The Department of Psychology offers two majors

Your psychology advisor can discuss your academic and career goals and help you choose the appropriate major.

• The small plan (45-credit) major requires students to complete a minor or a second major in some other subject.  The small plan is intended for students interested in combining a background in psychology with fields such as social work, family studies, business, law and justice, primate behavior, and other fields in which training in behavioral science would be useful.  For the small plan, click here.
• The large plan (60-credit) major leads to a bachelor’s degree without a minor or second major. It is recommended for students interested in pursuing graduate studies in psychology. The large plan major includes PSY363 Intermediate Statistics and Research Methods and more elective courses. For the large plan, click here.

The Psychology Major Coursework (Differences between the small and large plan are noted in bold below)

Required Courses

• PSY 101 General Psychology
• PSY 200 Introduction to the Major
• PSY 300 Research Methods in Psychology
• PSY 362 Introductory Statistics
• PSY 363 Intermediate Statistics & Research Methods (Prerequisite: PSY 300 and 362) -- PSY 363 is required for the large plan (60-credit) major but not the small plan (45-credit) major
• PSY 489 Senior Assessment

Select at least one Course from each of the following 5 groups:

Group I:  PSY 301 Learning or PSY 303 Analysis of Everyday Behavior

Group II: PSY 310 Multicultural Issues in Psychology or PSY 313 Developmental Psychology or PSY 346 Social Psychology

Group III: PSY 453 Theories of Personality or PSY 445 Clinical, Counseling and Community Psychology or PSY 449 Abnormal Psychology

Group IV (PSY 300 Required): PSY 420 Psychology of Language or PSY 460 Cognitive Psychology

Group V (PSY 300 Required): PSY 450 Sensation and Perception or PSY 478 Behavioral Neuroscience

In addition to the above Required and Group courses, the small plan (45-credit) major requires 4-7 elective credits in psychology and the large plan (60-credit) major requires 14-17 elective credits in psychology.  In addition to classes listed in the Groups, other 300 and 400-level psychology classes may be taken as electives.  A maximum of 5 lower division credits may be taken as electives.  Not more than 9 or 10 hours of PSY 495 may be applied to the small or large plan as elective credit, respectively.

Psychology majors are also required to complete a minimum of 10 hours of either civic engagement and/or research assistance prior to the completion of PSY 489. Here is a list of faculty-student research opportunities for 2022-2023: Faculty-student reserarch opportunities for 2022-2023