Learning theories:

• Classical, operant, observational, and cognitive models. 
• The concepts of extinction and reinforcement. 
• Learning processes and etiological formulation of clinical problems, including the concepts of generalization, secondary reinforcement, incubation, and stimulus preparedness. 
• Escape and avoidance learning. 
• Clinical applications in behavioral treatments: reciprocal inhibition, habituation, chaining, shaping, cueing. 
• The impact of various reinforcement schedules. 
• The psychology of punishment. 
• Optimal conditions for observational learning.    

Basic principles of visual and auditory perception:

• Figure-ground differentiation, object constancy, set, and other aspects of perceptual organization. 
• Perception as an active process. 
• The relevance of perceptual theory to illusions, hallucinations, and other psychopathology. 
• The development of visual perception as an illustration of constitutional/ environmental interaction.  
• Information processing and attention. 
• The application of these to the study of schizophrenia and other conditions.   

Memory:

Influences upon and optimal conditions for encoding, storage, and retrieval. Primary working memory storage capacity and the principle of chunking. Semantic episodic and skills memories and other aspects of long-term/secondary memory. Forgetting. Emotional factors and retrieval. Distortion, inference, schemata, and elaboration in relation. The relevance of this to memory disorders and their assessment.   

1. Thought: the relationship with language. Concepts, prototypes, and cores. Deductive and inductive reasoning.
2. Problem-solving strategies, algorithms, and heuristics.   

Personality: 

Derivation of nomothetic and idiographic theories. Trait and type approaches and elementary personal construct theory. Resume of principles underlying psychoanalytic, social learning, cognitive neuroscience, and humanistic approaches. The interactionist approach. Construction and use of inventories, rating scales, grids, and Q-sort.    

1. Motivation: needs and drives. Extrinsic theories (based on primary and secondary drive reduction) and homeostasis. Hypothalamic systems and satiety. Intrinsic theories, curiosity, and optimum levels of arousal. Limitations of approach and attempts to integrate.  
2. Cognitive consistency. Need for achievement. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.  

Emotion: 

Components of emotional response. Critical appraisal of James-Lange and Cannon-Bard theories. Cognitive appraisal, differentiation, and the status of primary emotions. Emotions and performance.   

1. Stress: physiological and psychological aspects. Situational factors:  
2. Life events, daily hassles/uplifts, conflict, and trauma. Vulnerability and invulnerability, type A behavior theory. Coping mechanisms. Locus of control learned helplessness and learned resourcefulness. Resilience.  

States and levels of awareness: 

• Levels of consciousness and evidence for unconscious processing. 
• Arousal, attention, and alertness. 
• Sleep structure and dreaming. 
• Parasomnias.
• Biorhythms and effects of sleep deprivation. 
• Hypnosis and suggestibility. Meditation and trances.