The Psychology Undergrad Podcast

The Psychology Student

Transforms dense psychology textbooks into lively, easy-to-digest conversations between two hosts. Each episode focuses on a single chapter unpacking theories, experiments, and key thinkers through examples you’ll actually remember. Whether you’re cramming for exams, revisiting core concepts, or just curious how the mind works, this podcast helps you understand, not memorize.

  1. 2d ago

    The Debate Over What Counts as Mental Illness

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! So is mental illness a biological reality, or a label society puts on people who don't fit in? In this episode we take opposite sides and argue it out. One of us defends the medical model, with the DSM-5 as a "Dictionary of Symptoms and Medicine," Z codes, the WHODAS 2.0, and the evidence for medications like SSRIs and stimulants. The other argues the social constructionist and humanistic side, using a kaleidoscope analogy, Rosenhan's famous "Being Sane in Insane Places" study, and the tragic case of Ellen West. Along the way we cover side effects like tardive dyskinesia, Gilligan's critique of Kohlberg, the Cultural Formulation Interview, and ataque de nervios. We also bring in Fowler's stages of faith to ask why we want a diagnosis so badly in the first place. We don't pick a winner. We end with Kegan's idea of holding two truths at once: maybe it's the brain's hardware and the story's software, both at the same time. Hashtags: #ThePsychologyUndergrad #MentalHealth #DSM5 #AbnormalPsychology #Psychopathology #SocialConstructionism #CarlRogers #Rosenhan #Psychopharmacology #CounselorEducation #PsychologyPodcast #CMHC #NCE #StudyWithMe

  2. 2d ago

    Group Work, Consultation and Clinical Supervision

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! It's 1968. The doors are locked for a 48-hour session, the leader is telling everyone to scream at each other, and half the room is naked. For a short time that counted as cutting-edge group therapy, until the APA stepped in. In this study session we follow group work from Jane Addams and Dr. Pratt's tuberculosis patients to the five types of groups used today. To make them easier to remember, we match each one to a kind of religious gathering. We explain Tuckman's stages with a roommate story everyone knows: the stolen yogurt. We also cover why confidentiality in a group can never be fully guaranteed. Then we look at consultation, comparing the expert "visiting theologian" with the "spiritual director" who helps an organization find its own answers. Last comes clinical supervision and the strangest idea of the semester, the parallel process, where a client's anxiety moves up to the counselor and then to the supervisor. We finish with a question: how much of your own daily stress started somewhere else? #ThePsychologyUndergrad #GroupWork #GroupTherapy #ClinicalSupervision #Consultation #ParallelProcess #CounselorEducation #PsychologyPodcast #CMHC #NCE #StudyWithMe

  3. 2d ago

    Inside the Invisible X-Ray: Counseling Theories, Clinical Skills and Family Systems

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! A broken bone shows up on an x-ray. A broken mind doesn't. In this late-night study session we work through Neukrug (2022), chapters 4, 5 and 6, from Freud's id, ego and superego to the hidden feedback loops that run your family. We cover: - Psychodynamic roots: the ego as a stressed-out middle manager, defense mechanisms, Jung's shadow and Adler's teleology - Existential and humanistic theories: Frankl's logotherapy, Rogers' core conditions (unconditional positive regard as grace), Gestalt's unfinished business - Cognitive-behavioral tools: Ellis' ABC model, Beck's cognitive distortions, Glasser's WDEP, ACT's hexaflex and defusion, and the motivational interviewing acronyms DARN CATS and OARS - The counselor's toolkit: proxemics, the Carkhuff empathy scale, therapeutic silence, confrontation, Schwitzer's inverted pyramid and SOAP notes - Couples and family systems: cybernetics and homeostasis, the identified patient as scapegoat (straight from Leviticus), Minuchin, Haley's paradoxical intention, Bowen's triangulation, EFT and Gottman's Four Horsemen All the way through, we look at where modern psychology meets old ideas of sin, grace and moral responsibility. We finish on a puzzle: if family systems shape so much of what we do, where does free will begin? Mnemonics, analogies and exam hacks throughout. Grab your coffee. Hashtags: #ThePsychologyUndergrad #Counseling #CounselingTheories #Psychology #FamilySystems #FamilyTherapy #CBT #ACT #MotivationalInterviewing #Freud #CarlRogers #Gottman #MurrayBowen #MentalHealth #CounselorEducation #StudyWithMe #PsychologyPodcast #NCE #CMHC

  4. Oct 20

    How Trauma and Culture Wire the Brain: From the Womb to Adolescence

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! - The fetus as a "stress sponge": a mother's cortisol and adrenaline cross the placenta and wire a baby's brain for threat before birth. - Wilhelm Reich's character armor: how chronic stress becomes physical rigidity, seen in infants who can't relax into a caregiver's arms. - Freud's psychosexual stages: retold as the body's first contact points with the world (trust, control, body awareness). - Attachment as "glue": Bowlby, Ainsworth's Strange Situation, and how Western independence and collectivist amae define "secure" differently. - Vygotsky's shoelace analogy: children learn only what their environment demands, so kids surviving violence, foster care or systemic racism put survival ahead of academics. - Dev's story: a first-generation South Asian Muslim teen coming out as transgender, mapped onto Aaron Devor's 14-stage model, with social media as a lifeline. It closes on one question: if our wiring is set before we can choose our environment, how much of you is actually you? #Psychology #DevelopmentalPsychology #ChildDevelopment #Trauma #AttachmentTheory #Neuroscience #PrenatalStress #CharacterArmor #Freud #Vygotsky #MaryAinsworth #CulturalPsychology #Adolescence #TransgenderIdentity #MentalHealth #PsychologyPodcast #PsychStudents

  5. Oct 18

    Your Grandmother's Egg: Generational Trauma, Epigenetics, and the Broken Rulers of Lifespan Development

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Did you know the egg that became you formed inside your grandmother? On this late-night study session of The Psychology Undergrad, we work through lifespan development from before conception to adulthood. We start with epigenetics and transgenerational trauma: how the Dutch Hunger Winter, colonization and the "haunted womb" leave biological marks that pass down through generations. Then we put the classic theories to the test: Erikson's psychosocial stages, Piaget's cognitive stages (mnemonic: Smart People Cook Food), Levinson's life structures (adulthood as levelling up in a video game), Bandura's triadic causation, and Gilligan's ethics of care as a response to Kohlberg. We look at where each one's "ruler" was marked wrong for women and marginalized groups. We also walk through two case studies, Carla and Ariana, rebuild Bronfenbrenner's ecological model as a smartphone (app, operating system, Wi-Fi), and cover Hays' ADDRESSING model and Hardy's privileged and subjugated tasks. Our closing question: if farming changed human development 11,000 years ago, what will digital life do seven generations from now? Hashtags #PsychologyUndergrad #LifespanDevelopment #GenerationalTrauma #Epigenetics #DevelopmentalPsychology #Erikson #Piaget #Bandura #Bronfenbrenner #CounsellingStudent #MentalHealth #PsychologyPodcast #StudyWithMe

  6. Oct 18

    The Making of a Professional Counselor: History, Identity, and Ethics

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Why can't a mental health diagnosis be as clear as an x-ray? This study session works through Chapters 1–3 of Neukrug's The World of the Counselor. - Guidance vs. counseling vs. psychotherapy: what separates them. - The field's history: Jane Addams and Hull House, Freud, the Army Alpha test, Pinel unchaining asylum patients, and Frank Parsons, the founder of vocational guidance. - What makes a counselor effective: Wampold's research, Rogers' unconditional positive regard, empathy, cognitive complexity, and the "it factor". - Ethics: the ACA Code of Ethics and its moral principles, and what happens when a counselor's personal values clash with a client's choices. - Standards and justice: the ABCs of accreditation (CACREP), board certification (NCC) and licensure, then the MSJCC and social justice as counseling's fifth force. - The closing question: could AI ever have the "it factor"? #CounselingStudent #COUN530 #Neukrug #ProfessionalCounseling #CounselorIdentity #ACAEthics #CACREP #MSJCC #MulticulturalCounseling #SocialJustice #CarlRogers #CounselingHistory #MentalHealth #GradSchool #StudyPodcast

  7. Sep 23

    Stages of Group Development: How Teams Form, Storm, Norm & Perform

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! What turns a group of coworkers into a real team? We walk through Tuckman's stages of group development, team roles, and what separates high-performing teams from the rest. Industrial-organizational psychology for psychology students. #psychology #psychologyundergrad #psychstudent #iopsychology

  8. Sep 23

    Conflict Resolution & BATNA: The Psychology of Negotiation

    Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode! Conflict at work is inevitable, but it doesn't have to be destructive. We cover conflict resolution styles, the negotiation process, BATNA, and common biases that sink deals. Industrial-organizational psychology for psychology students. #psychology #psychologyundergrad #psychstudent #iopsychology

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Transforms dense psychology textbooks into lively, easy-to-digest conversations between two hosts. Each episode focuses on a single chapter unpacking theories, experiments, and key thinkers through examples you’ll actually remember. Whether you’re cramming for exams, revisiting core concepts, or just curious how the mind works, this podcast helps you understand, not memorize.

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