Kuch Kuch Cognition Hai

The title is a nod to a Bollywood movie. The blog talks about my journey through a cognitive psychology course, going from feared to favorite

One of my best learning experiences was taking PSYC 351C (Cognitive Psychology). I took this course after a really rough academic term where I was not doing my best and honestly felt pretty discouraged. Going into the semester, I was already worried. On top of that, I had heard a lot of people say that PSYC 351C was one of the harder psychology courses. Some students even told me to avoid it if possible.

I still ended up taking it.

What surprised me was how quickly my opinion changed. I remember coming back after one of the earlier lectures about vision and how the brain processes information and spending another hour just looking through the diagrams again because I found them interesting. Later units on neurotransmitters, hearing, and different parts of the brain had the same effect. Instead of feeling like I was studying because I had to, I started reading ahead because I wanted to understand how these systems worked.

I also developed a routine without really planning it. After every lecture, I would come home, rewrite my notes, redraw some of the diagrams from class, and connect ideas together in my notebook. I noticed that when I rewrote things in my own words, topics that felt complicated in class suddenly made more sense.

Looking back now, I can see elements of cognitivism and constructivism in that experience. The visuals and organization of the course helped me process difficult information, while rewriting notes and rebuilding concepts myself helped me understand them more deeply (Miller, 2025).

The course I was most nervous about ended up becoming one of my favourites. I finished the course with 100% on the final exam, which honestly would have been hard to believe at the start of the semester.