One degree is not better than the other – how you intend to use your degree is a more important consideration. We encourage you to research the major options listed on our website and compare them to your graduate school and career goals. You should also look at classes that are of interest to you. Students may change major tracks within Psychology at any time. For more help choosing a major and classes, please see our Career Guide and the Career Center.
For Psychology BA and BS majors (with and without specialization) and Cognitive & Behavioral Neuroscience majors: All lower division courses EXCEPT PSYC 60 (or COGS 14B or MATH 11 or the equivalent) can be taken P/NP. PSYC 60 MUST be taken for a letter grade.
For Business Psychology BS majors: All lower division courses EXCEPT PSYC 60 (or the equivalent), MGT 16, and MGT 18 can be taken P/NP. PSYC 60 (or the equivalent) and both MGT courses MUST be taken for a letter grade.
For all majors: Remember, no more than 25% of your total UC San Diego courses may be taken pass/no pass.
No. All upper division courses applied to the major MUST be taken for a letter grade. If there is ANY chance that you would eventually declare Psychology as your major, then you should take all Upper Division Psychology classes for a letter grade.
The only exception to this rule are classes that cannot be taken for a Letter Grade but will apply to the major: PSYC 195 (may be applied once to our majors' Elective requirements by petition), AIP 197 (requires pre-approval and mentorship by a Psychology faculty member; may be applied once to our majors' Elective requirements by petition), and PSYC 199 (or COGS/MGT 199, depending on major requirements; applies toward Research requirements for BS majors ONLY).
Students can select any 2 (BA majors) or 3 (BS majors) of any courses listed under the Natural Science area on their degree audit or the Psychology Majors pages. Cognitive and Behavioral Neuroscience majors will need to take COGS 17 and 2 additional courses listed under the Natural Science area on their degree audit.
Natural Science coursework often can overlap with your college General Education requirements; consider checking your GEs for courses that can count for both requirements.
Natural Science courses in Biology, Chemistry, and Physics that are numbered 10 or greater are intended for non-science majors; these (as well as COGS 17 or PSYC 2) are the recommended courses for most Psychology majors (unless they are pursuing a second major or minor, or a post-graduate program that would require the courses intended for science majors).
Yes; the department will accept a D grade toward Psychology B.A. and B.S. degrees. However, both your major GPA and cumulative GPA must be at least 2.0 in order to graduate.
The minimum grade in any class counted toward a Cognitive and Behavioral Neuroscience Bachelor of Science degree is a C-.
You can take a lower-division course at a community college. Use Assist.org for guidance on the specific course to take. Contact the Psychology Department via the Virtual Advising Center if you do not see your course listed.
Community college courses will only transfer for lower division credit. While the course content may be similar, community college courses will not replace upper-division electives required by the major. This is due to accreditation requirements, and no exceptions can be made.
Any course taken at another UC, CSU, or other 4-year institution offering a bachelor’s degree must be petitioned before it can be used in place of a UCSD Psychology course. The course syllabus must be submitted with the petition form. Please see our Petitions page for more information and step-by-step instructions.
PSYC 99/199 is an opportunity for students to participate in independent study related to research being carried out by Psychology faculty. Students may assist in running subjects, collecting data, and/or evaluating data under the supervision of a faculty member or graduate student.
Undergraduate research experience is highly regarded by graduate schools and provides students early insight into a future career, or helps change minds while there is still time to do so. PSYC 99 and 199 will only count towards the research experience requirement for the B.S. degree and will never count as a Psychology Electives for either the B.S. or the B.A.
Current opportunities are advertised through the REAL Portal. Students can also approach relevant faculty directly. Instructions can be found on the Research page.
The double major petition form can be picked up from your college, or found on TritonLink. All major requirements must be listed on the double major petition. For example, you should list all three Natural Science and two to four Formal Skills courses (depending on your choice of major), the Programming course and the Statistics course. Upper division courses you have completed or in which you are currently enrolled can be listed on the form. Do not list courses you have not yet taken; instead use the generic terms "PSYC Core", "PSYC Specialization", "PSYC Elective" or "PSYC Research" (or, if you are in the CBN major, "CBN Core", "CBN Specialization", etc.; Business Psychology majors should list "PSYC Core", "Bus PSYC", "Bus MGT", etc.). You must indicate that you are aware of ALL lower and upper division courses required for the major. If you are overlapping any classes between your two majors, you will need to declare the specific overlapping courses on your double major petition form as well. Students may overlap a maximum of two courses between their two majors.
For instructions on how to fill out the double major petition form, please check out this example of a completed form (pdf).
Bring your completed form to the Psychology Student Affairs Office in 1533 Mandler Hall. If you have questions contact the Psychology Department via the Virtual Advising Center.
It is not possible to double major within the same department. As such, you may not officially earn two Psychology specializations (although it is possible to complete the requirements for both, so that you can choose to graduate with either).
Students majoring in Cognitive & Behavioral Neuroscience who wish to additionally earn a Psychology degree MAY choose to declare their CBN major through Cognitive Science so that they may earn one of our other Psychology degrees. Remember, you may only overlap a maximum of two Upper Division courses between double majors, so students choosing this route will need to choose their courses wisely.
At UCSD Psychology can briefly be described as the study of human/animal mental functions and behavior with a scientific emphasis.
Cognitive Science may be concisely defined as the study of the nature of intelligence with an emphasis in three main areas – brain, behavior and computation.
Human Development focuses on scientific issues of growth, development, and behavioral change across the lifespan.