The Graduate Program in Psychology

Because the goal of the U of T graduate program in psychology is to educate researchers, course load is kept quite light to permit plenty of time for carrying out research. Most of the course work is concentrated in the M.A. year.
 

The M.A. Program

In the M.A. year, students must complete the following four courses:

1. Directed Studies (first term, to prepare for the M.A. thesis research);
2. Design of Experiments I (first term, experimental design and statistics);
3. Strategies and Methods in Psychological Research (second term); and
4. Two half-courses in the department
5. The only other requirement in the M.A. year is completion of the M.A. research project and submission of the M.A. thesis at the end of the M.A. year.

The Ph.D. Program

Assuming adequate performance, students normally proceed to the Ph.D. program after their M.A. year.

In the first Ph.D. year (Ph.D. 1), students must complete the following courses:

1. Design of Experiments II (first term);
2. Professional Psychology (second term);
3. Project course. This is a one-term research project course spread out over the full year. The project supervisor must be a faculty member other than the student’s Ph.D. supervisor.

Students admitted with an M.A. from another university may be exempted from the Project course in Ph.D. 1. However, these students will normally be required to take Design of Experiments I and Strategies and Methods in addition to the other Ph.D. requirements.

In Ph.D. 2, students must complete a one-term course spread out over the full year leading to a formal proposal for doctoral research and requiring an examination in the student’s area of specialization.

In addition to these course requirements, students are expected to complete an additional four half-courses in the department within the first two Ph.D. years. Of the 6 unspecified half-courses completed during the M.A. and Ph.D. years, at least two must be in an area of Psychology outside the student’s area of specialization. Each area group may have additional requirements regarding which courses students must complete.

Of course, students are encouraged to take other courses as they and their supervisors see fit, but the majority of time in Ph.D. years is spent conducting research.

Research Groups

All areas of the department meet regularly, with programs of internal and external speakers. As just two examples, the Ebbinghaus Empire (perception, memory and cognition) has met on Wednesdays at noon for over a quarter of a century; the Friday afternoon meetings of the Animal Behavior Research Group have been going on almost as long. These informal gatherings reflect the strong research emphasis of the department (as well as the small number of formal courses required). Graduate students are expected to attend the research group in their area of specialization and to present their own work periodically. Everyone is encouraged to attend other research groups as well.

 The Department also presents a regular colloquium series on Wednesdays at 4 pm, typically alternating speakers from other universities with in-house speakers. This is followed by a gathering in the departmental lounge to chat over snacks, wine, and beer, after which groups form to go out to dinner. Indeed, social gatherings are frequent, including the traditional Christmas parties, a summer picnic, softball and volleyball games, and the like.

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