Psychology
Department

Degree Requirements for the Major

To earn a bachelor of arts degree with a major in psychology, a student must satisfy the following minimum requirements:

1. General College Requirements (see “Curriculum” section), including the following requirements to satisfy the major:

2. At least 44 semester-hours as specified in a., b., c., d., e., and f., below. A grade of C- or better must be received in each course under point 2, and the cumulative grade point average of courses used to satisfy the major must be at least 2.00. Courses taken for Credit/No credit may not be used to satisfy requirements under point 2.

   1. Required Core Courses: 12 semester-hours
      • PSYC 101: Introduction to Psychology
      • PSYC 201: Psychological Statistics
      • PSYC 203: Writing and Research Methods in Psychology
   2. Lower-division Content Course: 4 semester-hours chosen from:
      • PSYC 210: Comparative Animal Behavior
      • PSYC 220: Critical Thinking: An Introduction to Cognition and Perception
      • PSYC 230: Lifespan Development
      • PSYC 250: Social Psychology
      • PSYC 270: Personality Psychology
   3. Distribution Across Content Areas: 16 upper-division semester-hours, as specified below. Note: At least 8 semester-hours of these 16 semester-hours must be laboratory courses (400-level).

      Content Area A: 8 semester-hours

      • PSYC 331: Infant and Child Development
      • PSYC 333: Adolescence
      • PSYC 335: Adulthood and Aging
      • PSYC 362: Focus on Social Psychology
      • PSYC 375: Abnormal Psychology
      • PSYC 378: Counseling
      •  PSYC 430: Developmental Psychology with Laboratory
      •  PSYC 450: Social Psychology with Laboratory
      •  PSYC 470: Counseling and Psychotherapy with Laboratory

        Content Area B: 8 semester-hours

      • PSYC 312: Sensation and Perception
      • PSYC 314: Drugs, Brains, and Behavior
      • PSYC 420: Psychology of Learning with Laboratory
      • PSYC 422: Biological Psychology with Laboratory
      • PSYC 424: Cognitive Psychology with Laboratory

   4. Upper-Division Electives: A minimum of 8 additional semester-hours in upper-division psychology courses. Credits earned from internships, field experiences, and independent studies cannot be used to meet this requirement. A maximum of either four semester-hours in a St. Mary’s Project in psychology (PSYC 493-494) or four semester-hours in Directed Research in Psychology (PSYC 397 or PSYC 497) can be counted toward this requirement.

   5. Every psychology major must complete a senior capstone experience. This requirement may be fulfilled in one of two ways:

      1. St. Mary’s Project (8 credits): This project may be in psychology or in another major discipline or study area. The guidelines established in the selected area apply.
      2. Alternative Capstone Experience. 8 credits, distributed as follows:

         1. PSYC 490: Senior Seminar (4 credits)

         2. An additional upper-division four credit course, not used to satisfy any other requirements for the major, chosen from the following options:

            • PSYC 305: History and Systems of Psychology; or
            • PSYC 402: Advanced Research Methods and Statistics (4 credits); or
            • PSYC 410: Service Learning; or
            • PSYC 497: Directed Research (4 credits)(all four credits must be taken for graded credit during the same semester); or
            • An additional laboratory course in psychology

         Current students and advisers: Please note that the diversity requirement does not apply to students graduating after SP11 regardless of whether or not it was listed in their entering catalog.