Prof. Azuma, who leads a class of 16, specializes in neurocognitive psychology of attention and memory, and behavioral phenotype in neurodevelopmental disorders. However, the topics that her seminar covers go beyond her specialization. She does not lecture. Instead, the students choose topics, and teach and learn from each other. Prof. Azuma watches student discussions, and steps in only when their discussions reach a stalemate or go off track.

Her seminar used to be on cognitive neuroscience, but she revised the format to cover broader, more general psychology. Since she is the only psychology professor in this faculty, she made her seminar open to any SILS (School of International Liberal Studies) students interested in the field.

This change also gives students more freedom in the choice of topics they discuss in the seminar. Anything related to human behavior can be analyzed within the psychological perspective. Thus, students can select a topic of discussion inspired by their personal experience, what they have read in books or magazines, or what they heard from their friends and families.

As the scope of the seminar has evolved, so has its style. "I want it to be a student-led course," Prof. Azuma says. "So I asked the students how they want it to be conducted. Many of them said they wanted more discussion. But if I lead the discussion, somehow it seems to straitjacket their arguments. So I decided to let the students lead discussions as well."

Tomohiro Tsuchiya, a senior, chose this seminar because he took Prof. Azuma's course when he was in his freshman and junior years and got interested in psychology. "I like this seminar because of its autonomy. It is organized by students, and Prof. Azuma usually acts as an observer."

In the beginning of this academic year, students chose 5 areas of topics that they wanted to discuss in the seminar. These were psychoanalysis, bipolar and mood disorders, applied psychology, consumer psychology, and neuropsychology. Then students were divided into 5 groups, and each group choose a more concrete topic of presentation and discussion. Each group, in turn, prepared a short presentation as well as questions to guide the discussion.

"The students seemed to enjoy it and said they liked it this way better," said Prof. Azuma. "I usually do not say a word during the discussion, since it becomes very lively without my intervention."

Presentation titles this year included, "Application of neuropsychology tests on children," "How can PTSD be proved scientifically?" "Do you think you are a compulsive buyer or rational buyer?" "Have you ever noticed any subconscious marketing in your daily life?" and "How mathematical education in India differs from that of Japan."

Prof. Azuma wants the students to be able to critically examine the ideas or questions given to them, think deeply, express their thoughts with their own words, and provide empirical and/or theoretical evidence to validate them. "I do not want them to be people who merely get tasks done as they are told," she said. She designs this seminar as not only an opportunity for students to gain knowledge, but as training for them to think and perceive in their own way.

Prof. Azuma says she wants students to face controversial issues that people usually avoid even thinking about. "I encourage the students to discuss difficult questions. In one class the students who chose the topic of neuropsychology asked: 'Should we allow people with heritable mental illness to have children?' We had a very heated discussion on this one. It's not something you commonly think about or discuss, but you can exchange opinions on topics like this in our seminar as scholars of psychology."

Students in this seminar are diverse, with 3rd year and 4+ year students, Japanese and non-Japanese students with various cultural background, all studying together. "Some of them are more fluent in English than others", Prof. Azuma says. "But I find they are very kind and helpful to each other, and the class atmosphere is more constructive than competitive."

Their interests are also diverse. Some got interested in psychology because they or someone close to them had some psychological issues in the past, such as depression or eating disorder. Others have approached psychology for other reasons. "Some students choose topics somewhat distant from the field of psychology, but I never say no to an idea. They can learn to think, conduct research, and write papers using any topic. The scope of this seminar is so broad that anyone can pursue the topic of his or her interest. I just want students to challenge anything that they are interested in."