Üsküdar Üniversitesi Founding Rector Prof. Dr. Nevzat Tarhan met with students from the Faculty of Medicine and Faculty of Dentistry for a ‘Positive Psychology’ lecture at the start of the new 2023-2024 academic year. In the lecture, conducted online in two separate sessions, in Turkish and English, Tarhan drew attention to the importance of positive psychology, both as a therapeutic method and its impact on people's protective mental health. Emphasizing that the university highly values this course, Tarhan noted that positive psychology emerged from the findings of the 'mind laboratory'.
Üsküdar Üniversitesi, which set out as Turkey's first and only thematic university in the field of behavioral sciences and health, has valued the positive psychology course since its establishment and includes it as a compulsory part of its curriculum.
In this context, Üsküdar Üniversitesi Founding Rector Psychiatrist Prof. Dr. Nevzat Tarhan met with medical and dental students for a positive psychology lecture at the beginning of the new academic year.
Two Separate Lectures from Tarhan: In Turkish and English…
Meeting with students online, Prof. Dr. Nevzat Tarhan stated that positive psychology involves researching what makes life valuable and worth living, focusing on and developing people's positive and strong characteristics, and striving to improve psychological well-being and joy of life. Tarhan noted that positive psychology is based on preventing individuals from experiencing mental problems.
Positive Psychology: The Systematized Form of Eastern Wisdom and Anatolian Sagacity…
Underlining that positive psychology is an approach that focuses on individuals' positive characteristics, strengths, and virtues rather than their negative, lacking, and problematic aspects, Tarhan noted that positive psychology is the systematized form of Eastern wisdom and Anatolian sagacity with scientific methodology.
Positive Psychology Emerges from the Findings of the Mind Laboratory…
Addressing students in two different sessions, in English and Turkish, during the day, Tarhan said that not only academic skills but also social and emotional skills, alongside life success, are important for humans. Pointing out that positive psychology is not merely "Pollyannaism" (being overly optimistic), Tarhan stated, “Classical psychology brings the negative to zero, and a scientific methodology has been developed to go beyond zero. In this era, the soundness of knowledge needs to be tested with scientific rigor. Therefore, beliefs must enter the laboratory, but the mind laboratory. Positive psychology emerges from the findings of the mind laboratory. The neuroscience laboratory, a second laboratory supporting this, paved the way for science.”
Extraordinary Work Emerges When Health Knowledge and Software Knowledge Combine
Prof. Dr. Nevzat Tarhan also offered advice to medical and dental students, emphasizing the need to learn a programming language as a second language. Tarhan said, “It would be a great advantage for all of you to know a software program and be able to write something. When health knowledge and software knowledge combine, extraordinary work emerges. In hospital software programs, artificial intelligence will be able to make preliminary diagnoses, perform face reading, make presumptive diagnoses with brain signals, and ease the physician's work, reducing errors. Combining software and the health profession can make a significant difference.”
