BSc (Hons) Psychology with Clinical Psychology

This degree deals with the broad themes of individual differences, social functioning, biological and evolutionary issues, cognition and development across the lifespan.

The modules you take will develop your understanding of psychology’s everyday applications, such as studies of mental health and psychological disorders and the rationale for and use of psychological tests.

At each level of the programme, you’ll have some opportunity to learn about the clinical applications of psychological research. You'll have the opportunity to develop your own particular interests by choosing from a wide range of specialist modules, and will carry out a research project on a clinically relevant topic of your choice with guidance and support from a supervisor. This allows you to apply the many skills you have learned throughout the programme to define and address new questions.

This modular system allows considerable flexibility of choice in your final year when you can tailor your study according to your particular interests and ultimate aims. You will choose six option modules, with at least four modules on topics relating to neuroscience. Your final year research dissertation will be on a neuroscience topic supervised by an expert in the field. The precise list changes year by year (for example, a new member of staff may add a module). The current full list of modules offered by the department can be found below.

In your first year, you will take introductory modules covering the main topics within psychology. You will also receive practical training in the principles, methods and techniques of psychological research.

Concepts, theories and methods from developmental psychology, personality and social psychology. Topics include some or all of the following: methods and measures; social and cognitive aspects of development; methods of studying individual differences including ability and personality; evaluating psychometric measures; test administration; stability and change in behaviour; the roles of inheritance and environment; attitudes and attitude measurement; person perception; social influences; crowd behaviour; and group processes.

This module will include explorations into:

• theoretical, ethological and comparative perspectives
• basic neuroanatomy and neurophysiology
• relationships between brain and behaviour and modes of investigating them
• chemical communication in the brain and in the body
• genes, chromosomes and the inheritance of behaviour
• the nature of evolutionary influences on behaviour
15 credits. Information Processing and Cognition* Information Processing and Cognition* 15 credits

This module is designed as a general conceptual overview of cognitive psychology and an introduction to topics that are central to the study of human cognition. Emphasis is placed on the methods and theoretical models used by cognitive psychologists to study human perception and thinking.

Topics include:

• visual perception
• models of attention and short-term memory
• encoding and retrieval of information from long-term memory, classical and operant conditioning
• connectionist models of learning
• higher cognition in animals.
15 credits. Design and Analysis of Psychological Investigations Design and Analysis of Psychological Investigations 30 credits

This module provides an introduction to experimental research in psychology. The lecture component covers experimental design and statistics. The laboratory component focuses on designing and running experiments, applying statistical analyses to data generated, and reporting experimental findings. Lectures and labs are linked so that designs and analyses introduced in lectures are implemented in labs.

Topics include experimental design, research ethics, and statistical analysis of experimental data up to and including the analysis of designs with one independent variable and more than two experimental conditions.

You will be allocated to a lab class which you will attend on a weekly basis during terms 1 and 2. Your allocation will be posted on the first-year notice-board. In addition, you must attend a weekly lecture for your whole year group.

30 credits. Practical Issues in Psychological Research Practical Issues in Psychological Research 15 credits

This module acquaints you with the main areas of research in the Department of Psychology, fosters an understanding of practical issues involved in the planning and conduct of research, and develops your ability to critically evaluate research conducted by others.

15 credits. Extended Essay in Psychology Extended Essay in Psychology 15 credits

An extended essay, relating to topics taught on PS51005A, PS51006A or PS51007A, on a subject agreed with a supervisor in the department. It will involve some tutorial contact with supervisors, but mainly requires you to use library and bibliographic resources to search for relevant material.

15 credits. Skills and Employability in Psychology Skills and Employability in Psychology 15 credits

This module has been designed to develop the practical skills associated with the study of psychology, with a particular emphasis on enhancing your ability to study, research and gain employment in the field of psychology. An important part of this module is to promote personal development and enhance employability by linking in with Goldsmiths’ 3D graduate scheme.

15 credits. Year 2 (credit level 5)

Year 2 will provide you with a more in-depth knowledge and understanding of concepts, theories and relating to a broad range of psychological topics from social psychology to developmental psychology. You will also explore statistics and laboratory-based research.

Small group teaching activities will give you the opportunity to discuss clinical applications of the core material.

Year 2 modules Module title Credits. Biological Substrates of Behaviour Biological Substrates of Behaviour 15 credits

The module covers six major areas of biological psychology:

1. hormones, sexual motivation and sex differences
2. sleep and arousal
3. eating and body weight regulation
4. sexual selection and mate choice
5. brain evolution and development
6. and emotions and stress

These topics are considered in terms of neurological, neurophysiological, physiological, biochemical and genetic substrates.

15 credits. Personality and Individual Differences Personality and Individual Differences 15 credits

This module covers:

• identification and measurement of individual differences in temperament
• biological and environmental contributions to individual differences
• causal theories of personality
• the relationship between psychopathology and personality
• background to methods of description and classification in psychopathology
• genetic, constitutional and environmental aspects of disorders of personality and behaviour
• rationale of therapeutic techniques
15 credits. Social Psychology Social Psychology 15 credits

This module covers concepts, theories and empirical research related to:

• human aggression
• attitudes and attitude change
• attribution and social judgement
• environment and social behaviour
• non-verbal communication
• interpersonal attraction
• intergroup processes
15 credits. Developmental Psychology Developmental Psychology 15 credits

This module covers:

• concepts, models and theories of development
• the module of development from infancy to old age
• cognitive and social aspects of behaviour in childhood
• language development
• adolescence as a developmental period
• mid-life, and the effects of ageing
15 credits. Design and Analysis of Psychological Studies Design and Analysis of Psychological Studies 15 credits

Covering: analysis of variance techniques non-parametric methods, correlation and regression; further experimental design and strategy.

15 credits. Cognitive Psychology Cognitive Psychology 15 credits

This module covers major topics in the area of cognitive psychology including:

• attention
• visual object recognition
• written language processing
• working memory: long-term memory and acquired memory problems
• everyday memory
• representation of knowledge.
15 credits. Research Methods in Psychology* Research Methods in Psychology* 30 credits

Covering research methodology including laboratory and field observation, questionnaire, survey methods and interviewing; experimenter effects and demands characteristics; conceptual, historical and ethical issues in psychological research and science more generally; evaluation of research strategies.

30 credits. Year 3 (credit level 6)

In Year 3 you will take the following compulsory modules:

Year 3 compulsory modules Module title Credits. Psychopathology Psychopathology 15 credits

This module examines major forms of psychopathology including depression, anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, personality disorder and eating disorders. These conditions will be considered in depth, addressing diagnostic issues and the development of current theoretical explanations. The principles and evaluation of psychological interventions will also be considered.

15 credits. Neurodevelopmental Disorders Neurodevelopmental Disorders 15 credits

This module explores issues relating to diagnosis, ethics and research methods in relation to a broad range of neurodevelopmental disorders, for example, autism, dyslexia, specific language impairment, developmental coordination disorder, sensory impairments, ADHD and Williams syndrome. Consideration will also be given to the implications of theories of neurodevelopmental disorders for understanding of normal cognitive functions.

15 credits.

You also complete an individual Research Project (45 credits), which should have a clinical focus. The purpose of the project is for you to gain direct experience of:

• formulating a theoretical question
• translating this into testable hypotheses
• designing an original study which adequately tests the hypotheses
• implementing the research procedures
• analysing the data using appropriate statistics
• interpreting the results in light of both conceptual and practical considerations
• communicating this information clearly in the form of a written report

You will also gain experience of oral presentation of your work during the spring term or early in the summer term, to a small group of your peers and your supervisor.

The project is a piece of original empirical research, conducted under the supervision of one of the academic members of the Department. Pure theorising, a literature review, or an exact replication study are not acceptable.

There are four stages:

• formulation of hypotheses and an ethical and feasible research design
• recruitment of participants/collection of data
• analysis and interpretation of data
• writing the report

You also choose five 15 credit modules (two clinically-relevant options and two free-choice options). Examples that could be selected include:

Year 3 option modules Module title Credits. Multivariate Statistical Methods in Psychology Multivariate Statistical Methods in Psychology 15 credits

Each week a two-hour lecture covers the major statistical analysis techniques used by psychologists, building on the knowledge covered in the first two years of the module. Each lecture is followed by a 1.5-hour session in which the student carries out analyses in SPSS related to the material covered in that week's lecture. The topics include:

• data screening and cleaning
• factor analysis
• psychometrics
• linear multiple regression
• extensive coverage of statistical analyses based on the general linear model including ANOVA, MANOVA, ANCOVA, plus executing specific contrasts

There are five screencast lectures, and accompanying SPSS worksheet exercises, that provide a "crash-course" revision of basic statistics and introduce students to the style of the module. Students may wish to take these in their own time before the start of reading week in term 1. The module proper starts after reading week in term 1. The module ends at reading week in term 2.

15 credits. Applications of Attention Research Applications of Attention Research 15 credits

This module will provide detailed study of the scientific investigation of attention, a highly topical aspect of human cognition that plays a fundamental role in our experience of the world. Students will be introduced to current theories of attention and their application to other fields of psychological enquiry including cross-cultural psychology, social psychology, individual differences, and emotion.

15 credits. Anomalistic Psychology Anomalistic Psychology 15 credits

This module includes consideration of the relationship between psychology and parapsychology. This involves discussion of the distinction between science and pseudoscience. The module also involves critical evaluation of various claims, many of which would, if valid, have profound implications for mainstream psychology (including claims derived from astrology, psychoanalysis, alternative therapies, etc). Various psychological processes, which underlie belief in such claims, will be discussed and non-paranormal accounts of ostensibly paranormal experiences, (eg precognitive dreams, sightings of UFO’s, out-of-body experiences) will be evaluated.

15 credits. Topics in Neuropsychology Topics in Neuropsychology 15 credits

This module will explore a range of issues fundamental to understanding neuropsychology, including underlying theories, research methods, clinical manifestations and application of this expertise related to diagnosis.

Specific topics will include:

• causes and psychological sequelae of brain injury
• dementia
• dysfunctions of memory, perception, attention, consciousness, language and executive processes
15 credits. Psychology and Law Psychology and Law 15 credits

The module will provide the opportunity for advanced study of psychological science applied to the investigation of crime and the process of criminal law. Research will be primarily, but not exclusively, drawn from applied cognitive psychology. The syllabus will cover current issues in psychology and law, for example: interviewing suspect s and witnesses, confessions, detection of deception, eyewitness testimony, eyewitness identification, offender profiling, and CCTV. Material from case studies will be used throughout. The module will be of interest to students considering postgraduate study in forensic psychology.

15 credits. Neurodevelopmental Disorders Neurodevelopmental Disorders 15 credits

This module explores issues relating to diagnosis, ethics and research methods in relation to a broad range of neurodevelopmental disorders, for example, autism, dyslexia, specific language impairment, developmental coordination disorder, sensory impairments, ADHD and Williams syndrome. Consideration will also be given to the implications of theories of neurodevelopmental disorders for understanding of normal cognitive functions.

15 credits. Behavioural Genetics Behavioural Genetics 15 credits

This module will provide a systematic introduction to behavioural genetics. Areas covered include: behavioural genetic techniques; behavioural genetic research into a range of different topics (e.g. psychopathology, cognitive abilities and disabilities); associations between genetic and environmental influences; and ethical issues in respect of behavioural genetic research.

15 credits. Angels or Apes: Origins of Human Nature Angels or Apes: Origins of Human Nature 15 credits

A study of recent developments in evolutionary theory applied to social behaviour and cognition. Topics include: an introduction to the Machiavellian (or Social) Intelligence Hypothesis, Homo Sapiens’ place in nature, the evolution of deception, cultural learning, joint attention, altruism and co-operation, self-recognition, Theory of mind and the social organisation of human hunter-gatherers.

15 credits. Addictive Behaviours Addictive Behaviours 15 credits

The module will introduce psychological and neurobiological theories of addiction, considering and evaluating the extent to which behaviours