9451098 Barber In order to enhance the teaching of behavioral neuroscience in our Psychology curriculum, we propose to acquire specific equipment items for introductory and methodology courses in Biological Psychology and for student research in this field. The formal courses bring students up to date on basic findings, theories, and techniques of Biological Psychology. Equipment requested for the Introductory course in the sequence (Psychology 125) will facilitate a weekly demonstration component that provides video, interactive computer, and hands-on experiences to enable students to visualize structure/function relationships and to "see" anatomical and physiological terminology in an active context. The Methodology course (Psychology 325) combines lectures and discussions with laboratory exercises. Students ultimately perform a guided experiment on brain/behavior relationships, using equipment provided by the grant. In this experiment, students examine (1) the normal physiological functioning of brain structures implicated in learning and memory and (2) the ways these structures may affect learning and memory. Students in the Methodology course also prepare a professional report of their experiment and participate in co-producing a Laboratory Manual in Biological Psychology, to be used by future student generations. Thus, they undertake a full range of scientist's activites, from the acquisition of factual information, through the generation of new data, to dissemination of information into the community of scientists.
