Overview

It includes a wide variety of topics, including perception, learning, memory, thinking, emotion, personality, social interaction, development, and abnormal behavior. Psychologists recognize that understanding behavior in all its complexity requires studying it from multiple perspectives. A thorough understanding of memory, for example, requires knowledge ranging from the neural structures and processes that underlie it to the social and cultural forces that influence it.

At California State University, Fresno, students majoring in psychology take core courses in general psychology, statistics, and research methodology, along with additional courses in each of the primary areas of the discipline. There are also numerous opportunities for students to supplement their coursework with hands-on experience in faculty research labs and in the field under faculty supervision. Advanced and well-qualified students can participate in our senior honors program. These students design, conduct, and present an original research project as a senior thesis.

Psychology majors learn to think critically, write and speak clearly, identify and solve problems, and work effectively both individually and in groups. As a result, the study of psychology provides excellent preparation for graduate study and careers in a variety of fields.

Career Development 

What You Can Learn

• The Scientific Basis of the field of Psychology.

• The appropriate research methods and statistics required to conduct psychological research.

• The relationships between biology and behavior.

• How humans and other animals learn to behave in their environment.

• How a person's behavior develop and change over their lifespan.

• How the manner in which a person thinks about the world effects their behavior.

• The effects that culture have on a person's behavior.