Course Syllabus

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Welcome!

Welcome to BESC 3010: Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences! This is my favorite class and hopefully it will be yours, too. On this page I want to give you the basic information about the course and, at the bottom, the calendar for the course.

Course Objectives

This is the course description from the UVU catalog.

Behavioral Science 3010, Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences. Introduces use of statistics for research purposes. Teaches descriptive and inferential statistics. Includes central tendency, variability, correlation and regression, probability (particularly probability distributions), and various inferential techniques such as t-test for independent and dependent samples, one-way and two-way analysis of variance, post-hoc tests, and non-parametric statistics.

See a full description of course objective, learning objectives, methods and activities here.

Grading

There are five components to grading, with this breakdown:

  • Homework: 5%
  • Quizzes: 15%
  • Posttests: 20%
  • Exam 1: 20%
  • Exam 2: 20%
  • Final Exam: 20%
  • Extra Credit: 2.5%

(This adds up to 102.5% because that's how you do extra credit in Canvas, although Canvas rounds this off to 103% in certain places.)

Final exam grade requirement. It is the policy of the Behavioral Science Department that in order to receive a passing grade in this course – that is, a C- or higher – you must earn a raw score of at least 50% on the departmental final exam. There are 97 questions on the final, so you must get at least 49 correct to pass the course. (And that's a raw score of at least 49, before I do the "grade adjustment." See the link below for more information on this policy.)

Please see more detailed information on assignments and grading here.

Exams

There are three exams in this course, all of which are administered in the Classroom Testing Center on campus or by proctor (which you will need to arrange with the Distance Education office and not me). Each exam is cumulative:

  • Exam 1, which has 66 questions, covers chapters 01-05, and is in the Testing Center from Wednesday, February 15, through Wednesday, February 22. (The Testing Center is closed Saturday, February 18, through Monday, February 20, which is Presidents Day.)
  • Exam 2, which has 80 questions, covers chapters 01-08, and is in the Testing Center from Wednesday, March 29, through Monday, April 3.
  • The Final Exam has 97 questions and covers all twelve chapters (i.e., chapters 01-12). It is in the Testing Center on Monday, May 1, and Tuesday, May 2.

All of the exams are multiple choice, with an emphasis on the concepts and interpretation of procedures. These exams are all closed-book. You can bring 5 pages of scrap paper and a calculator (but not a cell phone calculator). It is important to note that whereas I wrote the all of the quizzes, the posttests, and the first two exams, the Final Exam was written by the department and is required of all sections of BESC 3010. I have done my absolute best, however, to mirror the style and content of the department's exam in all of my other materials.

An Important Note About Due Dates

All of the homework, quizzes, posttests, and exams in this course have due dates that are listed below. The quizzes have "soft" due dates. That is, they can be taken at any point during the semester without penalty and can be taken multiple times. Their due dates are simply suggestions. (But they have to have due dates if they are to appear on the Canvas calendar.)

On the other hand, the homework and posttests have "hard" due dates. Homework assignments – that means the goals, feedback, and so on – must be done by the specified time to get credit. After their due dates, they are locked and cannot be done anymore. (The reason for that is that those assignments are simply not relevant after their due dates.) The posttests also have a hard due dates. (There are a few exceptions to this: Goals 1, Feedback 1, Updating the Canvas Profile, Posttest 01, and Posttest 02 have grace periods for the first two weeks of class and are not marked down for being late. That is because people may still be joining the class during that time. But the due dates kick in after those.)

Because people sometimes miss due dates for inescapable reasons, I have set up Canvas to automatically drop the two lowest posttest scores. As such, you shouldn't ever need to have any missed posttests reopened.

In addition, all three exams must be taken by their published due dates (with exceptions, of course, for major problems on a case-by-case basis).

As a note, I will replace missing grades with zeros in the gradesheet after each assignment is due. This is to avoid problems with how Canvas communicates grades at the end of the semester. For the quizzes or the assignments with a grace period, if I mark a zero but you then complete the assignment, your earned grade will replace the zero.

Please note that anything can be done earlier, including the final exam. If you're worried about fitting all of your coursework together, you may want to move earlier on this class rather than later. It's just something to think about.

Online Textbook

Our textbook for this course is Data Sense: An Introduction to Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences, which I wrote and Kendall-Hunt publishes. You can buy the ebook version – which is what I recommend – from their site for $52. If you prefer, you can buy a print copy of the book for $65 at the same site, although it may take a few weeks to receive it. (I believe it is a publish-on-demand title.) Whichever version you decide to get, your purchase also includes access to the lecture videos.

Warning: If you buy a used copy of the book or if you buy it from anybody other than the publisher, you probably won't get access to the videos. (You can try contacting the publisher's Customer Service department and see if you can work something out.) You have been warned.

Lecture Videos

There are over 70 professionally-produced videos that provide the lectures for this course. The videos are screen recordings of PowerPoint presentations that go through all of the principles and calculations involved in each chapter. All of the videos can be easily viewed on a small screen (e.g., a 4" smart phone screen) and all of them have closed captions available.

The videos for the first two chapters are available for free on my YouTube channel. They're on a public playlist called "Data Sense Preview." The complete set of videos are hosted on the book publisher's site at datasense.kendallhunt.com. From there, you'll need to register for an account. That, in turn, will, require your registration code, which you should have received when you purchased the book.

As a note, the video site appears to be a little finicky about browsers. If you have trouble with the videos, try switching browsers. I believe that Chrome has some problems but Firefox or Safari may work better. Shockingly, one person reported that it worked best for them on Internet Explorer. Also, if you're on a tablet or phone, you may need to go to a proper laptop/desktop. Then again, the publisher keeps working on these issues, so things change. Just remember to be flexible.

Study Sheets & Practice Final

I have prepared study sheets that list the essential topics and formulas that you need to know for each exam. Click on the links below to get each study sheet:

The final exam is a mandatory, department-wide, comprehensive exam. I have created all of my materials – the text, the lectures, the quizzes, and the exams – to help you prepare for the final. However, the department has also prepared its own practice final. You can take that practice final for extra credit by going here. You can also see videos where I explain every question here (at the bottom of our Quiz Review playlist). Finally, you can download a sheet with all of the formulas that you will need to memorize for the final by clicking here.

Review Videos

To help students prepare for the exams, I have occasionally held special review sessions before each exam. These two-hour sessions were recorded and posted on my YouTube channel at the bottom of the playlist "Data Sense: Quiz Reviews." You can also access each video directly with these links:

Additional Resources

In case you would like any additional information on the topics we cover in this course, one excellent resource is Andy Field's website "Statistics Hell." (And it's not really a form of Satan-worshipping; he's just playing on the way most students feel about statistics.) In particular, see his Alphabetic List of Statistics Resources (AKA "Cocytus").

Tutoring

Free Stats Tutors at UVU

The UVU Calc & Stats Lab in LC 301 offers free tutoring for statistics. Because the people who are able to help specifically with BESC 3010 are not always there, you should call ahead of time. (The Math Lab's phone number is 801.863.8310.) There are sometimes people who can help in the regular Math Lab in LA 201 but (a) you’ll need to call and check; and (b) they tend to be much busier over there. For more information, see either the Math Lab’s web page or their Tutoring Services web page.

Professional Stats Tutors at UVU

In addition to the free services provided by UVU, there are a few professional tutors available. The advantage is that both of these people took this class from me in the last two years. That means that they had the same book, the same quizzes and posttests, the same exams, and the same assignments that you have. Both of then are able to give focused instruction for this particular course. If you would like to contact one of them, please let me know and I'll send you their information.

How to Prepare for the Exams

In order to do well in this course, there are a few things you can do that have been helpful for other students. It's a time-consuming process but it's thorough and works well. Here is the step-by-step procedure:

  1. Read the chapter text all the way through. Write down anything that is potentially confusing or any questions you have. That way you can follow up on those things later.
  2. Watch the lecture videos. See if your questions from the text are answered and write down anything new that is potentially confusing or any questions you have. 
  3. Take the first chapter quiz. Try to do it without using any notes or references. If you missed any questions, see if you can figure out the right answer by looking at the text or your notes.
  4. Watch the review video for that quiz. See if your questions got answered.
  5. Take the first chapter quiz again and repeat the process until you get 5/5 and understand each question.
  6. Do the same for the other three chapter quizzes. Each time, make sure you completely understand the questions on one quiz before you move on to the next.
  7. Go through all four quizzes in a row without using any notes. Make sure you can get all of the questions correct.
  8. Meet with a study group, if possible, to review the quiz questions from the chapter.
  9. Take the chapter posttest. It's okay to use notes on this.
  10. If you missed any question on the posttest, do the following: (a) check the text and your notes for information; (b) if you have a study group, discuss the questions with them; and (c) if you still need help, call or text me at 801.910.5432 and I can usually help you right away. (And don't forget that you can Google anything in this class for more information or different examples.)
  11. Download the study sheet for the upcoming exam: just the first sheet for Exam 1, add the second sheet for Exam 2, and add the third sheet for the Final Exam. (That is, you will need all three study sheets to prepare for the final.) Memorize any formulas on the study sheets because you can't take them in with you for the exams.
  12. Download the one-page formula sheet.
  13. Go through all of the quizzes and posttests before taking an exam. So, for Exam 1, review the 25 quizzes and posttests for Chapter 01-05. For Exam 2, review the 45 quizzes and posttests for Chapter 01-09. For the Final, review all 60 quizzes and posttests for Chapter 01-12.
  14. Watch my exam review videos on YouTube. As mentioned above, these are available on my YouTube channel at the bottom of the playlist "Data Sense: Quiz Reviews." 
  15. After you take each exam, go on Canvas and see what questions you missed. Find the answers to those questions and review them frequently.
  16. Take the practice final without using any notes or references.
  17. Watch the eight review videos for the practice final.
  18. Contact me at 801.910.5432 if you have questions.

Contact Information

Instructor: Barton Poulson, PhD
Associate Professor of Psychology
Behavioral Science Department
Office: Classroom Building 207H (But call before you come, please)
Department: Classroom Building 207
Email: bpoulson@uvu.edu
Phone/Text: 801.910.5432 (Texting is the best way to reach me)
Office hour: Mondays, 12:00-12:50, and by appointment (I'm usually on campus Monday through Thursday but I may be working somewhere other than my office. Just call or text me if you want to meet.)

Course Summary:

Date Details Due