I can honestly say that Psychology 1001 will be one of those courses that I will remember forever. It was a true challenge for me at the University but, above all, it was my journey into the scientific study of how we, as humans, work. I enjoyed the vast amount knowledge that our professors shared and the variety of the topics that were covered through out the class. Early on in the semester, we were introduced to the six principles of scientific thinking. Having been foreign to the world of Psychology at the time, learning these concepts was new to me. However, one stuck out to me more than the others, Correlation Vs. Causation. If only I would have known that this idea would be so apparent in my life, even outside of the classroom. After applying this principle of scientific thinking into real world situations, it became clear to me that this was a vital concept in the understanding of the human mind. It taught us that just because something may seem to cause the other, it would not always be as simple as we may think. "Every action must have a reaction," sure, but this principle makes us understand the reaction process and to give it more thought then to simply assume. In five years time, Psychology 1001 will be a distant memory, but the categories covered in the time we shared, such as Correlation Vs. Causation, will stick with me forever, whether I want them to or not.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FGMvClgUyQ:
Here, a man defines Correlation VS Causation into a real world situation- his daughter's new found ability to summon snow! This reminded me of how this concept will stay with me, because it applies to so many different things and to so many different people.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_causation
Now if only the media would learn this too...