The Student Room Group

Help wanted

Hi guys :smile:

This is on behalf of my brother who's currently researching unis. He wants to do psychology and as I know nothing about that but I know how helpful TSR was for me when I was choosing where to apply I thought I'd ask you guys.

He's currently in Year 11 and for his mock GCSEs he got mostly As and Bs with one C (physics), so he should get decent GCSE results but obviously you can't really predict that. His school are going to be doing IB instead of A-levels and he reckons he can get around 35 points - again this is a complete guess but I'm just telling you what he told me. The one problem is he's adamant he doesn't want to higher level Maths or Biology - as far as I know his choices are HL English, Philosophy and History and SL Maths, Biology and Italian ab initio.

Can anyone suggest unis that don't care about having a HL science which are reasonably good - he wants to be a clinical psychologist and plans on doing a masters in clinical psychology after a general psychology undergrad degree.

Thanks very much for your help in advance :biggrin: I realise this is fairly pathetic asking on behalf of him but I want to help but not being a psychologist at all I don't want to give him wrong information.
Having studied Psychology at A-level and a little bit at Manchester Uni, I would say that it does have a fair amount of biology and maths. For eg to get in to Manchester uni, it is not compulsory to have done A-level or equalivent maths or sciences.However it does put your brother at an advantage. Psychology involves a lot of research and experiments and therfore maths/statistics comes useful.
Also, bear in mind other unis might be different,every uni has different entry requirements.

Any other questions, feel free to ask. All the best to your brother
Reply 2
I think that the only real problem here would be that actually psychology has a LOT to do with Maths and Biology. I bet he can get into some uni without actually doing those, but I think the problem would be more that would be actually like studying psychology on a university level, cause these subjects that he seems not to like at this point, are the core of the subject.
Reply 3
An Alevel in biology would definitely be an advantage, maths isn't such a necessity, as long as he has done well at GCSE (above a B), then he will be in a similar boat with most people.
I think maths is something you can learn and never forget how to do, however with biology you either 'get it' or you don't. So having done an Alevel to prep you in biological terms then i think it is more advantageous.
Reply 4
He could consider applying to some unis through clearing - i did, and I managed to get in without on of the necessary grades
Reply 5
If he's trying to avoid biology and maths then maybe he should ask himself why he wants to study psychology. Both inevitably go hand-in-hand with psychology. :dontknow:
By the time he is applying, entry requirements will probably (hopefully) be more strict, so maths and biology A2 (or equivalent) will definitely be advantageous.

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