How many years do you need to study psychology ?

Question: How many years do you need to study psychology ?
- Keywords:
  career,
  study
Asked by anon-284818 on 8 Mar 2021.
- Lisa Grünwald answered on 8 Mar 2021:
  
  Hi Eli, it’s usually 3 years to your undergraduate degree (or 4 if you are in Scotland). Some people might then go onto doing extra qualifications, to train as a therapist (can take anything from 10months to another 3-5years!) or to work in academia, where you might do a Master’s degree (1year) and/or a doctorate (PhD), which can take another 3 years full time.
- Alex Baxendale answered on 8 Mar 2021:
  
  Hello! A basic Psychology degree is 3 years (or 4 years depending on course), but this is the same as a lot of Undergraduate degrees at University, so nothing out of the ordinary there! From there it really depends on what you want to do as a job, to do a research job you realistically need a Masters degree which is another year (apparently it can be from 2 to 4 years though!). You can get a job doing research with a Masters degree, but a PhD can definitely help get you ahead there as well, this can be another 3 years (up to 8 if you want to do it part-time). Really it depends on what you want to do, different jobs require different amounts of time – if you want to teach Psychology in college you can do a 3 year undergraduate and a 1 year teacher training course, or if you want to be a counselor then a 3 year undergraduate and a counseling course that can take multiple years!
- Lisa Orchard answered on 9 Mar 2021:
  
  Hi Eli. The others have given you some great answers. Remember you can study things full-time or part-time, so it could take longer depending on which you choose. I would say to get to the position of calling yourself a psychologist as a job, you are probably looking at an absolute minimum of 6 years. It’s also important to get work experience too so it will often taken longer in total.
- Dennis Relojo-Howell answered on 9 Mar 2021: last edited 9 Mar 2021 11:36 am
  
  Hi Eli. I’ve been educated in two different countries, and I also had a non-linear trajectory. So my experience might be tad different than my fellow scientists.
  
  I did my BSc in the Philippines which should take 4 years to finish; it took me 6 years to complete it. I also did my first master’s degree in the Philippines which should take 2 years to finish; it took me 4.5 years to complete. And then I did my second master’s degree here which I finished on time for 1 year (albeit I had to resit my stats module). Now for my PhD, I suspect I will finish it in six years.
- Harry Piper answered on 9 Mar 2021:
  
  That’s a tough question and it really depends what you intend to do! An undergraduate degree typically takes 3 years (sometimes 4 depending on the course, sometimes you have a year abroad), a master’s degree typically take 1 year and a PhD takes 3-4 years. Of course, this all assumes you are full time! Ultimately it comes down to what you want to do for a living and the level of qualification required!

Question: How many years do you need to study psychology ?

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