A Workshop on the Development of the Psychology Curriculum at Al Andalus University

Under the auspices of Prof. Dr. Mhd Amer Al Mardini, University President, and as part of the activities of the Basic Sciences Development Program at Al Andalus University, a workshop was held on Saturday 12-17-2022 in the Scientific Research Committee to develop the psychology curriculum in the university faculties.

Prof. Dr. Mohammad Moualla, Chairman of the Scientific Accreditation Committee, gave a speech in which he welcomed the attendees, stressing the importance of psychology and its relation to other sciences, as well as the reflection of this relation on the individual's personality. During his speech, he also addressed the relationship between psychology and the environment in which the individual grows, and the environmental factors that play a role in shaping and refining the individual's psyche.

Prof. Dr. Mhd Amer Al Mardini, University President, gave a speech in which he referred to the need to initiate revision for all basic science courses at the university; he also focalized mental health as the basis for the students' undergraduate study and the development of their ideas. He noted that the psychology course is one of the courses that should be taught interactively in all faculties of the university, with the aim of refining the student's psyche in mind in order to reach the desired positive outcomes of this course.

Then Prof. Dr. Hussain Salman, Vice President for Scientific Affairs and Scientific Research, talked about the need to pay attention to the course contents of the psychology course and its teaching methodology, as there is a close link between the psychological situation and respiratory diseases. A bad psychological situation can lead, for example, to increased breathing and hyperoxia, which may lead to dyspnea associated with numbness in the extremities in addition to other clinical symptoms.

Then Dr. Lubna Daoud, instructor of the psychology course, presented a detailed explanation of the vocabulary of this course in the faculties of Al Andalus University, and she compared these contents with their counterparts in a number of leading universities on the global and Arab levels, such as Cambridge University, York University, Ajman University, and Mohammed Lamine Dabaghine University of Setif 2. It turned out that there were many commonalities between our course vocabulary and those of the mentioned universities.

After an extensive discussion was held on the teaching methodology of the psychology course and its contents in the faculties of Al Andalus University, Dr. Daoud at the end of the workshop presented suggestions for developing this course by adding some vocabulary, such as the physiological foundations of behavior, memory and thinking, and research methods in psychology.