Overview
What is Psychology?
Psychology is the study of human behaviour and mental processes. It includes topics such as infant and child development, perception, learning, motivation, cognitive processes (like memory and problem solving), individual differences and social psychology, and has many of the features of a science course, such as practical work, statistical description and analysis of data and courses on the underlying physiology of the human brain.
Do you enjoy:
- Analysing other people’s behaviour?
- Trying to understand how the brain works?
- Conducting your own research to answer questions?
Psychology: The course for you?
The School of Psychology aims to offer a knowledge base and a set of skills that not only equip students for the many careers that exist in psychology, but also prepare students intellectually for other careers. Psychology is a branch of science that demands clear, rigorous thinking, numeracy and the ability to define, study and solve problems in complex, changing settings. It is also an applied science that deals with how people act and behave in the real world and provides support for people in their social life and work, for example, through clinical and counselling interventions. If you are interested in the factors influencing human thinking, feeling and behaviour you will enjoy this course.
Psychology at Trinity
As well as offering high-quality teaching, Trinity’s School of Psychology collaborates with a number of other disciplines through Trinity College Institute for Neuroscience, the Trinity Centre for Global Health, Global Brain Health Institute and the Trinity Centre for Innovative Human Systems. Students are encouraged to become actively involved in our ongoing research, particularly in the third and fourth years of their studies. The Single Honours degree confers eligibility for graduate membership of the Psychological Society of Ireland and provide the basis for entry to postgraduate programmes, such as those in clinical psychology and counselling psychology.
Graduate skills and career opportunities
Many psychology graduates proceed to a career in professional psychology through professional training. The School of Psychology itself offers a range of postgraduate programmes including professional doctorates in Clinical Psychology and Counselling Psychology, Masters degree courses in Applied Psychology and Applied Behaviour Analysis, postgraduate qualifications in M.Sc. in Global Mental Health, online qualifications in Managing Risk and System Change, as well as the .Phil./P.Grad.Dip. Psychoanalytic Studies and Research M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees.
However, the advanced understanding of human behaviour and experience and the wide range of skills developed during the course have allowed students to enter many professions, ranging from management, marketing, advertising, and accountancy to journalism, broadcast media, teaching, and recruitment. The school will provide seminars about career development during the course of your degree.
Your degree and what you’ll study
The course is designed to develop knowledge and understanding of the concepts, principles, theories, and research methods of contemporary psychology; to develop skills of analysis and synthesis, problem-solving, research design, and statistical description and evaluation using the Python programming language; to provide practice in the design, execution, reporting and critical evaluation of research; and to develop competence in group work, communication and presentation skills, and self-assessment. During the lecture term, students spend approximately 10-12 hours per week receiving tuition such as lectures, tutorials, seminars and laboratory practicals.
First and second years
As a first and second year student, you will take foundation-level modules in a range of areas such as: Social Psychology; Perception; Psychological Disorder; Developmental Psychology; Cognition and the Brain, Language; Thinking; Fundamentals of Neuroscience and Behaviour; Evolutionary Psychology; Personality and Individual Differences; and Research Methods and Statistical Analysis.
You will also be given the opportunity to take modules from other programmes across the university.
Third and fourth years
By third year you will have identified areas within psychology that are of particular interest to you and you will have the opportunity to develop these interests throughout third and fourth year, by choosing modules from a series of advanced options.
On completion of the course, students must have taken at least one module from each of the five specified thematic areas:
- Biological.
- Social.
- Developmental.
- Cognitive.
- Personality and Individual Differences.
Some of the modules offered in recent years include: Neurological Rehabilitation; Advances in Neurotherapy: From Molecules to Prosthetics for Neuropsychiatric and Neurological Disorders; Developing brains, developing persons: from culture to consciousness; Case Studies in Neuropsychology; Making Sense of Action; Social Neuroscience; Child Language Acquisition & Development; Morality and Moral Development; Human Factors and Organisational: Child Development in Changing Family Contexts; Applied Issues in Developmental Psychology; Child and Adolescent Clinical Psychology; Child Health and Well-being Cognitive: Human Reasoning; Creative Cognition;Biopsychology; Health Psychology; and Psychology of Criminal Behaviour.
In the fourth year a large part of your workload involves carrying out an independent Capstone project under the supervision of a member of staff. Many students report that this project, while challenging, is one of the most rewarding parts of the course.
A combination of end-of-semester written examinations and continuous assessment is used. In your final year, you will also undertake a Capstone project.
There are QQI/FET routes available for this course. Please see www.cao.ie for details.
Click here for further information on modules/subjects.
Study abroad opportunities
Second-year undergraduates are eligible to apply to study for one or more semesters of their third year in certain other European psychology schools, and, where appropriate, some subsistence funding is provided by the EU Erasmus fund, and there are no additional course charges to be paid while abroad. Assessment is carried out in the host institution and marks are translated so that full course credit is recognised in TCD. The School of Psychology has bilateral agreements with several European universities, including the University of Helsinki, Freie Universität Berlin, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Groningen University and Université Paris Diderot. In addition, the university has learning agreements with a wide range of international institutions and placement in such locations is facilitated by the college’s international exchange programme. Further information on student exchanges can be found at: www.tcd.ie/ study/study-abroad/outbound/options
