OK so I did AQA Psychology this year and absolutely LOVED it. Favourite subject I've ever done, I didn't do it at GCSE and had no idea what the subject was until enrolment - I don't regret my decision to take it at ALL. If you're doing AQA the same as me, then here's like a brief run-through:
Year 1
You'll look at the following topics:
- Social Influence (Conformity, Obedience, Legitimate Authority, Asch/Zimbardo/Milgram case studies etc.)
- Memory (Coding, Capacity, Long Term/Short Term, Eyewitness Testimony, Cognitive Interviews etc.)
- Attachment (Romanian Orphan Study, Attachment Formation, Monotropy, Cultural Variations in Attachment, Ainsworth/Lorenz/Harlow case studies etc.)
- Psychopathology (Phobias, Depression, OCD, 4 Definitions of Abnormality, CBT, Systematic Desensitisation, Flooding, Cognitive Vulnerability etc.)
- Approaches in Psychology (Biological/Cognitive/Social Learning Theory/Humanistic*/Behavioural/Psychodynamic*, Biopsychology) * = A Level ONLY
- Research Methods (Ethical Issues, Qualitative/Quantitative Data, Types of Experiment, Observational Design, Histograms, Sign test etc.)
If you're doing AS exams, you'll sit 2 at the end of the year. (I didn't sit an AS exam but I did get an A* in my PPE/mock)
(I've just finished Year 1/AS so my knowledge isn't so great about the 2nd year - also, don't be put off by the complicated words that come up with the Biopsychology section in the 2nd year, you'll be taught what all of it means and it'll make sense to you especially after Year 1's content which sets you up for what's to come!)
Year 2
You'll look at the following compulsory topics:
- Approaches {again}
- Biopsychology (Neurons, Synaptic Transmission, Plasticity, Split-Brain Research into Hemispheric Lateralisation, Biological Rhythms, Localisation of Function, The Nervous and Endocrine System etc.)
- Research Methods II (Correlations, Reliability, Case Studies, Content Analysis, Statistical Tests, Chi-Squared as a test for Association, Mann-Whitney and Wilcoxon, Parametric Tests of Difference: Unrelated/related t-tests etc.)
- Issues and Debates (Gender and Culture in Psychology, Free Will and Determinism, The Nature vs Nurture Debate, Holism and Reductionism, Idiographic and Nomothetic Approaches, Ethical Implications of Research Studies/Theory etc.)
Then, your college/sixth form will probably choose 3 out of the following options for you to study (I won't go into detail with these):
- Relationships - Gender - Cognition and Development - Schizophrenia - Eating Behaviour
- Stress - Aggression - Forensic Psychology - Addiction
I think there's 3 2-hour exams at the end of the A-Level course as well. I hope this has been helpful, I do apologise for how long the reply is but that's as much as I know about the Psychology course! Good luck with your results and I hope you're happy with the decisions you make.