PSYCH 121
Laboratory in Cognitive Psychology
Description: Laboratory, four hours. Requisites: courses 10, 100A, 100B, 120A or 120B. Designed for Psychology and Cognitive Science majors. Laboratory experience with methods and phenomena from research on human perception, memory, and cognition. P/NP or letter grading.
Units: 4.0
Units: 4.0
3 of 4
Most Helpful Review
Winter 2020 - Dr. Holyoak is a sweet and caring professor. His presence was pleasant in lab and he was always willing to help with our papers/projects. I think what truly matters in this class though is the TA. We had a wonderful TA this quarter - shout out to you Maureen, you rock! - and I'm not sure if she TAs every time but that definitely matters. You have 2 written assignments and one big group project where you conduct a study, collect and analyze data and write a long paper with your group. It sounds intimidating but Dr. Holyoak and his TA are there to help you the entire time and they were even willing to revise and give feedback multiple times before the final submission. Great lab!
Winter 2020 - Dr. Holyoak is a sweet and caring professor. His presence was pleasant in lab and he was always willing to help with our papers/projects. I think what truly matters in this class though is the TA. We had a wonderful TA this quarter - shout out to you Maureen, you rock! - and I'm not sure if she TAs every time but that definitely matters. You have 2 written assignments and one big group project where you conduct a study, collect and analyze data and write a long paper with your group. It sounds intimidating but Dr. Holyoak and his TA are there to help you the entire time and they were even willing to revise and give feedback multiple times before the final submission. Great lab!
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Most Helpful Review
Spring 2025 - I was dreading this class at first but Prof. Liu was super helpful and understanding with any questions that came up. PsychoPy is a super easy platform to use and the team will walk you through it. She and my TA at the time, Bryce, were pretty lenient graders to me since I definitely turned in some projects at the last minute and got decently high marks. They also helped a lot with my group's coding project. With the group project, make sure your whole team is on the same page about what's going on. The papers do seem daunting but definitely start early! Would recommend to anyone who is intimidated by coding or labwork.
Spring 2025 - I was dreading this class at first but Prof. Liu was super helpful and understanding with any questions that came up. PsychoPy is a super easy platform to use and the team will walk you through it. She and my TA at the time, Bryce, were pretty lenient graders to me since I definitely turned in some projects at the last minute and got decently high marks. They also helped a lot with my group's coding project. With the group project, make sure your whole team is on the same page about what's going on. The papers do seem daunting but definitely start early! Would recommend to anyone who is intimidated by coding or labwork.
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Most Helpful Review
Class was easy, but make sure you look over your final papers for little details and mistakes. It's not as hard as 100B and not as nitpicky, but TAs can grade hard for you not knowing basic APA format. Overall it's a nicer version of 100B since you go slower - not sure why 100B wasn't modeled like this to begin with!
Class was easy, but make sure you look over your final papers for little details and mistakes. It's not as hard as 100B and not as nitpicky, but TAs can grade hard for you not knowing basic APA format. Overall it's a nicer version of 100B since you go slower - not sure why 100B wasn't modeled like this to begin with!
Most Helpful Review
Fall 2025 - We take a couple of quizzes based on some lectures in the beginning, but the quizzes ask obscure, random details of papers we are supposed to read. They are out of 2 or 3 points, so even one wrong can tank this portion of your grade. Luckily, the rest of the class and majority of your grade is for your group to design and execute a research project. He goes around and talks to you throughout class to make sure your idea and approach is good. There was a miscommunication between our group and him, and we had to do our entire project in one week. He was nice about it, as he gave us an extension. HOWEVER, I emailed him like 6 times with no response. We were supposed to present on zoom over a weekend, and he did not respond to my emails confirming the time and date and did not show up, even though we talked about this time and date during class. I also did not get any feedback on my final paper, so I have 0 idea why I ended with the grade I did. Overall, it's a pretty chill and easy class, but the professor is not responsive over email and the quizzes suck. He's pretty funny and chill tho.
Fall 2025 - We take a couple of quizzes based on some lectures in the beginning, but the quizzes ask obscure, random details of papers we are supposed to read. They are out of 2 or 3 points, so even one wrong can tank this portion of your grade. Luckily, the rest of the class and majority of your grade is for your group to design and execute a research project. He goes around and talks to you throughout class to make sure your idea and approach is good. There was a miscommunication between our group and him, and we had to do our entire project in one week. He was nice about it, as he gave us an extension. HOWEVER, I emailed him like 6 times with no response. We were supposed to present on zoom over a weekend, and he did not respond to my emails confirming the time and date and did not show up, even though we talked about this time and date during class. I also did not get any feedback on my final paper, so I have 0 idea why I ended with the grade I did. Overall, it's a pretty chill and easy class, but the professor is not responsive over email and the quizzes suck. He's pretty funny and chill tho.
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