Psych Major Syndrome

Using the skills you've learned so far in Introduction to Psychology, please write a brief self-assessment describing how things are going in your freshman year.

Presenting Concerns:

The Patient, Leigh Nolan (that would be me), has just started her first year at Stiles College. She has decided to major in psychology (even though her parents would rather she study Tarot cards, not Rorschach blots).

Patient has always been very good at helping her friends with their problems, but when it comes to solving her own...not so much.

Patient has a tendency to overanalyze things, particularly when the opposite sex is involved. Like why doesn't Andrew, her boyfriend of over a year, ever invite her to spend the night? Or why can't she commit to taking the next step in their relationship? And why does his roommate Nathan dislike her so much? More importantly, why did Nathan have a starring role in a much-more-than-friendly dream?

Aggravating factors include hyper-competitive fellow psych majors, a professor who's badly in need of her own psychoanalysis, and mentoring a middle-school-aged girl who thinks Patient is, in a word, naive.

Diagnosis:

Psych Major Syndrome

Alicia Thompson graduated from New College of Florida in 2006 with a degree in psychology and wrote this debut novel in between pulling all-nighters on her senior thesis. Her short stories "Abby Greene for President" and "Stealing Mark Twain" have appeared in Girls' Life magazine. She is currently working on an MFA in fiction writing at the University of South Florida (where she still pulls the occasional all-nighter).