Michigan offers numerous opportunities for you to geta graduate degree in psychology. On the one hand, you have your choice ofdozens of schools, including those in urban areas, rural areas, large schools and small schools, and public and private schools.
On the other hand, you have your choice of a wide range of psychology graduate programs. You can get a Master of Arts or a Master of Science. You may prefer a Ph.D. or a Psy.D. program, though, especially if you want to practice psychology. There are many subfields from which to choose at Michigan colleges, too, including Developmental, Clinical, Counseling, and Industrial-Organizational psychology, to name a few.
The programs outlined below showcase the breadth and depth of your psychology education choices in Michigan.
Best Psychology Graduate Programs in Michigan
Listed below are some of the popular schools offering psychology graduate programs in Michigan:
To find out how we select colleges and universities, please clickhere.
University of Michigan – Dearborn
Founded in 1959after Ford Motor Company gifted 200 acres of land for development (along with $6.5 million), the University of Michigan-Dearborn is a comprehensive, four-year regional university. The school’s first class had 34 students, but today hasmore than 8,000 studentsand confers more than 2,000 degrees each year. Though most students at UM-Dearborn are undergraduates, the school offers a wide array of graduate and doctoral programs, too.
UM-Dearborn has four colleges and schools that collectively offer nearly 130 undergraduate degrees, more than 70 graduate programs and certificates, and half a dozen doctoral programs. Most courses have 30 students or less, but the student-to-faculty ratio is just 16:1.
The student body at UM-Dearborn is diverse as well – nearly half of all students are the first to attend college in their family, and nearly one-third identify as a minority.
UM-Dearborn’s Master of Science in Psychology focuses specifically on health psychology. You can choose from two tracks in this field – Health Psychology or Clinical Health Psychology.
The Health Psychology option is a two-year, 39-credit program specializing in research. You will explore many different topics in health psychology, particularly those that will help you advance research in health and behavioral medicine. Upon graduating, you will have a skill set that allows you to design psychological research to improve healthcare service delivery.
If you choose the Clinical Health Psychology track, you will need two years of full-time study to complete the 48 credits required for graduation. Rather than a research focus like the Health Psychology option, this track focuses on service delivery in clinical psychology and primary care settings. In fact, the required one-year internship takes place in a healthcare setting and prepares you for limited licensure in Michigan as a psychologist.
In both instances, a thesis is optional. If you opt out of the thesis in the Health Psychology track, you must replace it with an elective course. If you opt out of the thesis in the Clinical Health Psychology track, you must replace it with a research project.
You can apply to UM-Dearborn online. To do so, you must have a Bachelor of Arts or Science in Psychology or a closely related field and have a minimum cumulative undergraduate GPA of 3.0 or higher. This should include coursework in Statistics, Introductory Psychology, and Abnormal Psychology.
Additionally, you must provide the following:
Central Michigan University
Central Michigan University was founded as a teacher’s collegein the late 19th century. And while the school retained its focus on teacher training for some time, it is a large, comprehensive, doctoral-granting institution today. In fact, CMU is one of the biggest colleges in Michigan, withnearly 15,000 studentson campus.
As a CMU student, you can explore hundreds of degree programs – 300, in fact – at the undergraduate and graduate levels. Most of these programs are available in person, but several dozen degrees from CMU are available entirely online. However, you don’t have to study online to easily access CMU courses and degrees. The school operates over two dozen learning centers across Michigan and the nation, which makes accessing its high-quality programs all the easier.
At CMU, you can get your undergraduate and graduate degrees in psychology in as little as five years, thanks to the school’s ‘Accelerated Bachelor of Science and Master of Science in Experimental Psychology’. This saves you a year of studies and allows you to enter the workforce or move on to a doctoral program that much more quickly.
The accelerated format allows you to take some graduate courses in psychology while you are still an undergraduate. Then, as a graduate student, you complete the remainder of the 36 credits necessary to complete the Master of Science portion of the program. This includes coursework in the following:
If experimental psychology isn’t your top choice, CMU offers many other graduate and doctoral options, including the following:
The graduation requirements for these programs vary widely, but generally speaking, you will need two to three years to complete the master’s degree options and five to six years to complete the doctoral and specialist options.
University of Michigan
The University of Michigan wasfounded in 1817, making it the oldest university in the state. It’s also one of the largest universities in the state, with an undergraduate enrollment of more than 32,000 students and more than 16,000 graduate students.
If you become a student at Michigan, you will attend classes on one of the most beautiful college campuses in the nation. What’s more, Michigan’s host city, Ann Arbor, is widely consideredone of the best college towns in the country.
The University of Michigan is considered a Public Ivy institution – a public college with very high standards of academic rigor. Michigan has a number of programs that rank among thebest in the nation, including more than 100 graduate programs in the top 10. Michigan also ranks among the top 25 national universities and is third among the top public schools in America, according toU.S. News and World Report.
The Developmental Psychology Ph.D. program from the University of Michigan readies you for conducting social science research. As such, you will gain crucial research skills, explore many different psychological perspectives, and analyze psychological data. These skills will be instrumental in allowing you to study the significance of developmental issues on human behavior.
This program requires about five years of study, during which time you will explore all aspects of the lifespan from infancy to death. This includes studying topics like:
The research you conduct while in this program will be strongly interdisciplinary and cross-cultural. The benefit of this is that you gain skills necessary for understanding human development in a much broader context.
The University of Michigan offers other Ph.D. concentrations in psychology if you prefer to focus on a different area. These include Biopsychology, Clinical Science, Cognition and Cognitive Neuroscience, and Social Psychology. Other options are Psychology and Women’s and Gender Studies, Social Work and Psychology, Education and Psychology, or Personality and Social Contexts.
Michigan State University
Withmore than 50,000 students, Michigan State University is one of the largest colleges in Michigan and one of the biggest in the nation. To address the needs of such a large student population, MSU has a 5,200-acre campus and offers more than 400 degrees and programs for undergraduate and graduate students. There are also more than 300 study abroad programs if you wish to get part of your education outside the U.S.
Michigan State is awell-regarded schoolfor its academic programs. MSU ranks among the top 40 public universities in the nation and ranks 77th among America’s best colleges.U.S. News and World Reportranks no less than 39 MSU programs in the top 15, including six programs that rank first in the nation.
MSU is also a member of the prestigiousAmerican Association of Universities, a collection of 65 top-tier universities in the U.S. and Canada.
MSU’s Organizational Psychology Ph.D. program is preparatory for two specific applications of psychology – in academics or in research. This being the case, you will explore critical topics in organizational psychology and its applications in various settings. You will also gain foundational knowledge of psychology as a whole as well as quantitative research methods.
The curriculum includes multiple seminars on specific organizational psychology topics. These might include the following:
Most students need about five years to complete this program. This includes time to complete coursework, a thesis, and comprehensive exams. After that, you must complete and successfully defend a dissertation before getting your degree.
MSU also offers five other Ph.D. concentrations in psychology. These include:
The admission requirements stipulate that you have a bachelor’s degree from a recognized institution and that you have a 3.2 GPA or higher during the last two full years of undergraduate studies. You must major in psychology or have at least 12 credits in psychology, all with a grade of B or better. You must also provide the following documentation:
Eastern Michigan University
Eastern Michigan University wasfounded in 1849in Ypsilanti. EMU still calls this area home, but it is a much different institution than it was when it was founded. The school’s campus has grown to 800 acres, where outdoor activities are abundant. You can hike, bike, swim, and enjoy wildlife with around 14,000 other students right from the comfort of campus!
EMU is organized into five colleges – Arts & Sciences, Education, Health & Human Services, Business, and the GameAbove College of Engineering and Technology. EMU offers dozens of different programs in these colleges at the bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral levels. Among these are four master’s degrees in psychology and a Ph.D. in psychology.
For example, you might take coursework in the following:
You must also complete nine hours of research and internship experiences, as well as a thesis and a dissertation. A qualifying paper, clinical supervision, and undergraduate teaching are further requirements.
EMU offers several master’s degrees if you aren’t ready for doctoral-level studies. These include Master of Science options in Clinical Behavioral, General Clinical, and General Experimental Psychology.
You can apply to this program online. You must have a bachelor’s degree from an accredited institution to apply. You must also provide the following documentation:
