Introduction

An overall aim of this free course is for you to develop an understanding of mental health science (focusing on anxiety and depression) from contemporary biological and psychological perspectives. At the Masters level, you will be expected to think critically about issues, models, and frameworks and their application in different contexts, to take a proactive ‘questioning’ approach, to put forward your views, and to argue a case convincingly backed up with evidence that supports your view. These are skills that you will continue to develop if you move on to postgraduate study. But before we broach these topics, it is first worth clarifying some concepts, dispelling some common misconceptions, and to help provide the context to inform your studies. You will learn how to evaluate news items, and to go behind the headlines and begin to explore some of the more contemporary and controversial findings within the field.

Course learning outcomes

After studying this course, you should be able to:

• Understand anxiety from biopsychosocial perspectives
• Discuss contemporary issues in mental health science related to anxiety
• Recognize different lines of evidence and appreciate the uncertainty, ambiguity, and limits of current knowledge in the study of mental health science.