Department of Psychology
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Degree Programs: Full-Time: M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D.
Chair: Norma
V. S.
Graham, Ph.D.
372A Schermerhorn
Tel:
212.854.5591
Director of Graduate Studies: Niall
Bolger,
Ph.D.
402A Schermerhorn
Tel:
212.854.3608
Director of Graduate Student Teaching: Lois
E.
Putnam,
Ph.D.
314 Schermerhorn
Tel:
212.854.4550
Designed to provide a broad base in psychology, this program offers an opportunity for intensive research. Advanced seminars are offered in four basic areas of psychology: cognition, psychobiology- neuroscience, sensation and perception and social-personality. The department is relatively small; each year it admits fewer than ten full-time students. The obvious benefit to such a highly selective system is that it affords graduate students the opportunity to become acquainted with all research conducted in the department by faculty as well as fellow graduate students.
The program is a five-year consecutive series of classes and research culminating in the Ph.D. degree. Nonsequential M.A.s and degrees in Clinical, Counseling, Organizational, Educational and School Psychology are not awarded through this department. Should you require information pertaining to application procedures for nonsequential M.A.s or degrees in the areas mentioned above, please contact: Teachers College, 525 West 120th Street, Room 146 Horace Mann, Box 302, New York, NY 10027; (212) 678-3710.
All students accepted to the five-year program receive a Faculty Fellowship, which supports tuition, health and insurance fees, and an annual stipend. All fellows receive equal awards and the stipend level is adjusted each year to keep pace with inflation.
Fellowships are awarded in recognition of academic achievement and in expectation of scholarly success. Teaching and research experience are considered an important aspect of the training of graduate students. Thus, graduate fellowships include some teaching and research apprenticeship.
Students enrolled in 2003-04 number 35. The mean age at first date of registration is 25. The age range is 22 to 37; 20 are female and 15 are male. Among those admitted, the average GPA is 3.80 and the average GRE is 1365. Twenty-two are U.S. citizens and 13 are international, from Austria, Canada, Germany, Hong Kong, Israel, Poland, South Korea, Sweden, United Kingdom, Venezuela and Yugoslovia.
Sixty-eight students received the Ph.D. in the years 1993-2005. Most of them have positions in academic or medical school institutions or industry. Academic affiliations include Harvard, Rutgers, Princeton, Carnegie-Mellon, Purdue, SUNY, Duke, McGill, NYU, the Universities of California, Arizona, Utah, Michigan, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington, Ohio, and a number of state or teaching colleges. Several students are in business schools. A few of them have assumed academic positions overseas in Japan, Israel, Hungary and Germany. A number are at research or medical institutes such as New York State Psychiatric Institute, Cornell Medical, NIMH, Armstrong Labs, AT&T, and Center for Machine Intelligence; several hold human factors positions in industrial settings.
The department also participates fully in the interdisciplinary Program in Quantitative Methods in the Social Sciences. This M.A. program trains students in how to apply quantitative methods to problems in the social sciences as they arise in business, government and nonprofit organizations. The program draws on the diverse strengths of the statistics and social sciences faculties at Columbia and other institutions in the New York metropolitan area. It is designed for students with a strong background in social sciences or quantitative methods who are interested in deepening their analytical skills and broadening their knowledge of the social sciences. See later in this application.
For the Special Admissions Requirements for QMSS, please see their website.
The Division of Sociomedical Sciences brings together a multi-disciplinary faculty of social scientists and health professionals interested in studying the influence of social and cultural factors on health and health care delivery. An understanding of these factors is essential in the work of all public health professionals (health administrators, health educators and policy analysts).
Students in the Division generally have academic backgrounds in the social sciences or professional experience in clinical health areas (nursing, social work, medicine and dentistry). Some students may be involved in research and desire further graduate and postdoctoral training; others, in their roles as practitioners, may wish to learn how to measure and evaluate the sociocultural factors that influence their work. A growing number are pursuing the M.P.H. degree in Health Promotion and Disease Prevention and go on to careers in health education.
Areas of research currently being addressed by faculty and students in the Division include preventive health behavior, the role of social supports, stress and coping, mental health effects of AIDS and tuberculosis, ethical and social policy issues in AIDS, health professionals and AIDS, gender and health, drug use in adolescents and adults, tobacco policy and health consequences of lifestyle. Students are encouraged to participate in ongoing research projects.
For Special Admissions Requirements for Sociomedical Sciences, please see their website.
Special Admission Requirements
For the Ph.D. in Psychology
In addition to the requirements listed below, all students must submit
1 official transcript showing courses and grades per school attended, a
Statement of Academic Purpose and 3 letters of evaluation from academic sources. All
international students whose native language is not English or whose
undergraduate degree is from an institution in a country whose official
language is not English, must submit scores of the Test of English as a
Foreign Language (TOEFL) or IELTS. For more information, refer to our Admissions Information and Frequently Asked Questions pages.
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DEGREE:
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Ph.D.
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Deadline for Fall Admission
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December 1
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Deadline for Spring Admission
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no spring admission
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Resume/CV
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yes
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Writing Sample
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no
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GRE General
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yes, minimum 1200 combined verbal/quantitative required
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GRE Subject
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recommended
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Miscellaneous
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see below
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Admission to the graduate program is based on an overall evaluation of applicants' scores, grades, recommendation letters, as well as potential for scholarship. A general guideline for admission is a minimum score of 1200 on the combined verbal and quantitative GREs. While the subject GRE is not required, it is strongly recommended. The deadline for GRE score submission is January 8. An undergraduate major in psychology is not required but it is an advantage to have had undergraduate psychology courses as well as statistics. There is no language requirement. International students must hold the equivalent of an American university baccalaureate (B.A.) and be fluent in both written and spoken English.
All applied psychology programs, such as Clinical, Counseling, Development, Experimental, Industrial/Organizational and Educational are housed at Teachers College. See www.tc.columbia.edu for more information about these programs.
