A lot of students did really well in this class (both exam distributions were great with many students receiving A's, and many ended up with A's my quarter). That being said, it definitely takes some work. However, if you've taken Psych 10 or Psych 85 already, this class repeats a LOT of what's covered in those two classes. I took both before taking Rissman's class, and a lot of it was review, which made studying for exams and understanding content way easier.

I also did not buy the textbook, and instead purchased the ZAPS module standalone product (ZAPS is required and worth 10% of your grade, but they're pretty easy to score close to 100% on each time). I got a 96% on the midterm and 91% on the final, and was completely fine with no textbook.

The exams would include some questions that referenced small details or things he'd mention in lecture only once. That being said, I would recommend rewatching lectures and making your notes as complete as possible, especially if you find it hard to pay attention in lecture like I did. The content was pretty interesting for the most part - but again, highly repetitive of Psych 10/85, with some new, slightly more complex content mixed in.

I studied consistently for the midterm throughout the first 6 weeks, then crammed all the final content in a week or so (after not paying attention in lecture at all after the midterm). Both went totally fine, and it's again, totally doable by rewatching the Bruincast and studying your notes really well. Use the weekly quizzes, ZAPS module questions, section attendance form quiz questions, and your notes/lecture slides to study. I used active recall, made my notes as beefy as possible, and made a Quizlet for each exam.

Getting an A in this class is totally doable with a mediocre amount of effort. The essay was also fine - took a few days to really crank it out and read the study in depth, but it was not bad at all and highly doable without using any AI.

Would recommend this class w/ Rissman!

I think this class is okay - probably more on the good side. Professor Rissman seemed like he did care a lot about the students in his class since he reweighted the final and midterm exams to help us out. He also made the decision to extend the deadline for the term paper, which was great. He was also incredibly validating about the election results and checked in with all of the students.

However, I felt like sometimes he didn't offer the most simple explanations of certain concepts during the first half of the quarter. I felt like he overexplained certain concepts in the first half of the quarter to the point where it got a little bit convoluted for my understanding, which is not really his fault because he seems so passionate about the material. I just wished he cut down on some of the lecture material by explaining it in a more summarized way. I think he got better at explaining the concepts in the second half of the course- I thought the class got a bit easier after the midterm.

The exams were kind of tough I'll have to admit! His exams had a lot of questions where you were asked to choose one out of four answers, with some of the answer choices being "both A&C" (for example). I thought those were pretty confusing but I think if you study and are good at MC questions, you'll be fine! The study sessions, lecture videos, and practice exams he uploaded were good study materials. The textbook honestly wasn't really needed and kind of a waste of my money, but if you don't feel confident you'll succeed without it, skimming the textbook would probably helpful since a lot of the lecture content is based off the textbook.

I would highly recommend going to section. My TA was Ashley C., and I thought she honestly explained the material very well and was super straightforward about how certain things worked. I feel like if you paid attention to lecture and went to section, you'd do pretty well in the class.

The quizzes were pretty easy, but some of the answers were hard to look up using the lecture materials. They're worth 10% of your grade, unlimited timing, and he drops your lowest score - I wouldn't be too worried about them.

The term paper is pretty low stress - it's about 1400 words and he gives you plenty of time to prepare it. As long as you follow the rubric he gives out and read the articles you have to base your essay off of, it should be pretty easy points. I would make sure to emphasize the weaknesses of the article and what the researchers in the article could add to their studies to make it better (if this is applicable to your research paper of choice). The weaknesses of the articles are the most important part of the grading.

Overall, I really enjoyed the class and the concepts in it. As someone who's more into social psych, I thought cog psych was interesting overall! I never realized that a lot of the illusion memes I saw online in middle school would end up being discussed in a cognitive psychology class lol.

Would definitely recommend this class for Column A requirements, but if you're not too great with multiple choice exams, I would consider taking this class with another professor.

I'm not sure if it was just that I found the content boring or if it was the exams but I struggled in this class. The lectures were engaging but he spent a lot of time on pointless examples of concepts. I was also surprised about the difficulty of the exams. I have done really well in other psych classes (100B and 115 I finished with high A+) so I think my study methods just didn't work for the exam style. Most questions were trick questions or "pick the most right" questions. They also had options like "A and B," "All of the Above," and "None of the Above." I studied by retaking notes on all lectures, making Quizlets, testing myself with the study guide/practice exam, and making mind maps. A lot of people did very well so maybe if I had read the textbook I would have done better? Nevertheless, I still ended with a good grade because he had a lot of homework/quizzes to buffer the grade. Whenever I spoke to him after class he was pretty frantic and distracted. I'd also heard him chatty with other students and could be rather condescending or dismissive. Not my cup of tea but I know many enjoyed him. He is pretty funny and endearing in lectures but not so much in private.

Thoughts on the professor:
Professor Rissman is such an amazing professor and lecturer. He is really knowledgeable about the material and not to mention he has his own lab here at UCLA where they do psych experiments. He'd often tie in his experiments and papers into the relevant lectures. He answers questions during lecture and is very responsive on ED (discussion forum he uses). He is very clear and direct. One thing I also liked was his use of relevant examples about the concepts to clear up any confusion and make the material easier to understand. It's super helpful. If he is teaching it, definitely take it with him! I loved this class because the concepts are super interesting so you'll definitely be engaged.

Extra Credit:
We could earn up to 2% of extra credit by participating in SONA studies. Half a point of extra credit was given for every hour of experiment participation. In total, 4 credits would get you the 2%.

Class Set Up:
Attendance is mandatory and is tracked through iClicker. He does have the location tracker feature turned on so you have to be within a certain range of the classroom. He did give us 1 freebie to miss 1 lecture but he didn't notify us until the end of the quarter and it isn't stated on the syllabus. I think it's because he wants people to actually go to lecture. All of the lectures are recorded through Bruin Cast. Discussion attendance is mandatory and is also tracked by the TA. You also have to attend the discusison section you're enrolled in because of attendance purposes. Discussion sections expanded upon concepts in class and even covered some material that we missed in lecture due to time.

Midterm = 25%
Final exam = 30%
Term Paper = 15%
ZAPS Labs = 10%
Quizzes = 10%
Clicker participation = 5%
Discusison section participation = 5%

Exams and studying advice:
For our quarter he changed the grading scheme to be 40% whatever exam you did better on and 15% for the exam you did worse on. The final isn't cumulative. The midterm tests weeks 1-5 and the final tests weeks 6-10. In my opinion, the exams were easy and for the most part, straightforward. The professor does try and try you by using "all of the above" and "B and C" or "A and C" answer choices. That's the only tricky part. The exams were both 50 multiple choice questions that were given on scantrons. My advice for studying for his tests is to memorize and understand the concepts. All of what's tested comes form his lecture slides. Memorize all the key terms, all the studies, their results, names of people... I created flashcards for each lecture with all the information and when it was time for midterm 1 to come around and I had a set of 200 flashcards. If you start early with the memorization it'll feel easier because this isn't something you can procrastinate on. This leads me to my next point...

Cons about the class:
The only negative thing about the class is the amount of information. Professor Rissman has a lot of information and slides that he goes through so it's a lot of information that's being tested. Especially when you have to know the small details like the names behind studies or theories. Our lectures would go until the very last minute and for the final, we didn't even get into the concept of creativity. This is why it's important to start studying early.

Quizzes: Our quarter had a total of 6 quizzes which is a lot. To be fair, for the last 2-3 quizzes, he allowed us to vote in lecture whether we should even have them or not and my class voted to have them so it depends on the quarter. The quizzes are open note and untimed. You only have 1 attempt. For us, they were either 15 questions or 10 questions. The lowest quiz is dropped.

Term Paper: We were given 3 article to choose one and we had to evaluate the study we chose. There was 1400 word count limit where we had to talk about the rationale, identify strengths and weakness, etc... It's graded by the TA so definitely ask them questions.

I honestly really enjoyed this class. I definitely feel like I took a lot away from this class. I absolutely loved the ZAPS modules, those were beyond helpful. They were very easy but allowed for a more in depth explanation of certain topics in a fun and interactive way. I definitely would keep these modules for future courses! Lectures were very interactive and interesting, though sometimes a bit long. While I understand this was a summer class and a lot of material was being pushed into a short amount of time, not allowing a short break in the middle was a bit much. Even if we can go back and watch the recording later of what may have been missed, it would still be nice to have a break implemented into the lecture, even just a few minutes would be helpful. The quizzes were very helpful in reviewing the material from the previous week, especially to see where you need to study more for the exams. I feel that there should be a practice exam or more practice in general with question types that are on the exams. I think the midterm has some poor wording making it more difficult to select a correct answer. Despite studying for days and feeling very prepared, I still did poorly on the midterm and that very heavily weighed on my feelings for how I would finish the course.

He truly cares for his students and that's all you can really ask for from a teacher. I took him during the summer session and the class was really fast paced, but manageable. The average grade for the midterm was pretty low, so he gave extra credit and changed the grading scale, so that the exam you score better on would count for more of your final grade.

this class really isn't as bad as some have made it out to be. some lectures are more engaging than others, and the professor did rush too much at times though. it was clear that he wanted everyone to succeed, and he was kind enough to give everyone extra points to move people's exam grades up, as well as change some grading weights (like final vs midterm) to further benefit people's grades. i recommend reading/at least skimming the textbook btw, it was actually really helpful for this class i feel like the prof used a lot of info from it.

i would 100% recommend taking this class with this professor!!

Honestly, I think there could definitely be worse professors to take this with. That being said, it was not great. The issue with Professor Rissman is he goes super fast, he has like 90 slides per lecture so near the end he stops making complete sense because he's going so fast and gets stressed. He's quirky and funny, but definitely passive-aggressive. I would say, all in all, he's a fair professor. As the quarter went on, he definitely got better at lecturing and became more charismatic. There's no homework besides weekly ZAPS and quizzes (open notes). I will say, his tests are super hard but they are multiple-choice. It's just an incredibly tough test if you don't have test-taking skills. It could definitely be worse, but it's honestly not that great.

I appreciated the way in which the asynchronous lectures were presented. You can watch your lectures whenever you want and go at your own pace.

The professor used Respondus for our midterm exam, which added unnecessary stress. But he listened to our concerns and did not use Respondus for the final exam.

The discussion sections were super helpful. My TA did a really good job at making the information more clear and easier to understand.

This class can be difficult but just try your best to keep up with the lectures so that you don't feel so far behind before the exams. I recommend this class more than the other classes in Column A (for Psych Majors).

Okay so I just want to leave this review to show that sometimes a class that everyone loves can be worse for some people than a class that everyone hates. My example would be this class and 100B. I loved 100B and got an A- in it. I hated this class and got C's on the exams, which isn't like me at all. Professor Rissman is a phenomenal professor, but I found the exams to be unfair and too challenging. I would even go over problems I got wrong on the exam with my T.A. and at one point the T.A. didn't even know why I got it wrong. In my opinion, the exams were extremely difficult. I guess with all that being said, the class was super easy for some people, so I think it really just depends on how your mind works. I guess mine didn't work with this class because I went into it expecting to do well and that's not at all what happened for me.