Research and Internships
PSYC 3900 Supervised Research in Psychology
Students interested in pursuing a Ph.D. in the future will need to gain research experience during their undergraduate years. A great way to get involved in research is to start out by helping a faculty member on an ongoing research project. You can receive course credit for doing so by taking PSYC 3900. Exactly what you will be doing to receive credit is something that you will work out with the faculty member who is sponsoring your PSYC 3900. Depending upon your talents and the needs of the project, you might be asked to help develop research materials, collect data, code data, or assist with data analysis.
PSYC 4900 Independent Research in Psychology
PSYC 4900 is a natural extension of PSYC 3900. In PSYC 3900 you work on a research project that has already been designed and is already in progress. In a PSYC 4900, you work on your own research project, answering a research question that you have come up with, possibly but not necessarily related to a project you worked on when taking PSYC 3900. Your PSYC 4900 project would be guided by a faculty member, but it would be up to you to design and execute the project as well as analyze any data that you collect. Students enrolled in PSYC 4900 are expected to present their research findings at the Annual Psychology Undergraduate Research Symposium.
1) Find a faculty sponsor;
2) Send the email with faculty’s permission, your ID# and the hours of credit to psych@bgsu.edu before the end of the first week of classes.
You may register for 1, 2, or 3 credit hours of PSYC 3900 or PSYC 4900 per term. You would be expected to work 48 hours during the 16-week semester (3 hours per week) to earn 1 credit hour.
PSYC 3900 and 4900 must be taken S/U. Only 6 credit hours of PSYC 3900 and 4900 count toward the psychology major or minor.
PSYC 3890 Internship Skills Training
This one-credit seminar is designed to prepare students to pursue an internship. The course is typically offered each spring semester. To register for the course, students must be majoring in psychology with a minimum GPA of 3.0 in their psychology coursework. They should also have accrued enough credit hours to be of junior or senior status and must be in good academic standing overall. This preparatory course is not required of future interns. However, students who plan to complete an internship are strongly encouraged to consider taking this seminar (at least one semester prior to applying for an internship).
1) Learning what you can realistically expect through completing an internship (including what you stand to gain and what will be asked of you);
2) Identifying personal values, interests, and skills which are relevant to your major (and relevant to working at an internship site);
3) Identifying subfields of psychology and the types of internship sites that coincide with your values, interests and skills;
4) Understanding and being capable of demonstrating the procedures necessary to secure an internship;
5) Recognizing key factors that can contribute to succeeding as an intern.
PSYC 4890 Internship
Internship opportunities allow students to gain psychology-related experience outside of the classroom setting. In many cases, these experiences may help to facilitate post-baccalaureate academic and career planning. In past years, students have secured placements in a variety of settings, such as comprehensive mental health centers, victims’ advocacy services, consulting firms, crisis hotlines, and market research companies. These supervised experiences, involving a diverse range of responsibilities, have typically received enthusiastic endorsement from student interns.
Although the Department of Psychology maintains limited information about various internship sites, this information should NOT be used by students as the sole resource for identifying prospective internships. It is the student's obligation to seek out an appropriate internship site as well as a site supervisor (who will apprise you of your internship activities and oversee your work). Please review the full internship requirements. Once you have a promising lead on an internship opportunity, you will need to identify an appropriate faculty sponsor – someone who is familiar with the type of work you will be doing. Your faculty sponsor will inform you of the specific academic responsibilities that must be fulfilled to complete your internship.
1) Find a faculty sponsor;
2) Send the email with faculty’s permission, your ID# and the hours of credit to psych@bgsu.edu before the end of the first week of classes.
PSYC 4890 is only available S/U. Students are permitted to accrue a total of 1-6 credit hours of PSYC 4890 (1-3 per semester). Credit hours earned in PYSC 4890 do NOT count toward the psychology major or minor. For each credit hour, students are expected to provide 48 hours of service at their internship site.
Updated: 02/14/2025 03:05PM