Research Focus Career Opportunities Admissions Faculty

The goal of the PhD. program in Psychology and Social Intervention is to prepare action scientists to work in a variety of settings in order to understand, transform and improve the contexts and systems (ranging from families, small groups, schools, communities, and neighborhoods to public policies) in which humans develop across the lifespan. The program has a strong emphasis on analysis and prevention of psychological, social, educational and health problems, as well as on the promotion of well-being in these domains from a systems perspective, including organizational, community, and policy levels.

Students learn how varied ecologies influence individual functioning and well-being and receive theoretical and methodological training in the conceptualization and assessment of such ecologies. Students also learn about successful and unsuccessful efforts in these domains across multiple levels of analysis. Students are expected to have an interest in studying and understanding various forms of diversity and structural inequality among groups of individuals, institutions, communities, and societies.

Our program maintains a heavy focus on research in applied settings and for the purposes of understanding and changing social settings. Our faculty study a wide range of ecologies (e.g., schools, neighborhoods, policy, service systems contexts, programs) and preventive interventions (e.g., pertaining to school readiness, school success, HIV and health behaviors, mental health, housing, and homelessness), locally, nationally and internationally. Our New York City location provides students and faculty with an ideal urban setting for studying many kinds of communities and settings combined with easy access to gateways to the world at large.

Our core objectives are to provide students with:

• Basic grounding in fundamentals of psychology and behavioral science
• Intensive training in:
  • theories of ecological psychology,
  • theories and techniques of preventive and promotive interventions,
  • program and policy formation, implementation, and evaluation,
  • conceptualization and analysis of individual and social change,
  • research methodology for multi-level and cross-level analysis.

Areas of research focus may include:

• The analysis and change of human service and community based organizations,
• Consequences of poverty, social exclusion and discrimination,
• The analysis and restructuring of ecological transitions (e.g., between neighborhoods, between school and work),
• The design and evaluation of prevention and promotion programs,
• Analysis and evaluation of public policies relevant to health, education, and well-being,
• Experiences of racial, ethnic, sexual, immigrant, and other minorities in organizational, community, and transnational contexts,
• Setting level influences on intergroup disparities or relationships

Career Opportunities

Our program prepares students for diverse roles in academia and social research. In the academic arena, our students are well-positioned for jobs in schools of human development, education, public health and public policy. In the area of social research, students are prepared to obtain positions in research, advocacy, and social service organizations. Indeed, there is increasing demand for evidenced-based strategies in health, education, and social service organizations and our students will be well-positioned to contribute to the design and implementation of such strategies.

Degree Requirements

Students take 45 to 72 credits, depending on prior graduate coursework. Requirements for program completion include:

• Core courses in Psychology and Social Intervention (e.g., Theories of Change in Applied Psychology, Understanding and Measuring Social Contexts , and Intervention and Social Change)
• Core design, methodology, and statistics sequence (e.g., Research Design and Methods in the Behavioral Sciences, Methods for the Analysis of Change, Qualitative Field Research, and Research Using Mixed Methods)
• Intervention-research or Policy-Research practica (two semesters)
• Psychology and Social Intervention elective courses (at least three)
• Participation in area seminar
• Completion of a 2nd year empirical paper
• Completion of a comprehensive examination requirement
• Completion of an independent empirically-based dissertation

Admission Requirements

• Strong academic background as evidenced by standard indicators, such as GPA and GRE scores.
• Evidence of prior research experience
• Evidence of interest in human ecologies, systems-level interventions and/or policy interventions and analysis
• Three letters of recommendation

Contact Information

212 998 5555