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Psychology Honors Program

The main purpose of the Psychology Honors Program is to provide a program of study for the superior student that will accelerate and enrich his or her knowledge of psychology. To this end, the Honors Program has the following goals:

• Educate students to think independently.
• Provide opportunities for close, scholarly and scientific analysis of significant topics in psychology.
• Encourage and provide opportunities for students to undertake research.
• Introduce students to a broad range of psychological ideas and issues.
  

From here you can

• Read an overview of the program
• Find a detailed description of the program requirements
• Find description of the Psychology Department's Honors courses
• Learn about the Honors Project including information about the Honors Thesis, the project's academic and thesis advisors, and the difference between Honors and High Honors
• Find out how to apply to or withdraw from the Honors program
• Find a Honors Program Course requirement Worksheet
  
  

Program Overview

1. Honors Seminars: These seminars make use of significant source works in psychology rather than textbooks that merely summarize source material. Seminars emphasize scholarly analysis, discussion and writing, rather than the lecture and multiple-choice exam format of most other undergraduate courses. The seminars are planned to cover a variety of topics in psychology during each student's program.
2. Honors Thesis: The thesis begins with a research apprenticeship with a member of the faculty whose work is of interest to the student. This apprenticeship may be informal at first, or it may be undertaken as a supervised lab or field experience. In either case, it should culminate in a piece of original research that the student has designed, executed and reported).
3. A program of upper-level psychology courses that cover the major areas of psychology that were not covered in Honors Seminars.
4. A program of courses in mathematics and science that provide tools that the student can use in psychology and beyond.
   

The Honors Program offers the student the opportunity to earn either a B.A. or B.S. degree in Psychology with Honors or High Honors. The difference between the B.A. and B.S. degrees is that the latter requires a supporting sequence of 17 semester hours in math and science. See the program description for more information.

Benefits of the Program

Honors students may take graduate courses and apply the credits toward their undergraduate degree. However, in order to take a graduate course, the student must get special permission from both the Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Department of Psychology and the Assistant Dean in BSOS. Forms are available in the Undergraduate Advising Office, 1107 Biology-Psychology Bldg.

The research advisor may also provide research space where feasible for the conduct of Honors projects.

Departmental Honors students have access to the upper level General Honors seminars and many of the General Honors functions.

Honors students may establish their own internships under supervision of the Psychology Department and receive Honors credit.