modules that all cells use to receive and communicate information to and from their environment.
Instructor: Deppmann

BIOL 4340: Experimental Foundations of Neurobiology
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: BIOL 3170 or an equivalent course
Description of course contents: The course content will focus on three areas of neurobiological research: conduction of the nervous impulse, sensory physiology, and synaptic physiology.
Instructor: Mellon

BIOL 4559-1: Laboratory in Neurophysiology
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: BIOL 3170 or an equivalent course
Description of course contents:
Instructor: Mellon

BME 3636/NESC 5330: Neural Network Models of Cognition and Brain Computation
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: CS 1110 and BME 2101 or Instructor Permission
Description of course contents: This is an introductory course to neural networks research, specifically biologically-based networks that reproduce cognitive phenomena. The goal of this course is to teach the basic thinking and methodologies used in constructing and understanding neural-like networks.
Instructor: Levy

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Linguistics

AMST 2500: Language and New Media
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Description of course contents: In this course we investigate the interactional relationship between language and American society with a focus on New Media contexts. More specifically, we consider how language both shapes and is shaped by society in email, texting, Facebook, blogging, online gaming, YouTube, and more. Taking an interdisciplinary approach that draws from fields such as anthropology, linguistics, media & communication studies, psychology, and sociology, we turn our analytical and critical gaze to how social constructions (including race, gender, class, ideology, power, and youth) variably influence, are created by, and are realized in New Media genres.
*Note: This course may satisfy the College’s Second Writing requirement.
Instructor: Williams

ANTH 2400: Language and Culture
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Description of course contents: This Introduces the interrelationships of linguistic, cultural, and social phenomena with emphasis on the importance of these interrelationships in interpreting human behavior.
Instructor: Perkowski

ANTH 2430: Languages of the World
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: One year of foreign language or Instructor Permission
Description of course contents: An introduction to the study of language relationships and linguistic structures. Topics covered include the basic elements of grammatical description; genetic, areal, and typological relationships among languages; a survey of the world's major language groupings and the notable structures and grammatical categories they exhibit; and the issue of language endangerment.
Instructor: Dobrin

ANTH 3490: Language and Thought
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Description of course contents: There is almost always more than one way to think about any problem. But could speaking a particular language make some strategies and solutions seem more natural than others to individuals? The classic proposal of linguistic relativity as enunciated by Benjamin Lee Whorf is examined in the light of more recent cross-cultural and psycholinguistic research. We highlight the interplay between social intelligence, linguistic structure and general cognition. In the course of the discussion, we consider topics such as the significance of literacy for cognition and the development of language-specific cognitive preferences during childhood. Finally, we ask how our own culturally-particular ways of talking about language might reflect and reinforce some of the unexamined common-sense ideas about the nature of language which underlie most linguistic research.
Instructor: Danziger

ANTH 5410: Phonology
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: LNGS 3250
Description of course contents: An introduction to the theory and analysis of linguistic sound systems. Covers the essential units of speech sound that lexical and grammatical elements are composed of, how those units are organized at multiple levels of representation, and the principles governing the relation between levels.
Instructor: Dobrin

EDHS 4300: Psycholinguistics and Communication
*Note: PSYC 4300 may be used to fulfill either the Cognitive Psychology or the Linguistics area requirement, but not both.
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Description of course contents: This course focuses on the psychological processes that underlie the acquisition and the use of language. There is an emphasis on the interaction between linguistic skills and other cognitive skills. Topics include learnability, microgenesis of speech, bilingualism and variation, and a psycholinguistic approach to breakdowns (i.e., language pathology).
Instructor: Loncke

EDHS 5020: Introduction to Speech and Hearing Science
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: EDHS 5010 and 5050
Description of course contents: Examines principal concepts and procedures for the study of physiologic, perceptual, and acoustic aspects of voice, speech, and hearing.
Instructor: Loncke

FREN 4509: Seminar in French Linguistics
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: FREN 3032; a keen interest in the French language; and a
willingness to speak French in class—students taking this course must feel comfortable speaking French in the classroom
Description of course contents: One of France’s most talked about institutions (though less widely understood) is the Académie française. In this seminar we will attempt to demystify the French Academy. We begin by reviewing its historical origins, founding goal, societal setting, structural composition, famous members, etc. Then we turn to the issue of perception: How is the Académie perceived in France and outside France? Why, for example, does it get such an appalling press from many writers, while others celebrate it as an historical monument not to be ignored? What do people say about its future? What does the Academy really do? When was the Academy most useful? When (and by whom) was its power ‘usurped’? Why is there not a single linguist among its esteemed members? Following the discussion on perception (myths and reality) we will broach the subject of linguistic politics and language change. Along the way we will make comparative observations about the functioning of language academies in other countries (Spain and Italy, in particular), and about Webster’s failed attempt to get the idea accepted in the US. Requirements will include a wide variety of readings in both French and English; oral interviews with French and francophone speakers; a mid-term exam; and a substantial research paper. The format of the seminar will be that of lively discussions and debates. Students will thus have the opportunity to practice their oral French skills—as well as work on their critical thinking skills, their writing skills and their independent research skills.
Instructor: Saunders

PETR 3340: Poetics of Existentialist Persian Literature
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Description of course contents: The main objective of this course is the study of cognitive nuances which make up the thematic and linguistic parameters of text—and its analysis in Persian literature and some of the other literatures in the region—that deal with existentialist issues. It will focus, mainly, on Classical Persian literature as it has, for 800 years, served as the symbol of thematic ingenuity and linguistic enigma in terms of poetics; and embodies, rhetorically, nuanced intricacies, deeply immersed in the use of language (i.e. rhetoric, figurative language, etc.). Henceforth, syntax becomes a jigsaw puzzle, comprehension of whose linguistic and hence poetic parameters delivers the intent of the writer in purveying his or her existential issues. True to form, theme, rhetoric, morphology, and syntax—as in most cultural settings—have worked together to convey the importance of content. The social and linguistic pragmatics can be misconstrued as the superficial dimensions of interpretation can actually be—and often are— diametrically opposed to the veiled meaning—intended by the poet—which is heavily immersed in linguistic and thematic historical precedents. Last, but not least, the phonological—and hence musical—aspects of this study will focus on the analysis of musical and phonological structures, which actually effectuate and amplify the signification of existentialist genres of expression. The quantitative and very mathematical nature of Persian meter and prosody will be analyzed. Every class will have a parallel analysis of descriptive grammar in the covered text—in translation. As this is a class in the study in poetics, linguistics of Persian literature and its centuries old dealings with existentialism, necessarily, influences, both in terms of historical precedence (Arabic, etc.) on Persian and in terms of subsequent linguistic and poetical influences on other literatures in Iran, such as Kurdish, Lori, Gilaki will be surveyed and analyzed as well, although to a lesser degree.
Instructor: Isfahani

PHIL 5510: Pragmatics
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Description of course contents: Pragmatics is the study of the use of language to convey more than what we literally say, as well as the study of how communication is possible in the absence of conventional language. Not limited to communication in our own species, pragmatics also seeks insights from the study of gesture, alarm calls, and even chemical communication in other species both extant and extinct. Among our topics will be speech acts, implicature, presupposition, non-literal language, expressive behavior (including the use of epithets and other “charged” language), and insights from the recently resurgent study of the evolution of communication.
Instructor: Green

PSYC 4110: Psycholinguistics
*Note: PSYC 4110 may be used to fulfill either the Cognitive Psychology or the Linguistics area requirement, but not both.
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Enrollment Restrictions: 4th years: Psychology Majors/Minors, Cognitive Science Majors, Linguistics and Communication Disorders Majors/Minors.
Description of course contents: This course will discuss how linguistic models help us to understand the psychology of language. We will focus on the emergence of language in children, acquisition and development of language, language disorders and neurolinguistics, sociolinguistics, and bilingualism.
Instructor: Loncke

RUSS 5010: Readings in the Social Sciences
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: Some background in Russian (at least through RUSS
1020 for non-native speakers) and instructor permission
Description of course contents: This course is a formal and systematic analysis of the basic syntactic structures of the contemporary Russian literary language with frequent comparison to English (and other, when possible) structures. The emphasis will be on data, not theoretical principles, although the conventional theoretical machinery and language of syntax (phrase structure, complement, anaphora) will be used at all times in class and on assignments.
Instructor: Elson

SPAN 4202: Hispanic Sociolinguistics
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: SPAN 3000 and 3010 or SPAN 3010 and 3200 or departmental placement
Description of course contents: This course offers a formal description of the Spanish language from the following angles of the linguistic discipline: language variation, change and acquisition; phonetics/phonology, morphology, and syntax.
Conducted in Spanish.
Instructor: Mendoza

SPAN 4203: Structure of Spanish
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: SPAN 3015 and 3200
Description of course contents: Seminar in Spanish linguistics. This is an
advanced introduction to the study of fundamental aspects of the sound and grammatical systems of the Spanish language. The course will start by analyzing present-day (syllable, word and phrase) structures of the language and it will progress toward a more detailed examination of some of the linguistic processes and changes involved in the development of those structures. Prior coursework in linguistics is expected. Taught in Spanish.
Instructor: Rini

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Philosophy

PHIL 2330: Computers, Minds and Brains
Credits: 3
Prerequisites: None
Description of course contents: Can computers think or have experiences roughly like ours? Over the last three decades different approaches to answering this question have been developed, including classical Al, neural nets, varieties of non-reductive physicalism, and neurophysiological eliminativism. All have something to say about what does and does not make humans special. The possibility also arises of transcending human nature and abilities using artificial intelligence and artificial life, rendering humans obsolete. These and other issues will be addressed through readings in philosophy, cognitive science, and computer science. No previous knowledge of philosophy is required.
Instructor: Humphreys

PHIL 3320: Epistemology
Credits: 3
Prerequisite: None
Description of course contents: Studies problems concerned with the foundations of knowledge, perception, and rational belief.
Instructor: Langsam

PHIL 3330: Philosophy of Mind
Credits: 3
Prerequisite: None
Description of course contents: What is the nature of the mind and why do we find its nature so puzzling? We shall critically examine various theories about the nature of the mind; we shall also discuss the nature of particular kinds of mental states and events, such as beliefs, desires, feelings, sensory experiences, and others. We shall be especially concerned with the relations between the mind and the body, and, more generally, between the mental and the physical. Most of the readings will be by contemporary philosophers.
**This course may satisfy the College's Second Writing requirement.**
Instructor: Gertler

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Computer Science

All Computer Science courses are acceptable except CS 1010 and CS 1020. Note: ECE 2066: Science of Information will count for major credit but does not fulfill the CS area requirement.

The most common introductory-level Computer Science courses for Cognitive Science majors are:

CS 1110: Introduction to Programming (Previously CS 101)

CS 1120: Introduction to Computing: Explorations in Language, Logic, and Machines (Previously CS 150)

CS 2102: Discrete Mathematics I (Previously CS 202)

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Cognitive Science Previously-Approved Courses for Spring 2013

Link to Class Search in SIS

Cognitive Psychology

Neuroscience

Linguistics

Philosophy

Computer Science

Cognitive Science Previously-Approved Courses
for Spring 2013