§-Psychology syllabus
VIC · VCAA← Psychology
Psychology syllabus, dot point by dot point
Every dot point in the VIC Psychology syllabus, with a focused answer for each. Click any dot point for a worked explainer, past exam questions and links to related points.
Unit 3: How does experience affect behaviour and mental processes?
Module overview →How have Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples used memory techniques and Western mnemonics to retain large amounts of information?
the use of mnemonics by written cultures, including acronyms, acrostics and the method of loci, and the use of mnemonics by oral cultures, including songlines used by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, to improve the encoding, storage and retrieval of memory
What do Alzheimer's disease and aphantasia reveal about how memory and mental imagery normally work?
the contribution that brain conditions such as Alzheimer's disease and aphantasia can make to the understanding of memory, with reference to the role of brain structures and the absence of mental imagery
How does the brain take in, hold and store information so it can be retrieved later?
the Atkinson-Shiffrin multi-store model of memory, including the function, capacity and duration of sensory memory, short-term memory and long-term memory, and the role of the hippocampus, amygdala, neocortex and cerebellum in storing and retrieving explicit and implicit memories
How do consequences and associations shape the behaviours a person learns over time?
classical conditioning as a three-phase process (before, during and after conditioning) involving an unconditioned stimulus, unconditioned response, conditioned stimulus and conditioned response, and operant conditioning as a three-phase model involving antecedent, behaviour and consequence, including positive and negative reinforcement and response cost
What makes one coping strategy effective in a situation, and why does matching the strategy to the context matter?
the use of strategies (approach and avoidance) for coping with stress and improving mental wellbeing, including context-specific effectiveness and coping flexibility
How do episodic and semantic memory let us relive the past and picture possible futures?
the roles of episodic and semantic memory in retrieving autobiographical events and in constructing possible imagined futures, including evidence from brain imaging and post-traumatic and developmental amnesia
How do the gut and the brain communicate, and why does this matter for stress and psychological functioning?
the gut-brain axis (GBA) as an area of emerging research, with reference to the interaction of gut microbiota with stress and the nervous system in the control of psychological processes and behaviour
How does the nervous system enable a person to interact with the external world?
the roles of the central and peripheral nervous systems and the autonomic and somatic nervous systems in responding to sensory stimuli and coordinating voluntary and involuntary movement, including the role of neurons in conscious and unconscious responses
How do neurons signal to one another at the synapse, and what do glutamate and GABA each do to the receiving neuron?
the role of neurotransmitters in the transmission of neural information between neurons (lock-and-key process) for the coordination of mental processes and behaviour, including the role of glutamate in learning and memory and GABA in regulating postsynaptic activation
How can a person learn a new behaviour simply by watching someone else perform it?
observational learning as a social-cognitive approach to learning involving attention, retention, reproduction, motivation and reinforcement, as demonstrated by Bandura's research, and its application to the acquisition of behaviour
How does the body respond to a stressor at both a biological and psychological level?
the fight-flight-freeze response to acute stress, the role of cortisol in chronic stress, Selye's General Adaptation Syndrome as a biological model, and Lazarus and Folkman's Transactional Model of stress and coping as a psychological model
How do connections between neurons physically change so that learning and memory can be stored in the brain?
synaptic plasticity, including long-term potentiation and long-term depression, resulting from the changing of connections between neurons (sprouting, rerouting and pruning) as the fundamental mechanism of memory formation that leads to learning
Unit 4: How is mental wellbeing supported and maintained?
Module overview →What happens when the body clock falls out of step with the day, and how does bright light realign it?
the effects of circadian rhythm phase disorders, including delayed sleep phase syndrome, advanced sleep phase disorder and shift work, on a person's sleep-wake cycle and mental wellbeing
What practical, evidence-based steps improve sleep quality and keep the body clock in time?
the improvement of sleep-wake patterns and mental wellbeing through application of behavioural strategies including sleep hygiene and the manipulation of zeitgebers such as daylight and blue light from electronic devices
How is mental wellbeing understood on a continuum, and how do biological, psychological and social factors contribute to a specific phobia?
mental wellbeing as a continuum, the distinction between stress, anxiety and a mental disorder, and the application of a biopsychosocial approach to explain the development and management of specific phobia, including evidence-based interventions such as systematic desensitisation
What happens to the body and mind when a person does not get enough sleep or their sleep-wake cycle is disrupted?
the regulation of sleep-wake patterns by internal circadian and ultradian rhythms, the effects of partial and total sleep deprivation on affective, behavioural and cognitive functioning, and the comparison of sleep deprivation effects to blood alcohol concentration readings
How does the body cycle through different types of sleep across a typical night?
sleep as a psychological construct and a naturally occurring altered state of consciousness, the distinction between REM and NREM sleep, the cyclical nature of sleep across a night measured using an EEG, EMG and EOG, and the differences in sleep across the lifespan
How can mental wellbeing be understood holistically, and what protects it across biological, psychological, social and cultural domains?
ways of considering mental wellbeing, including levels of functioning and resilience, and social and emotional wellbeing (SEWB) as a multidimensional and holistic framework to wellbeing including protective factors and cultural determinants for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples