(Polyvalent) Psychology B.Sc.

 

How do people think, memorize, and learn? Which structures and functions of the brain are involved? Why do people sometimes perceive things in very different ways? Do they make decisions differently in a group than alone, and if so, why is that? How do we know how we are feeling at a given time? And what makes up our personality?

Psychology is concerned with explaining, predicting, and changing human experience and behavior. In this discipline, we research causal relationships, observe, experiment, and test. Based on these findings, we can then develop and test models of human thought and action, always focusing on their biological foundations and social embeddedness.

Psychological insights are used in a wide variety of applications. These include, for example, education, medicine, psychotherapy, and - not least - all facets of the world of work.

RWTH offers students solid foundational knowledge with its comprehensive course of studies. Thus, it opens the way to two different paths: a general Master's degree in psychology or the option to go into psychotherapy.

This Bachelor’s course teaches students the necessary foundations of the discipline by providing insights into various critical facets of psychological research:

• Personnel Psychology and Career Development seeks to understand, predict, and change experience and behavior at work. Topics include career choice and development, personnel selection as well as teamwork and leadership.
• Industrial and Organizational Psychology is dedicated to analyzing, evaluating, and designing human-technology systems and various working and living environments. It uses findings from perception and cognitive psychology and puts it all in the context of occupational science and ergonomics.
• On the one hand, Clinical Psychology looks at how mental disorders develop, which courses they take, and how they are diagnosed, and on the other hand, what therapy options are available through psychotherapeutic methods.
• Health Psychology and Rehabilitation is devoted to health psychology issues in the context of prevention and medical and occupational rehabilitation.
• Educational Psychology is concerned with the scientific study of socialization and learning processes of people across their lifespan: Upbringing and educational aspects, impact and design of pedagogical interventions, culture-specific issues, and family and socio-political regulations.

 

Degree Content

Students receive in-depth training in all methods of psychology, i.e. in observing, experimenting, testing, measuring, and in empirical-mathematical methods of data evaluation and interpretation.

Degree Content

Semester	Core Curriculum	Application Section	Methods Section
1-2	Introduction to Psychology, General Psychology, Social Psychology, Biopsychology I		Descriptive Statistics, Inferential Statistics, Experiment Planning
3-4	Differential and Personality Psychology	Industrial and Organizational Psychology, Clinical Psychology I, Health Psychology, and Rehabilitation	Psychological Diagnostics, Empirical Research Methods
5-6	Developmental Psychology, Biopsychology II	Career Development and Personnel Psychology, Clinical Psychology II, Educational Psychology
	Bachelor’s Thesis

For detailed information about degree content or curriculum, please refer to the Institute of Psycholoy website (de).

Internships

All students must complete the internships required for psychotherapists as laid out in the regulations for licensure. The research-oriented internship I is carried out within the institute, the orientation internship and the professionally qualifying activity I have to be completed externally in appropriate care facilities.

Research Subject

In addition, students have to complete the required hours as a test subject. By actively participating in psychological studies, students gain valuable experience with different data collection methods in various psychology research areas.

Programs Abroad

The degree program does not entail a fixed semester abroad. However, the sequence of compulsory modules allows for a flexible study plan and thus the opportunity to easily plan a stay abroad.

The Faculty of Arts and Humanities maintains research and teaching cooperations with a number of European and non-European universities, such as the EU mobility program ERASMUS+. For example, psychology students can currently spend their year abroad at Maastricht University, Ghent University (Department of Experimental Psychology), or Vilnius University.

RWTH students not only benefit from the Faculty’s exchange programs but also from the University's strategic partnerships with international universities. They can, for example, complete short stays at one of the IDEA League universities to do research for a thesis or dissertation.

The UROP Abroad program, the only one of its kind in Germany, offers undergraduate students the opportunity to participate in research projects at international universities as early as their second year of Bachelor’s studies. These stays abroad are partially funded by RWTH-specific financial aid.

All of RWTH’s cooperation programs are listed on the International Opportunities web pages. Subject-specific offers are published on the Institute’s website.

 

Prerequisites

Personal Prerequisites

Those interested in studying psychology should be interested in human behavior and experience and be prepared to attentively observe. Furthermore prospective stduents should be able to logically think, since this is an important prerequisite for exact testing and experimenting in the natural sciences. In addition to good mathematical skills, it is important the students master the English language, since a great deal of psychological literature is in English.

Enrollment Prerequisite

RWTH "Psychology" Self Assessment

 

Career Prospects

Psychologists work, for example, in scientific research, prepare expert reports, design and support in-company training measures, and help with the selection of personnel. They are typically employed at research institutes and labs, occupational health and safety institutions, technical testing centers, management consultancies, personnel service providers, or conduct testing and survey work. They assist and optimize learning and reintegration processes, for example, in training, further education, and retraining institutions.

If graduates decide to become licensed psychotherapists, they can work in psychotherapeutic, psychiatric, psychosomatic, or neuropsychological care facilities, in prevention and rehabilitation, in facilities for people with disabilities, or other areas of institutional care.

 

Master's Degree Prospects

The Bachelor's degree program in Polyvalent Psychology provides students with the foundational knowledge and skills for two different Master's programs at RWTH.

In the Master's program in Psychology, students expand and advance their specialist skills and knowledge in cognitive psychology, occupational psychology, personnel and organizational psychology, and health psychology. Aside from their required courses, students select a project in one of these four sub-disciplines, thus choosing an individual focus. This allows them to optimally prepare for a later career field in the non-therapeutic sector.

Students who wish to later work as psychotherapists can opt for the Master's program in Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, which the RWTH Faculty of Medicine plans to offer soon. This course of study will comply with the licensure requirements for psychotherapists and will end with admission to the licensing examination.

 

Examination Regulations

Regulations that apply for all Bachelor and Master courses of study as well as detailed information about the necessary documentation of required language skills can be found in RWTH’s Comprehensive Examination Regulation. Examination regulations are only published in German as they are legally binding.

Subject Specific Exam Regulations regulate academic goals, the course of study layout, and exam procedures. The appendix to the regulations contains the description of the modules, from which the course of study is composed.

 

Faculty

The psychology Bachelor's course of study is offered by the Faculty of Arts and Humanities.

The Institute of Psychology at RWTH is shaped by its fundamental orientation towards the natural sciences and experimentation and its focuses on cognitive psychology and activity regulation. It is dedicated to interdisciplinary questions stemming from medical technology and traffic psychology, professional development, work-related stress management, and diagnostics and intervention within the context of health psychology.