MUN Psychology - Faculty


Verena Gosse

During the past 34 years my teaching and research interests have gradually moved from introductory psychology towards the areas of personality and health psychology.

For 22 years, I primarily taught both introductory psychology lecture courses to various class sizes (25 to 250+) and, with a former colleague, introduced Keller’s PSI (Personalized System of Instruction) as an alternate mode of course delivery. For 11 of the 19 years that it was offered, I was solely responsible for its development and administration.

Research related to introductory psychology has included the evaluation of PSI, being co-investigator in the evaluation of Phoenix as an authoring system for Computer Assisted Learning, of computer-simulated demos (Psych Sim), of Psychology 1000 as a Cable TV course, and of two-way interactive teaching video.

For the past 24 years I have primarily taught personality and related courses for majors and non-majors, utilizing lecture, labs, distance education, and more recently the incorporation of WEB components. Related research has involved the investigation of the relationship between various personality constructs and their measurements, between attitudes and disability, between life-perceptions and disability (sponsored by the Man-in-Motion Legacy Fund through the Canadian Paraplegic Association), and the evaluation of the life-skills program, Goal Oriented Adult Learning (sponsored by the Canadian Mental Health Association), and dental anxiety.

As well, over the years I have supervised a few honors students, have conducted text/chapter reviews – the most recent (2005) being a personality text (with an international perspective) for Wiley and Sons, Canada – and was a judge for the Canada Wide Science Fair in 2004.

Andrews, E., Gosse, V., Gaulton R., and Maddigan, R. (2000). Teaching introductory psychology at a distance by two-way interactive video. Reprinted in M.R. Hebb, C.L. Brewer and L.T. Benjamin Jr. (Eds.). Handbook for Teaching Introductory Psychology, vol. 2 (pp. 14-17). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Andrews, E., Gosse, V., Gaulton, R., and Maddigan, R. (1999). Teaching introductory psychology at a distance by two-way interactive video. Teaching of Psychology, 26 (2), 115-118.

Liddell, A. and Gosse, V. (1998). Characteristics of early unpleasant dental experiences. Journal of Behaviour Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, 29, 227-237.

Mahoney, K., Liddell, A., and Gosse, V. (1995). Learning experiences and general anxiety as predictors of dental anxiety. Canadian Psychology Abstracts, 36, 146.