McMaster University

School Description:

What is Psychology?

Psychology is the scientific study of the brain and behaviour. It is a science and a practice. As scientists, experimental psychologists conduct research to help understand why people think, feel, and behave the way they do. As clinicians, counsellors, or other practitioners, psychologists apply scientific understanding toward helping individuals, institutions, and society deal with issues relating to human behaviour and happiness. Whether you are interested in applied or scientific psychology, McMaster’s undergraduate psychology program will give you a strong foundation for a career, or for further professional training.

Undergraduate Program Description

Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour (PNB) is the scientific study of brain and behaviour. It covers a wide range of topics from perception (how we see objects, process speech sounds, hear music); to cognition (how we think); to emotion and social behaviour (how we feel, how we interact with others); to psychopathology (how and why does behaviour sometimes go wrong); to development and evolution (how does the organism develop in these various domains; what is the role of genetics in development, what is the role of environment); and how the brain develops and how experience influences its development. Students who graduate from our programs are well prepared for pursuing postgraduate training and careers in science, medicine and related health fields, speech pathology, clinical psychology, and the business world.

Graduate Program Description

Introduction to Graduate Training in our Department at McMaster University

Thank you for your interest in the graduate program in Psychology at McMaster. There are 30 faculty in the Department of Psychology and approximately 87 graduate students. The department has a strong research base in the areas of Animal Behaviour , Systems and Behavioural Neuroscience, Cognition/Perception, Developmental Psychology and Evolution and Social Behaviour. The breadth of faculty research areas provides a rich environment for graduate training in the field of Experimental Psychology.

Our graduate program is research-oriented and provides flexibility to optimize the program around the interests of the student. There is a strong collegial environment in the department that supports scientific interactions among faculty and students, and, as a consequence, students often undertake research projects with more than one faculty member. The graduate program introduces students to the issues and questions in the field of Experimental Psychology and trains them in the theoretical basis and research approaches used to study the problems.

If the information you’re looking for pertains to the research of a particular faculty member, then we encourage you to contact them directly, by telephone or by e-mail, or visit their web pages which can be accessed from our faculty web page or by looking at the descriptions of the Research Areas.