Hi,
I have a BA in psychology and grad certificate in public health and I am interested in graduated programs that combine the two areas of study. I am aware of Claremont Graduate University’s MPH/MA in psychology and Columbia University’s MA/PhD in public health. I’m just wondering if anyone knows of additional schools than the ones I posted or how to find a list of combined degree programs in public health and psychology. Thanks.
Hey there! I was in the same place as you almost 10 years ago, looking for combined programs in public health and psychology. I ended up getting my PhD in Columbia’s Sociomedical Sciences program, which is probably the best program of this type.
There really aren’t any other programs out there besides Columbia’s and Claremont’s (which is new). HOWEVER, there are a lot of other ways to do this - what I have found is that you actually don’t have to be in a formally combined program to study both, especially if you already have a graduate certificate in public heath.
You can go to a PhD program in the social & behavioral sciences in public health, take a lot of classes in the graduate psychology department, and work with psychological researchers and public health researchers at the same time as co-advisors. One great place to do this is Yale’s PhD program in chronic disease epidemiology, with a specialization in social & behavioral sciences. Lots of Yale’s PH faculty are psychologists. Another great place is at Michigan, in Health Behavior and Health Education. Many many Michigan PH professors are psychologists, and lots of Michigan psychology professors are doing health-related research. Brown has another newish program that has a great mix of psychologists and public health researchers.
You can go get a PhD in psychology at a psychology program in a university that also has a school or program of public health (or a heavy public health concentration in the medical school); take some public health courses and get a secondary advisor who is a public health professor. There are lots of excellent psychology departments where you could do this - Columbia, Yale, UCLA, Berkeley, Harvard, Michigan, Minnesota, UNC, Penn, UW, Brown, Hopkins, UVa, NYU, Arizona, Maryland, BU, University of Miami.
2a) Do the above, but then also do a postdoc in public health that will allow you to earn a one-year post-PhD master’s degree in public health or a related field, like health services research. There a lot of those out there.
PhDs are very flexible, and you can mold them to do whatever kind of research you want as long as the resources are there. So I would just look at universities that have great psychology departments and great public health programs/schools, and then create your own version of a combined program. Since you already have a graduate certificate you don’t really need an MPH or MA in addition to your PhD.
Hi, thanks for the information! I was looking at Arizona for MPH-environmental as I’m interested in smoking/tobacco prevention and addiction studies and prevention, but realize it’s unnecessary and lack the prereqs anyway. After reading your last statement, I will definitely look more into Arizona’s psychology department and the other schools as well. I keep finding myself returning to psychology and adding it to my studies. I’m interested in studying the individual, but also groups and populations which is what led me to public health.