Psychology A Level

Psychology A Level will help you to understand yourself and other people much better. It is a subject that tries to get to the bottom of what you are like and why you behave in certain ways. It is more precisely the “scientific study of the human mind and human behaviour”.

This course involves: AS Level (Year 1): Social and cognitive psychology; Biological psychology and learning theories. A Level (Year 2): Paper 1: Foundations in Psychology. Topics include Social psychology, Cognitive psychology, Biological psychology, Learning theories and Issues and debates; Paper 2: Applications of Psychology. Topics include Clinical psychology, Child Psychology; Paper 3: Psychological skills. Topics covered are: Methods, Synoptic review of studies and Issues and debates. This is a synoptic section in which students will be asked to draw on all topics to develop a general knowledge of key issues and debates.

You take five exams - two one-and-a-half-hour exams for AS and three two-hour exams for A Level. Students who have studied Psychology A Level often go on to study it at university or choose a related degree such as criminology, sociology or teaching. Psychology is very useful for any career that involves working with people e.g. nursing, teaching, health, business. There are few areas of life where knowledge of psychology is not valuable.