Why this course?
Our main focus in psychology is the study of human behaviour.
Studying with us, you'll look at conditions of behaviour – how we learn, remember, co-ordinate our actions and interact with others – and the reasons for differences between individuals, such as personality or intelligence.
Due to the popularity of the course and performance criteria for entry into Honours (Year 4) the numbers admitted to Years 2 and 3 of the course are limited.
We also offer some of the best teaching in Human Resource Management (HRM) in both Scotland and the UK
Human Resource Management (HRM) is about the relationship between employers and employees and the ways in which people are managed in the workplace.
This covers areas such as recruitment and selection, training and developing and managing conflict at work. These are an important part of the management process in all organisations.
Psychology
What you’ll study
Our BA degrees in Humanities & Social Sciences are initially broad-based. In Year 1 you'll study three subjects, including your chosen subject(s).
Year 1
The first year covers the basic principles of learning:
- biological bases of behaviour
- thinking
- memory
- personality
- social influences on behaviour
- changes in behaviour through the lifespan
- research methods
Years 2 & 3
Due to the popularity of the course, performance-related criteria may be in place to manage entry into Honours (Year 4); this means that the numbers admitted to Years 2 and 3 of the course are limited. Years 2 & 3 provides a greater understanding of human development and interaction, cognitive processes, individual differences and biological influences on behaviour.
Year 4
We offer a variety of classes that allow you to study an area of psychology in greater depth. You'll study conceptual and historical issues in psychology and write a dissertation based on your research project.
International placement
There's an opportunity for you to take an optional international research placement through Erasmus.
The School of Psychological Sciences and Health has Erasmus exchange agreements with several European universities. We currently have active exchanges with:
- Humboldt University zu Berlin, Germany
- Universidad de A Coruna, Spain
- University of Twente, Netherlands
- University Tubingen, Germany
- Radbout University, Nijmegen, Netherlands
For general queries about exchanges to and from the School of Psychological Sciences and Health, please contact Dr Kellyanne Findlay.
Major projects
You can undertake an optional summer research project working with a member of staff. In addition, there are opportunities to apply for funding to complete summer internships between year 3 and 4.
Facilities
Our high-quality facilities include six purpose-built experimental research laboratories:
- driving simulator lab
- memory lab
- perception and action lab
- psychophysiology lab
- psycholinguistics lab
- oculomotor lab
Postgraduate study
Psychology graduates can progress into postgraduate training to become professional psychologists. We currently run a number of post-graduate courses which provide additional research training:
Student competitions
We currently award two prizes to exceptional psychology students.
The Gustav Jahoda Prize founded in 1997 in honour of Emeritus Professor Gustav Jahoda, the first Head of the Department of Psychology, is awarded annually on the recommendation of the Board of Examiners to a psychology Honours student for outstanding academic performance in their final year.
The British Psychological Society Undergraduate Award is also awarded annually for outstanding academic performance in the final year.
Teaching staff
Find out more about our staff.
Human Resource Management
What you'll study
Year 1
The introductory class 'Managing People' will provide you with an overview of the study of HRM.
Years 2 & 3
You'll learn more about HRM processes and the employment relationship. Second-year classes focus on areas of workplace behaviour, including recruitment and selection, teams and groups and employee commitment and engagement. In third-year you'll focus more on the employment relationship and behaviour at work. Themes explored include power and authority, interests and conflict.
Year 4
A range of specialist classes is available for study at single or joint Honours.
Study abroad
In Year 3 you'll have the opportunity to study in Europe, North America and elsewhere for one or two semesters.
Student competitions
The Peter Bain Prize is awarded each year to the student with the highest mark for their dissertation.
The HRM Society
The HRM Society is run by our students for our students. It aims to bring together all year groups into one network where they can share knowledge and practice, awareness of careers and build relationships with alumni and employers.
Course content
Year 1
Psychology
Psychology 1a
You'll take this class in semester 1 and are not expected to have any prior knowledge of psychology. It explores learning theory, developmental psychology, personality, biological psychology, and the scientific basis for psychology.
Psychology 1b
This class is taught in semester 2 and covers sensation and perception, cognitive psychology, social psychology, abnormal psychology, and research methods.
Human Resource Management
Managing People
In recent years the task of managing employees has been made more challenging by rapid changes in the business environment. This class focuses on the contemporary and practical issues of how people are organised and managed in the workplace and examines theoretical perspectives which help our understanding of the complex relationship between the employer and employee in facilitating the organisation and production of goods and services.
Year 2
Psychology
Cognition & Neuropsychology
This class reveals how our understanding of higher mental functions has been enhanced through:
- theoretical and experimental studies of normal human cognition
- neuropsychological studies of how cognitive functions may be damaged as a result of brain lesions
Topics covered include disorders of the perceptual system, memory and attention, and the role of the frontal lobes in planning, motivation, emotion, and personality.
Social & Health Psychology
This class introduces social psychological theories and research that provide insights into why people believe what they believe, and why they behave the way they do.
Topics covered include attribution theory, aggression, prosocial behaviour, group influence, norms, conformity, obedience, and attitudes.
It ends with an introduction to health psychology, demonstrating how social psychological principles covered earlier in the class are applied to pressing, real-world health issues such as dietary behaviour, smoking/alcohol-use, and suicide.
Introduction to Research Design & Analysis
You'll be introduced to the main features of measurement, research design, and statistical analysis in psychology.
Following a general introduction, the course presents fundamental concepts, issues, and debates in the field of research methods.
You'll also become familiarised with the conceptual basis for inferential statistical testing, and introduced to different inferential statistics. Finally, a brief introduction to qualitative research methods takes place.
Human Resource Management
Work Psychology
This class develops understanding of managing people from a psychological perspective through understanding behaviour, attitudes, motivation and wellbeing of people at work. Areas covered include what leads to positive employee work attitudes like job satisfaction, organisational commitment, and their outcomes in terms of work behaviour, such as job performance, withdrawal, absenteeism, turnover, fair treatment and trust.
Work Psychology for Human Resource Management
This class looks at applying psychological theories explaining effectiveness and well-being of people at work to Human Resource Management as an approach to managing people and the employment relationships. Areas covered include organisational and individual decision-making relating to the recruitment and selection process, the impact of performance management on employee perceptions, team working, and the impact of leadership on attitudes and trust.
Year 3
Psychology
Research Methods in Psychology
This class builds on year 2 and equips you with a broader, more advanced set of methodological and analytic skills. These skills are essential for carrying out the year 4 dissertation and for being able to read and understand articles published in academic journals.
Individual Differences
You're encouraged to think scientifically about conceptual and practical issues related to the study of individual differences, with specific reference to intelligence and personality. You'll gain the chance to put this knowledge into practice by designing your own measurement instrument.
Cognition
You'll be introduced to some of the core topics in cognitive psychology
- Perception and action, particularly how we perceive time and recognise faces
- Memory and learning, including models of episodic and working memory
- Language, including word production, sentence comprehension, and discourse processing
- Thinking, specifically problem solving, deductive reasoning and judgement and decision making.
Development
This class reviews the ways that children develop from infancy right through to the end of adolescence. Key theories are presented and used to explore the extent to which children’s development is continuous or stage-like and whether specific skills develop more quickly than others. Issues relating to infancy, ‘theory of mind’ (understanding others’ thoughts and beliefs), executive function (planning and monitoring abilities), language, and communication form the core themes in the class.
Psychobiology
The purpose of this class is to provide the opportunity for you to learn the basic principles of brain function, and to encourage you to address the implications of this understanding for their own view of how behaviour is generated. It includes coverage of electrophysiology and psychopharmacology, neuroanatomy, research methods in neuroscience. There are focused sections relating to the visual system and the motor system.
Social Psychology
This class allows you to consider current ideas and positions within social psychology. Four themes drive the class
- Attitudes and attitude change, covering the Theory of Planned Behaviour and the Health Belief Model
- Identity, with a focus on social, personal and group identities
- Prejudice, connecting both attitudes and identities, and covering a broad range of areas such as social representations, stereotyping, prejudice and conflict
- Epistemology, where consideration is given to the theory of knowledge, how social psychological knowledge is produced, and to what effect
Human Resource Management
Work, Employment & Society
This class critically explores changes in the nature of work, employment and society through investigating the extent to which current developments in the workplace can be seen to represent a fundamental shift in the nature of workplace regulation. It'll provide contrasting and complementary perspectives on workplace behaviour to those provided in year 2.
Employment Relations
You'll be introduced to the British system of employment relations, and the general principles, processes and outcomes. It'll consider different theoretical approaches to the study of employment and industrial relations and then examine the role and objectives of trade unions, employers and the state, and their interactions in collective bargaining, employee participation and industrial conflict.
Year 4
Psychology
Dissertation in Psychology
The dissertation is an opportunity for you to undertake an original piece of research, closely supervised by a single member of staff. Planning for the dissertation begins in year 3, and dissertations can be of such high standards that they are subsequently published in peer-reviewed academic journals.
Advanced Organisational Behaviour
This class is offered by the Strathclyde Business School, and draws on current themes in Human Resource Management understood from the perspective of micro-organisational behaviour theory and research. Although the theoretical underpinning of the material covered is primarily about work and organisational issues at the level of individual behaviour in organisations, a contextual understanding of these issues is also encouraged.
Advanced Psychological Theory & Practice
Choice of topics may include:
- Belief & Anomalistic Experience
- The Psychology of Mental Health
- Artificial Intelligence
- Psychology & Ageing
- Psychology of Language
- Critical Review
- The Psychology & Cognitive Neuroscience of Face Recognition
- Neuropsychology of Ageing and Dementia
- Physiological Psychology
- Health Psychology
- Practical Aspects of Memory
Study abroad
Erasmus International Work Placement
This class is an option which is available to a restricted number of students who'll apply to take part. It involves a placement with a European University partner working in a research team during the summer between years 3 and 4. Additional assessment is the completed during semester 1 of year 4.
Human Resource Management
Advanced Organisational Behaviour
This class draws on current themes in work and organisational psychology, and HRM understood from the perspective of micro-organisational behaviour theory and research. It's structured around the concepts of Reframing Organisations and, although the emphasis is on ‘micro’, or individual-level, approaches to organisational behaviour, ‘reframing’ takes into consideration more ‘macro’ or sociological and critical management approaches as well.
HRM & Employment Relations in Public Services
The aim of the module is to provide you with a critical understanding of the context and content of ‘New Public Management’ and alternative public management reform strategies. There's particular reference to impacts on HRM and employment relations.
The module will enable you to compare how different countries’ reform trajectories have impacted on changes in HRM and employment relations.
Perspective on Work & Employment
This module builds on the year 3 class, Work, Employment and Society, and explores the contribution of social theory to understandings of the contemporary conditions of work and organisations.
Human Resources in the Global Economy
This class looks at HRM within a broader understanding of globalization and the international political economy. It places current themes in an international and comparative perspective by analysing and comparing different national ‘models of management’, and a range of employee response to them and, amongst other things, asks questions about the ways in which these management practices are disseminated by multinational companies (MNCs).
Psychology Work Placement
Students have the opportunity to undertake a 20 credit work placement class where they will have the opportunity to apply their academic knowledge and skills in a workplace setting, and develop both personally and professionally. Students are supported to find a suitable placement and throughout the experience. Previous placements have included: the NHS, Schools, University departments and third sector organisations such as health support and rehabilitation charities.
Assessment
Psychology
We assess students using:
- class tests
- essays
- practical reports
- dissertations
- individual presentations
- group presentations
- degree examinations.
Online and face-to-face group project work is also included in the course. You'll take part in practical assignments from first-year onwards.
Human Resource Management
The majority of classes are assessed by a final, unseen, examination in addition to one or more forms of individual and/or group coursework. In some cases, you can earn an exemption from the exam by achieving a specified coursework mark. Exams are normally held at the end of the semester in which the class is taught.
You normally have one opportunity to be re-assessed for a failed class.
Learning & teaching
Psychology
Our methods include:
- lectures
- small-group tutorials
- practical labs
- online tutorials
- online wikis
- group work
- problem-based learning
- one-to-one supervision
These methods are used across all years of the degree and aim to provide you with opportunities to learn and work in different ways.
Human Resource Management
Teaching is given over two semesters in blocks of 12 weeks each.
Methods include lectures, tutorials and seminars. As a student you'll take part in team-based projects and make use of online teaching materials. Our industrial partners regularly assist in teaching and the assessment of student presentations.
Entry requirements
Required subjects are indicated following typically accepted grades.
Highers
Standard entry requirements
1st sitting: AAAA (Higher English, Maths/Applications of Mathematics National 5 B, or equivalent, plus one from the list of Highers subjects below)
2nd sitting: AAAABB (Higher English, Maths/Applications of Mathematics National 5 B, or equivalent, plus one from the list of Highers subjects below)
Higher subjects
- Classical Studies
- Drama
- Economics
- French
- Gaelic
- Geography
- German
- History
- Italian
- Modern Studies
- Philosophy
- Politics
- Psychology
- Religious Moral & Philosophical Studies
- Sociology
- Spanish
We recognise a wide range of Highers, however, your profile must reflect a good grounding in essay-based subjects.
A Levels
Year 1 entry
Typical entry requirement: ABB (GCSE English Language 6/B or English Literature 6/B, GCSE Maths 4/C)
Minimum entry requirement: BBB (GCSE English Language 6/B or English Literature 6/B, GCSE Maths 4/C)
Year 2
Typical entry requirement: AAA (two core subjects required; GCSE English Language 6/B or English Literature 6/B, GCSE Maths 4/C)
Minimum entry requirement: ABB (two core subjects at AB; (GCSE English Language 6/B or English Literature 6/B, GCSE Maths 4/C)
International Baccalaureate
36 (Maths SL5)
HNC/HND
Year 1 entry
HNC Social Sciences: A in Graded Unit; Maths National 5 B or equivalent
Irish Leaving Certificate
Subjects and grades as for Highers
Additional information
Personal statement
It is important to take care over your personal statement. We look for information about your academic and career interests, and your range of skills, abilities, and relevant experience. Your personal statement should show evidence you have a strong awareness and interest in the subject you are applying to.
Deferred entry
Deferred entry normally not accepted.
Applicants with Highers
Due to the high level of competition for the number of available places, it is unlikely that Conditional Offers will be made to anyone attaining less than AAB at the first sitting of Highers.
Second-year entry
Second-year entry for A Level/Advanced Higher candidates is possible with AA/AB in the two subjects you are planning to study.
Admission to Honours
All students will be admitted as potential Honours students. Students may exit with a Bachelor of Arts degree at the end of Year 3 of the programme if they have accumulated at least 360 credits and satisfied the appropriate specialisation requirements. For admission to the final year of the Honours course, a student must have achieved an approved standard of performance.
Widening access
We want to increase opportunities for people from every background. Strathclyde selects our students based on merit, potential and the ability to benefit from the education we offer. We look for more than just your grades. We consider the circumstances of your education and will make lower offers to certain applicants as a result.
Find out if you can benefit from this type of offer.
International students
Find out entry requirements for your country.
Degree preparation course for international students
We offer international students (non EU/UK) who do not meet the academic entry requirements for
an undergraduate degree at Strathclyde the option of completing an Undergraduate Foundation year programme at the University of Strathclyde International Study Centre.
Upon successful completion, you will be able to progress to this degree course at the
University of Strathclyde.
Fees & funding
How much will my course cost?
2019/20
All fees quoted are for full-time courses and per academic year unless stated otherwise.
Scotland/EU
Rest of UK
Assuming no change in Rest of UK fees policy over the period, the total amount payable by undergraduate students will be capped. For students commencing study in 2017/18, this is capped at £27,750 (with the exception of the MPharm and Integrated Masters courses); MPharm students pay £9,250 for each of the four years. Students studying on Integrated Masters degree programmes pay an additional £9,250 for the Masters year with the exception of those undertaking a full-year industrial placement where a separate placement fee will apply.
International
Dean’s International Undergraduate Scholarship
The Dean’s International Undergraduate Scholarship is open to new international students who will begin a full-time undergraduate course in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in September 2019. The award is a £3,500 scholarship per year for the duration of your degree. All offer holders are eligible to apply for this scholarship.
University preparation programme fees
International students can find out more about the costs and payments of studying a university preparation programme at the University of Strathclyde International Study Centre.
Additional fees
Psychology
Course materials & costs
All recommended texts and computer software packages are available from the University Library and Pegasus.
Other costs
Students should purchase a standard calculator. It's required for the duration of the course.
Human Resource Management
Course materials & costs
Students are encouraged to purchase the core textbook for each Human Resource Management class.
- approximate cost - £40 to 50 per textbook
Other costs
PG Diploma and MSc Human Resource Management is accredited by the Chartered Institute of Personal Development (CIPD). Students wishing to achieve the Associate Membership of CIPD are required to join as a student member during studies. This is not a mandatory requirement for passing the course but is required by CIPD to achieve membership update on passing the course.
Costs for membership*:
- £40 joining fee
- £141 for 18 months' membership fee
*As of 26 March 2019. Visit CIPD website for full details.
Please note: All fees shown are annual and may be subject to an increase each year. Find out more about fees.
How can I fund my studies?
Students from Scotland and the EU
If you're a Scottish or EU student, you may be able to apply to the Student Award Agency Scotland (SAAS) to have your tuition fees paid by the Scottish government. Scottish students may also be eligible for a bursary and loan to help cover living costs while at University.
For more information on funding your studies have a look at our University Funding page.
Students from England, Wales & Northern Ireland
We have a generous package of bursaries on offer for students from England, Northern Ireland and Wales
You don’t need to make a separate application for these. When your place is confirmed at Strathclyde, we’ll assess your eligibility.
Have a look at our scholarship search for any more funding opportunities.
International Students (Non UK, EEA)
We have a number of scholarships available to international students. Take a look at our scholarship search to find out more.
Available scholarships
We have a wide range of scholarships available. Have a look at our scholarship search to find a scholarship.
Careers
As a psychology graduate, continuing your studies will help you become a professional psychologist, which can lead to working in areas such as clinical, educational or occupational psychology. Many graduates also work in research.
Other possible careers are teaching, human resource management, social work, counselling and management and professional positions throughout the private and public sectors.
Recent HRM graduates have found employment in insurance, retail, manufacturing, recruitment consultancy and in the public sector. Some are employed in jobs such as HR trainee, HR assistant and recruitment consultant while others are employed in general administration and management.
