This book uses Psychology to teach Psychology. With a fresh and engaging voice, this book focuses on where the field of contemporary psychology is headed. Okami's primary objective is to create a highly readable, pedagogically sound text built around how we know students learn. The perspective is fully contemporary and it emphasizes critical thought and psychological science. Regardless of the many perspectives covered in the text, Paul Okami takes psychology seriously as a science, just like biology and chemistry. He focuses on solid, empirical research from the many fields that currently inform the field of psychology. In the 21st century, instructors need a textbook that reflects the latest advances in fields such as behavioral genetics, neuroscience, cognitive psychology, evolutionary psychology, conciousness studies, postive psychology, and cross-cultural psychology in order to accuratly convey the field of psychology to their students. These once controversial areas of study are now integrated into mainstream psychology, and many of their adherents who were previously viewed as "rebels" are now established figures and respected scientists within their disciplines.
It is essential that this introductory text reflects this contemporary persepective in context-not merely to butress 20th century perspectives with recent integration. With 1.2 million students in the large, stable intro psych market in classes of majors and non-majors fulfilling general education requirements mixed in, this course is one of the largest markets that can be entered and every major publisher has multiple titles in this course. The primary goal of many instructors is to introduce students to the scientific basis of psychology and to give them an idea of what this discipline has to do with the many fields that they might enter into, both during college and after. In order to do this, they need an ample support package of ancillaries including video, test banks, Power Points, assessment solutions, and more, so we are prepared to provide these tools. This book marks a step in Oxford's efforts to enter larger, more competitive markets, and a major leap in the development of a comprehensive psychology program.