School: Arts and Humanities

This unit information may be updated and amended immediately prior to semester. To ensure you have the correct outline, please check it again at the beginning of semester.

  • Unit Title

    Advanced Developmental and Professional Issues in Psychology
  • Unit Code

    PSY5188
  • Year

    2025
  • Enrolment Period

    1
  • Version

    4
  • Credit Points

    15
  • Full Year Unit

    N
  • Mode of Delivery

    Online
  • Unit Coordinator

    Dr Deirdre DRAKE

Description

This unit critically evaluates advanced lifespan developmental psychology as a framework for understanding the systemic and developmental factors that inform the ethical practice of psychology in different professional and cultural contexts.

Prerequisite Rule

Students must be enrolled in course T75, K84 or K86 in order to complete this unit

Learning Outcomes

On completion of this unit students should be able to:

  1. Apply knowledge pertaining to ethical and culturally responsive conduct to working with clients in different professional contexts.
  2. Evaluate the contribution of advanced developmental, social, cultural and abnormal psychology theory and evidence in understanding legal and ethical decision-making concerning individuals in different professional and legal contexts.
  3. Appraise the ethical, theoretical, and legal foundations that under lie the professional rules that govern the psychologist-client relationship, and the conduct of research in psychology.
  4. Evaluate the advanced theoretical and empirical knowledge in developmental psychology, and how this knowledge is applied to issues in working with clients across the lifespan.

Unit Content

  1. Professional and personal development of the practitioner.
  2. How Lifespan Developmental Psychology theory and research on different life stages and transitions, including specific issues in working with children, adolescents, adults, older adults, families and different cultural groups (with particular reference to indigenous Australians) informs issues in professional practice.
  3. The application of advanced psychological research, methods, and expertise to issues in the law relating to individuals and families across the lifespan, including civil and criminal competencies, abuse, child custody, and guardianship.
  4. Legal and professional rules that govern psychological practice, with particular reference to The Australian Psychological Society's Code of Ethics, and The National Health and Medical Research Council's Standards on the conduct of ethical research.
  5. Psychological theory and empirical bases informing contemporary systemic approaches to lifespan development and their impact upon professional psychology.

Learning Experience

Students will engage in learning experiences via ECU’s LMS as well as additional ECU learning technologies

Additional Learning Experience Information

Online delivery supported by discussion groups and study modules.

Assessment

GS1 GRADING SCHEMA 1 Used for standard coursework units

Students please note: The marks and grades received by students on assessments may be subject to further moderation. All marks and grades are to be considered provisional until endorsed by the relevant School Progression Panel.

ONLINE
TypeDescriptionValue
Case StudyEthical Issues Analysis10%
Case StudyCourt Case Analysis50%
AssignmentEssay40%

Disability Standards for Education (Commonwealth 2005)

For the purposes of considering a request for Reasonable Adjustments under the Disability Standards for Education (Commonwealth 2005), inherent requirements for this subject are articulated in the Unit Description, Learning Outcomes and Assessment Requirements of this entry. The University is dedicated to provide support to those with special requirements. Further details on the support for students with disabilities or medical conditions can be found at the Access and Inclusion website.

Assessment

Students please note: The marks and grades received by students on assessments may be subject to further moderation. Informal vivas may be conducted as part of an assessment task, where staff require further information to confirm the learning outcomes have been met. All marks and grades are to be considered provisional until endorsed by the relevant School Progression Panel.

Academic Integrity

Integrity is a core value at Edith Cowan University, and it is expected that ECU students complete their assessment tasks honestly and with acknowledgement of other people's work as well as any generative artificial intelligence tools that may have been used. This means that assessment tasks must be completed individually (unless it is an authorised group assessment task) and any sources used must be referenced.

Breaches of academic integrity can include:

Plagiarism

Copying the words, ideas or creative works of other people or generative artificial intelligence tools, without referencing in accordance with stated University requirements. Students need to seek approval from the Unit Coordinator within the first week of study if they intend to use some of their previous work in an assessment task (self-plagiarism).

Unauthorised collaboration (collusion)

Working with other students and submitting the same or substantially similar work or portions of work when an individual submission was required. This includes students knowingly providing others with copies of their own work to use in the same or similar assessment task(s).

Contract cheating

Organising a friend, a family member, another student or an external person or organisation (e.g. through an online website) to complete or substantially edit or refine part or all of an assessment task(s) on their behalf.

Cheating in an exam

Using or having access to unauthorised materials in an exam or test.

Serious outcomes may be imposed if a student is found to have committed one of these breaches, up to and including expulsion from the University for repeated or serious acts.

ECU's policies and more information about academic integrity can be found on the student academic integrity website.

All commencing ECU students are required to complete the Academic Integrity Module.

Assessment Extension

In some circumstances, Students may apply to their Unit Coordinator to extend the due date of their Assessment Task(s) in accordance with ECU's Assessment, Examination and Moderation Procedures - for more information visit https://askus2.ecu.edu.au/s/article/000001386.

Special Consideration

Students may apply for Special Consideration in respect of a final unit grade, where their achievement was affected by Exceptional Circumstances as set out in the Assessment, Examination and Moderation Procedures - for more information visit https://askus2.ecu.edu.au/s/article/000003318.

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