Like humans, animals show robust differences in individual behavior. In this class, we will explore different conceptions of animal personality across a range of organisms including nematodes, insects, dogs, cats, dolphins, and nonhuman primates. In doing so we will explore the neuronal underpinnings of personality, the potential evolutionary benefits of differing personalities among a population, and how it affects our understandings of the cognitive abilities of different species.

The study of aesthetics involves examining our interactions with art, which can be defined broadly as human creations, our experiences of beauty and ugliness, and our encounters with the things of our world. In fact, the psychology of aesthetics is one of the oldest fields in psychology, and yet it remains relatively obscure because of the difficulty of studying what “moves us” with the tools of psychological science. In this course we will explore cerebral and embodied approaches to understanding aesthetic experience, as well as the relationship between aesthetic experience and resilience, health and well-being.