Psychology

Psychology impacts on every aspect of human behaviour.

Across the globe, people are confronted daily with new technologies, unfamiliar cultures, and ongoing challenges that affect all facets of how we live. Studying psychology at Essex allows you to embark on a journey into the thoughts, feelings, and actions of those individuals.

You will learn from internationally recognised experts, on diverse topics including brain and behaviour, child development and ageing, relationships and sexuality, personality and perception, culture and identity, memory, emotion and psychopathology. We will also help you develop important skills to think critically, analyse evidence, build complex arguments, and communicate effectively with others.

Learning isn’t just about sitting in a classroom. At Essex, we pride ourselves on providing a research-led education with award-winning lecturers who are also world leaders in their research fields. As an undergraduate student, you can get real research experience by working alongside researchers through our Research Experience Scheme (RES). During a RES placement, you can gain experience developing all kinds of skills used by researchers from all areas of psychology, including experiment set-up and design, literature reviews, recruiting and testing participants, and even coding and data analysis.

A degree in psychology prepares you for a wide range of career pathways. While many students go on to become trained psychologists, counsellors and therapists, others pursue fulfilling careers in education, forensic sciences, data analysis, health, marketing, advertising, public policy, organisational development and human resources.

Our department is proud of the multicultural mosaic that makes up our community. Our staff and students come from over 40 countries around the world, bringing their own unique perspectives and experiences, which enrich our teaching, learning, and research.

Psychology courses in Clearing 2022

Looking to start in 2023?

We provide a stimulating and vibrant research environment that allows both our students and staff to shape the future of our expanding research-intensive department.

It’s an exciting time to be studying human behaviour. Across the globe, people are confronted daily with new technologies, unfamiliar cultures, and ongoing challenges that affect all facets of how we live. Studying psychology at Essex allows you to embark on a journey into the thoughts, feelings, and actions of those individuals.

Further study in our Department of Psychology gives you the freedom and the facilities to study, experiment, explore and research why we think, feel and act the way we do. You will learn from and work alongside internationally recognised experts, on advanced psychological topics including the neurocognition of language, brain and behaviour, child development, culture, identity, research methods and statistics.

At Essex, we pride ourselves on providing a research-led education with award-winning lecturers  who are also world leaders in their research fields. As well as your research project, you can work alongside researchers through our Research Experience Scheme (RES).  During a RES placement, you can gain experience developing all kinds of skills used by researchers from all areas of psychology, including experiment set-up and design, literature reviews, recruiting and testing participants, coding and data analysis.

Career opportunities expand much further than becoming a psychologist, prospects also include working in research, education, forensic sciences, data analysis, health, marketing, advertising, public policy, organisational development and human resources.

We provide a stimulating and vibrant research environment that allows both our students and staff to successfully shape the future of our expanding research-intensive department.

We give you the freedom and the facilities to study, experiment, explore and research why we think, feel and act the way we do. Psychology is linked to many other fields including biology, linguistics, medicine, sociology and economics. All branches of psychology seek to explain people’s behaviour.

Psychology is not limited to the study of the brain, by exploring the science behind the mind you will gain the skills to build complex arguments, critically analyse evidence and understand how therapy can make a positive impact on people’s lives.

Career opportunities expand much further than becoming a psychologist, prospects also include working in education, forensic sciences, data analysis, health and marketing.