MSc Health Psychology

The MSc Health Psychology at the University of Gloucestershire trains students to apply psychological knowledge to health, illness, and wellbeing across individual, community, and systemic levels. It is suited for graduates who want BPS-accredited training toward roles in health research, public health, or psychological intervention design.

Curriculum Structure

In the taught year, students take Being a Health Psychologist, exploring the professional role, ethics, and reflective practice required in public and clinical health contexts. They also study Understanding Health Contexts: From Cell to Society, which examines how biological, social, economic, and cultural systems interact to influence health and illness. Through Experiencing Health & Illness, students gain insight into patients’ perspectives on illness, recovery, and coping.

Alongside these, Research & Evidence-Based Practice teaches students to critically evaluate and conduct empirical studies using both quantitative and qualitative designs, while Intersectional Practice encourages a socially just approach to health psychology by examining inequalities and diversity. Finally, Making a Difference: Intervention & Change empowers students to design, implement, and evaluate behaviour-change interventions, culminating in a Dissertation where they lead a research project on a health-psychology topic of their choice.

Focus areas (string):
“Professional health psychology, social determinants of health, client experience, evidence-based research, inequality, behaviour-change interventions”

Learning outcomes (in a string):
“Ability to apply theory to health settings; design and evaluate health-psychology interventions; conduct rigorous empirical research; engage with social justice in health; professional competency as a reflective health-psychology practitioner”

Professional alignment (accreditation):
BPS-accredited for Stage 1 Health Psychology training.

Reputation (employability rankings):
Gloucestershire reports that 95% of its postgraduate health psychology graduates are in work or further study within six months, with strong links to NHS and community health organisations.