Ph.D. in Psychology Requirements

Note: The GRE scores requirement has been suspended for program admissions in 2023-2024.

Admission Requirements

The applicant must meet the School of Graduate Studies’ current minimum general admission requirements as published in the graduate catalog.

1. A four-year bachelor’s degree from a recognized college or university. For U.S. degrees, accreditation must be by one of the six regional accrediting associations.
2. Eighteen (18) hours of undergraduate work in psychology including a course in General Psychology, Developmental, Abnormal, Statistics, and Experimental Psychology.
3. A cumulative Grade Point Average (GPA) of at least 3.2 for all undergraduate work.
4. Satisfy the School of Graduate Studies’ English Language Proficiency requirements as published in the graduate catalog.
5. A year of biological science (biology, physiology, etc.).
6. A semester of college algebra.
7. General background in other social and natural sciences also recommended.
8. Graduate Record Examination— Verbal, Quantitative, and Analytic Writing. (a) Must score at or above the 30th percentile in Analytic Writing. (b) In addition, combined percentile ranks in Verbal & Quantitative must exceed the 60th percentile (i.e., Q+V > 60th percentile), OR applicant must have an undergraduate GPA of at least 3.75.

In addition to the other materials required in the application (personal statement, resume, etc.) applicants will complete an essay, following the prompt below:

“An important mission of our program is to improve inclusion by expanding the diversity of our students’ backgrounds and experiences. Please explain, in less than 300 words, how your membership in our PhD program would serve this mission. We are particularly interested in experiences that have shaped your unique perspective on the world; e.g., having been a McNair Scholar, being bilingual,  having attended a tribal college or  HBCU, having done research or service work with diverse or historically underserved populations, etc. Note that the program defines diversity in very broad terms, including but not limited to age, disability, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, language, national origin, race, religion, culture, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status.”

Personal Statement: Applicants are required to submit a personal statement. Applicants should use their personal statements to tell us about themselves and to describe why they are applying to the program, what kind of research they would like to do at UND, which faculty member(s) they see as a potential research advisor, and what they would like to do after earning their degree.

Curriculum Vitae: Applicants are required to submit a CV that lists applicants’ educational and work experiences. Particular attention will be given to scholarly activities. Therefore, the CV should include 1) a listing of all research assistantships, including the semesters they occurred and a brief description of responsibilities, 2) a listing of all publications and research presentations, 3) a listing of all other scholarly activities, such as an independent thesis, research conducted through a McNair/TRIO scholarship, and any research awards sought or obtained. 

Quantitative Skills Coursework: Applicants must include either in their CV, or as a separate document, a listing of all the courses they have taken in which quantitative reasoning skills have played a significant role (for example, any course in math or statistics), along with the letter grade earned in each course.

Degree Requirements

Students seeking the Doctor of Philosophy degree at the University of North Dakota must satisfy all general requirements set forth by the School of Graduate Studies as well as particular requirements set forth by the Psychology Department.

1. Minimum of 60 credit hours beyond 30 credits from Masters degree work is required for the Ph.D. (minimum of 90 credit hours total).
2. Maintenance of at least a 3.0 GPA for all classes completed as a graduate student.
3. Completion of “Scholarly Tool” coursework to develop skills in research design including:

   Course List

   Code	Title	Credits
   PSYC 541	Advanced Univariate Statistics	3
   PSYC 542	Multivariate Statistics for Psychology	3
   PSYC 543	Experimental Design	3

4. Completion of an empirical dissertation;
5. Graduate students in the clinical psychology Ph.D. program are required to meet a number of eligibility criteria to take comprehensive exams and establish candidacy for the Ph.D. degree. An assessment will be conducted after the student successfully completes all of the requirements for the Master of Science degree in general psychology. To remain in the Ph.D. program and proceed on to comprehensive exams, practicum assignments, dissertation research, and remaining coursework, the student must have:
   1. earned a cumulative graduate grade point average of at least 3.5;
   2. completed his or her M.S. degree within three years of enrollment;
   3. gained the approval of a majority of the core and associated faculty of the clinical psychology doctoral program.
      Students failing to meet one or more of these requirements will be terminated from the Ph.D. program in clinical psychology.
6. Completion of the comprehensive examination for the Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology.
7. Completion of the following for the Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology:

   Course List

   Code	Title	Credits
   One calendar year of full-time internship (usually during the fifth year)		3
   Practicum experience which includes
   PSYC 580	Clinical Practice	8
   PSYC 587	Supervised Field Work	13
   Clinical coursework
   PSYC 570	Clinical Assessment I:Basic Issues in Clinical Assessment	4
   PSYC 571	Clinical Assessment II:Advanced Issues in Clinical Assessment	4
   PSYC 573	Theories of Psychotherapy	3
   PSYC 574	Advanced Therapeutic Interventions	3
   PSYC 575	Behavior Pathology	3
   PSYC 579	Professional Issues and Ethics in Psychology	3
   PSYC 594	Special Topics in Psychology	2
   Foundation coursework in
   History of Psychology
   PSYC 505	History of Psychology	3
   Social Bases of Behavior
   PSYC 560	Advanced Social Psychology	3
   Biological Bases of Behavior
   PSYC 537	Physiology of Behavior and Psychophysiological Measurement	3
   Cognitive/affective bases of behavior
   PSYC 539	Cognitive Psychology	3
   Developmental Basis of Behavior
   PSYC 576	Child Psychopathology and Treatment	3
   or PSYC 551	Advanced Developmental Psych
   Diversity Elective
   PSYC 521	Diversity Psychology	3
   Research Credits
   Master’s Thesis		6
   Dissertation		13
   Total Credits		83