Psychology, Social-Evolutionary-Cultural, PhD

Graduate Study in Social Psychology

This program integrates social and cultural perspectives to link basic affective processes with socially crucial issues within and outside of North America. The social psychological perspective examines human interaction from the point of view of the experiences of self and the emotional feelings and actions of the participants. At Clark, it includes the study of group dynamics, inter-group relations, and societal peace and conflict. The cultural psychological perspective examines how presuppositions arising from language, culture, social, and political ideology interact with our basic natures to produce human experience and behavior. Students and faculty in the program are concerned with how the understanding of basic developmental, social, and political processes, and the use of a wide variety of both quantitative methods–experimental, field, phenomenological, and semiotic–can be use to investigate and address pressing social issues in health and peace. The program encourages interdisciplinary research,as well as novel projects and research-action paradigms. Faculty and students work together to design courses. For further information, contact Joseph de Rivera at jderivera@clarku.edu.