Postgraduate Psychology 2025-2026

The initial lectures of this course provide introductory information that is essential for new postgraduate students. The subsequent lectures and assessments develop essential research skills and knowledge such as academic writing, ethics and grant writing.

In order to conduct research in Psychology, students will need to use specialized software and learn some basic programming. This course provides instructive lectures on how to use some of the more widely adopted and useful software suites and programming languages, accompanied by workshops in which students perform PC based exercises to practice their skills.

This course aims to provide you with a thorough understanding of psychological research in three core areas of psychology, biological, individual differences, and cognitive. In addition, students will attend tutorials to support skill development and a weekly seminar course on contemporary psychological research.

The Social Mind details the psychological processes through people understand the self and others. Emphasis is placed a range of core topic in social cognition; including: stereotyping and prejudice, mind wandering, self-control, and mind perception.

This in-person course covers two areas relevant to the performance and safety of organisations and their workers: culture and conflict.

Culture: ‘The way we do things around here’ – the rules and norms that govern employee behaviour. We will discuss organisational, national and professional culture, alongside multi-cultural teams.

Conflict: Differing experiences and backgrounds can produce disagreement, sometimes resulting in rudeness and bullying, adversely impacting worker performance and wellbeing. We will discuss conflict, the impact on staff, plus management strategies.

In this course, students will develop a critical review of the current literature in the area of their thesis project. This is the first step towards completing a professional level piece of research under the supervision of a member of academic staff.

At some point in our lives we will, hopefully, enter the world of work and be met with some of the challenges and issues which confront organisations globally such as managing organisational change, how to create a talent pipeline and how to create high performing teams. This online module provides an opportunity for students to understand the role of Occupational Psychology in dealing with these challenges and how psychological theory underpins practice in the workplace and across organisations. 

A major component of the MRes is the Research Module. For this, students complete their own research project supervised by a member of staff who is an expert in the relevant field. They also attend departmental seminars and present their research at a postgraduate psychologia.

Human Factors is an incredibly broad and diverse subject, ranging from design factors (how can we make products intuitive), to human behaviour (how do people think and act at work - and what influences them), to organisation level issues (workplace environment, messaging around risk and safety). The aim of this course is to provide students with insight into the applications of Psychology and Human Factors within real world environments. You will also learn to conduct incident analysis using accident reports from high-risk industry – enhancing understanding of the factors leading up to accidents.

This course will explore the principles of various approaches to mental health, and the various treatment and therapies that can develop from these approaches. This course provides a foundation for psychology of mental health through a series of lectures covering a range of classic and contemporary perspectives and their application.

This course aims to introduce students to, and support them in developing, the professional skills necessary for competent and compassionate psychology practitioners in applied domains. The course will cover a range of relevant topics including professional ethics, legal and professional obligations, management of workplace issues, interacting with stakeholders and developing professional relationships.

In this course, students will examine principles and methods of assessment to evaluate psychological functioning. Students will learn techniques such as observation, psychological testing, and interviews, and understand their role in formulation and/or diagnosis and treatment. Students will explore how assessment outcomes are used in professional, research, and/or clinical settings.

This brief course provides an introduction to the essential skills and information you will need to study psychology as a postgraduate student.

A thorough understanding of common statistical techniques and the ability to apply them is essential to conduct research in Psychology. This course provides lectures on the most important statistical techniques in Psychology accompanied by workshops in which students perform PC based data analysis exercises.

This course provides lectures on a range of more specific and/or advanced research skills than those provided in Term 1 such as Philosophy of Science and Career Development.

This course aims to provide you with a thorough understanding of psychological research in the core areas of social and developmental psychology. In addition, students will attend tutorials to support skill development.

The aim of this course is to introduce students to the use of basic as well as more advanced descriptive and inferential statistics for data analysis in psychology.  Both quantitative and qualitative research methods will be covered and students will gain understanding of the key concepts and issues in psychological research and study design.

Business consultants can offer much needed advice and expertise across diverse areas that require an in-depth understanding of the people working in these areas to do so. Psychology Toolkit for Consulting course offers students an introduction into the a range of tools used by psychologist when consulting across these varied industries. The course will be taught by a practicing consultant and experienced academic and will cover both theoretical as well as practical aspects of psychological tools used in consulting.

Positive psychology is “the scientific study of what goes right in life” and “what makes life most worth living” (Peterson, 2006). Focusing on what is right with people is increasing being successfully applied to the world of work thus creating work settings which provide the greatest satisfaction amongst workers and where people, teams and organisations flourish and thrive. This course considers how the application of positive psychology theory and models can help overcome organisational challenges such as change management, motivation and effective leadership.

This course will canvass a range of theoretical and applied issues in forensic and criminal psychology.

Delve into the psychology of addictive behaviours, taking a close look at disorders surrounding alcohol, various other psychoactive drugs and gambling. Examine theories explaining the cause and maintenance of addictive behaviours, such as the role played by biology, cognition, learning and the social world, and how these all pose a challenge to treatment and recovery.

In this course, students will develop research dissemination skills and present the research project they are conducting under the supervision of a member of academic staff.

In this course, students will examine current and emerging research topics in mental health. This seminar-based course encourages discussion and engagement with contemporary issues and trends in the field. Topics will vary each year, reflecting developments in research and practice, and offering opportunities to explore diverse perspectives in mental health.

This course aims to support students in developing the necessary skills to undertake an applied project. Students will be encouraged to undertake independent study, research, and project planning in the topic area of their thesis. To support this process, the course will include interactive sessions aimed to build their skills and confidence with critically reviewing the literature, developing an applied research question, time and project management, together with written and verbal communication. Students will also receive and provide peer support and feedback.

You will learn how different qualitative methodologies can enhance our understanding of people. This course will cover a wide range of methodologies and their different applications, including discursive analysis, grounded theory, interpretative phenomenological analysis, ethnography but also theory-based analysis and framework analysis.
Lectures will be semi-flipped, in that you will be asked to do some reading beforehand, which will be the basis for interactive elements within the lecture.
Note that some of the research articles included are on topics that may be sensitive, e.g., grief, suicide and eating disorders.

Worker performance, well-being and safety are of great importance to organisations. This course will explore factors such as workplace conflict, stress, fatigue, safety culture and risk normalisation to enable students to understand the core aspects that could impact performance, well-being and safety at work. These factors will be discussed in the context of a variety of high-risk industries, including aviation, forestry, healthcare and offshore drilling, including evaluation of real-life case studies.  Students will also learn management and support strategies to enhance performance and safety at work.

This brief course provides an introduction to the essential skills and information you will need to study psychology as a postgraduate student.

This course covers statistical topics that go beyond the scope of what is normally taught at undergraduate level. The topics covered help researchers surpass the limitations of standard statistical approaches (e.g. NHST).

Students will complete an empirical project, under the supervision of a member of staff, where the student collects and analyses data in answer to a specific research question.   The aim is to further develop the skills and knowledge necessary to carry out psychological research at a very high standard.

An important aspect of working in a professional applied psychology context, whether that is focused on human factors, organisational psychology, or both, is the ability to integrate and present knowledge. This will usually take the form of a psychology project, conducted to address a specific problem or question. The project may encompass a review of the literature, quantitative or qualitative research, or an industrial project. For this course students will conduct a library- or research-based project, under the supervision of an academic from within the School of Psychology.

An important aspect of working in applied psychology, particularly in mental health, is the ability to integrate and present knowledge in meaningful ways. This course allows students to conduct a psychology project addressing a specific problem or question, which may include a review of the literature, quantitative or qualitative research, or a community-based project. Projects could range from traditional theses to practical evaluations, such as exploring the therapeutic role of crafts for children with adverse childhood experiences. Students will be supervised by an academic from the School of Psychology and may also be co-supervised by a community partner (such as Camphill School).