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Sociology |
Sociology |
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Coordinator: Melissa Milkie | (301) 405-6428 | mmilkie@socy.umd.edu
The University of Maryland’s Department of Sociology offers a rich and varied program in Social Psychology that spans multiple levels of analysis and methodological approaches. Seven faculty members identify social psychology as a principal area of interest. Eight courses in social psychology are offered at the graduate level. We also offer a strong program of training in the methodology and statistics of contemporary social psychology.
The social psychology area at Maryland has achieved national distinction (ranked 16th in the U.S. in 2006) and has been very popular among graduate students. Our faculty is unified through strengths in micro approaches to stratification (e.g., gender, race, and socioeconomic status) and also thrives in covering all three major social psychological perspectives (symbolic interaction, group processes, and social structure and personality) and several methodological approaches. We may be the only social psychology program in the country with this breadth, and we co-author work together, which further contributes to our uniqueness. Melissa Milkie and Jeff Lucas, along with alumnus David Rohall, (Ph.D., 2000) have co-written an undergraduate textbook in Sociological Social Psychology (now going into its 3rd edition) that underscores how features of stratification underlie much of the research accomplishment of our field.
Associated Research Centers Ties between the social psychology program and the Joint Program in Survey Methodology, an interdisciplinary graduate training program, provide a unique resource for graduate student training in public opinion and survey methodology. Our Social Psychology faculty is also connected to the Maryland Population Research Center on campus. Our associated research centers provide opportunities for faculty and graduate research and training, as does the experimental laboratory for the study of group processes.
Faculty Interests Sociology faculty with major research interests in social psychology include Jeff Lucas, Melissa Milkie, Stanley Presser, Rashawn Ray and John Robinson. Carmi Schooler joined our program in 2007 as Senior Research Scientist and Leonard Pearlin has been a Senior Research Scientist at Maryland since 1995.
The social psychology faculty is actively engaged in numerous research projects. Lucas is PI on a National Science Foundation grant to examine stigma and status processes in interpersonal interactions; Milkie's research focuses on gender, race/ethic and socioeconomic statuses and adult and children's mental health in family, work and school contexts; Pearlin continues his prolific work examining stress and health among older Americans based on a National Institute on Aging (NIA)-funded grant; Presser's research explores how the measurement of attitudes and behavior is intertwined in complex ways with social psychological processes; Ray is currently examining how racially mixed and segregated communities influence physical activity levels across racial/ethnic groups and contribute to healthy lifestyles and obesity rates, and Robinson examines how time use patterns are critical for understanding different social groups' patterns of behavior in societies across the world.
The social psychology faculty has diverse orientations and represents an array of theoretical perspectives. Both quantitative and qualitative methodologies employed by social psychologists are represented in the faculty's empirical studies, including surveys, experiments, observational studies, content analysis, in-depth interviewing, and cross-cultural research designs.
Academic Program Our specialty area is vibrant, and includes a brownbag seminar series in which graduate students actively participate. All graduate students in social psychology are expected to complete SOCY 660, Theories of Social Psychology. For the Ph.D. specialization, students take at least two other courses from the following list:
SOCY 624 Lives and Times: Socialization Across the Life
Course SOCY 647 Interpersonal Processes and Small Groups
SOCY 699
Power, Status, and Leadership in Groups
Other special topics courses or courses in other departments may be allowed by petition. Students are encouraged to take more than three courses in the specialty area to prepare themselves for research and teaching in this area as well as for comprehensive exams in social psychology.
Recommended methods courses include the following:
SOCY 604 Survey Research
Graduate Student Research Opportunities and Employment In addition to working with individual faculty on research, graduate students can find employment as research assistants in a variety of projects within the department and in the Washington DC area. Students are encouraged to present papers at regional and national professional meetings and to publish their work in professional journals. There are also many opportunities to develop teaching skills that will be helpful in future employment, as social psychology is perennially popular in the sociology undergraduate curriculum. Recent graduates have positions as faculty members in both research universities and liberal arts colleges, as well as in government and nonprofit research organizations.
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2112 Art-Sociology Building, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742
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Ph: 301-405-6392
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