BA (Hons) Social Science

Study a Social Science degree from Abertay and analyse the key issues affecting society.

Course detail

Start Date

September

Duration

1 or 2 years (depending on whether students join the programme in Year 3 or Year 4)

Award Title

BA (Hons)

UCAS Code

L300

Programme Overview

Dive deep into the social sciences to understand and analyse the key issues affecting society. Explore business management, criminology, psychology, sociology and sport, and learn how to apply the latest theories to a wide range of real world situations.

Please note: This course is advanced entry only to Year 3 or Year 4 depending on your previous qualifications.

Abertay’s fascinating Social Science degree provides you with the opportunity to study human behaviour and actions, offering you a broader scope than many conventional social science programmes.

Learn to think in different ways

This cross-disciplinary degree course aims to develop your ability to think in different ways and acquire valuable intellectual skills, preparing you for working in an ever-changing, knowledge-based economy.

The Social Science BA (Hons) curriculum is built around a core module set, with a wide variety of options and modules available for you to build a programme that reflects your interests and preferences.

You can also organise your degree studies around a subject pathway preference from any of those on offer. This way, you can specialise in a particular subject stream, and will have this as a named component of your final degree award.

Undergraduate Open Days

Visit our Dundee campus and find your place at Abertay University.

Our 2023 undergraduate Open Days will be held on ...

  • Saturday 30 September 2023

  • Saturday 4 November 2023

... and you're invited!

Click below to book your place. 

BOOK AN OPEN DAY

Your Journey Starts Here

Social science allows you to study human behaviour and society from a variety of angles. This variety provides you with a broad perspective on the world and a diverse range of skills - ideal for today's constantly-evolving job market. Ready to jump in?

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About Your Modules

All modules shown are indicative and reflect course content for the current academic year. Modules are reviewed annually and may be subject to change. If you receive an offer to study with us we will send you a Programme document  that sets out exactly which modules you can expect to take as part of your Abertay University degree programme. Please see Terms and Conditions for more information.

Modules

Year 2 Core Modules

You must study and pass two core modules

Brief description

Introduction to the work of three key social theorists of the 19th and early 20th centuries, Karl Marx, Max Weber and Emile Durkheim. Their work is used to critically illustrate the nature of capitalist modernity and the foundations of contemporary sociological theory and practice.

Indicative content:

  • Karl Marx: Capitalism, Workers` Movement and The Communist Manifesto (1848); Dialectics, Fetishism and the Purpose of Critique; Value, Labour, Money; Capital, Surplus Value and Exploitation; Primitive Accumulation, the Logic of Separation and the Question of Crisis; Class Struggle, Revolution and Communism.
  • Max Weber: Introduction: contextual overview and biography; The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism; Conception of sociology and methodology; Bureaucratisation and rationalisation; Class, status and party; Political sociology: power, legitimacy and the state.
  • Emile Durkheim: Introduction: contextual overview and biography; The Rules of Sociological Method; Suicide; The Division of Labour in Society; Morality and Religion; Crime, Deviance and the Law.

Brief description

Media discourses of criminal activity and the state. 

Indicative content:

  • Crimes of the Powerful: The state as criminal actor.
  • Media, Crime and Power: Investigative Journalism, Corruption and the Political Process.
  • State Corporate Corruption
  • The Nation State and Violence
  • Terrorism and Counter Terrorism in the Global War on Terror
  • Crimes Against Humanity
  • Transnational Organised Crime
  • The Geopolitical War on Drugs
  •  Urban Legends, Conspiracy theories and other Stigmatised Knowledge

Year 2 Option Modules

Students starting in 2nd year choose two subject pathways from Psychology, Sport, Business or Criminology. Please choose the Option which includes your two chosen subject pathways. Each subject pathway will contain two modules in that subject (one per term). Please bear in mind that the two subject pathways you choose will determine which modules you can take in stages 3 and 4. 

Brief description

Introduction to the cognitive and social aspects of the British Psychological Society (BPS) core curriculum. Cognitive psychology encompasses much of what are considered ‘mental processes’. These processes range from relatively low-level processes of perception to higher level things like memory and decision making. Social psychology is the study of how we process information about others, and the biases that influence this processing.

Indicative content

  • Conceptual and historical perspectives in cognition: Origins of research in cognition, and cognitive neuropsychology. Understanding how cognitive processes operate in different brain areas.
  • Neural architectures: Neurones, receptive fields and vision. How does the brain connect the world outside with our thoughts and experiences?
  • Perception and recognition: The recognition of objects and faces.
  • Attention: Is cognition a limited resource to be allocated carefully or do we attend to everything?
  • Learning and memory: What circumstances determine how we learn new information? How is this information stored in our brains and how do we access this information while reasoning?
  • Decision making and problem solving: How do we choose responses; how do we solve problems?
  • Conceptual and historical issues in social psychology: Defining social cognition and social behaviour. Understanding classic and contemporary approaches, and the social processing biases they reveal.
  • Pro- and anti-social behaviour: Exploring the influence of social learning on aggression and the social factors that influence helping behaviour.
  • Attitudes and social influences: Understanding attitudes and the attitude-behaviour link, routes to attitude change. Conformity and obedience.
  • Social identity, stereotypes and prejudice: Exploring the impact of social identity on perception and behaviour. Stereotypes, prejudice and discrimination.

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Brief description

The overall purpose of this module is to develop students’ understanding of the core concepts of sport and exercise psychology and how these apply to real world environments. This will be achieved by explicitly addressing students’ knowledge of affect, behaviour and cognition within relevant contexts.

Indicative content

  • Definition of the field of sport and exercise psychology
  • Fundamentals of sport and exercise psychology
    The role of personality in sport: 
    models of achievement motivation and competitiveness; motivational climates; stress, arousal, anxiety and other emotional processes.
  • Group processes: Group and team dynamics, group cohesion, communication, leadership.
  • An introduction to psychological skills

Brief description

Key social issues in physical activity and health contexts.

Indicative content

  • Interdisciplinary nature of social sciences: Students will explore the ways in which various disciplines within social science help us to understand and explain issues relating to physical activity and health.
  • Critically engage with the notion of ‘healthy’ lifestyles: Students will question the social construction of what bodies are defined as ‘healthy’ and which activities are seen to create a ‘healthy’ body.
  • Social Inequalities: Students will explore how social inequalities affect our physical activity and health opportunities/choices, and how our physical activity and health opportunities/choices re-create social inequalities.
  • Research topics within the social sciences: Students will explore how social inequalities affect our physical activity and health opportunities/ choices, and how our physical activity and health opportunities/choices re-create social inequalities.
  • Qualitative methodologies: Students will be introduced to qualitative research and how it has developed our understanding of physical activity and health.

Brief description

Introduction to the cognitive and social aspects of the British Psychological Society (BPS) core curriculum. Cognitive psychology encompasses much of what are considered ‘mental processes’. These processes range from relatively low-level processes of perception to higher level things like memory and decision making. Social psychology is the study of how we process information about others, and the biases that influence this processing.

Indicative content

  • Conceptual and historical perspectives in cognition: Origins of research in cognition, and cognitive neuropsychology. Understanding how cognitive processes operate in different brain areas.
  • Neural architectures: Neurones, receptive fields and vision. How does the brain connect the world outside with our thoughts and experiences?
  • Perception and recognition: The recognition of objects and faces.
  • Attention: Is cognition a limited resource to be allocated carefully or do we attend to everything?
  • Learning and memory: What circumstances determine how we learn new information? How is this information stored in our brains and how do we access this information while reasoning?
  • Decision making and problem solving: How do we choose responses; how do we solve problems?
  • Conceptual and historical issues in social psychology: Defining social cognition and social behaviour. Understanding classic and contemporary approaches, and the social processing biases they reveal.
  • Pro- and anti-social behaviour: Exploring the influence of social learning on aggression and the social factors that influence helping behaviour.
  • Attitudes and social influences: Understanding attitudes and the attitude-behaviour link, routes to attitude change. Conformity and obedience.
  • Social identity, stereotypes and prejudice: Exploring the impact of social identity on perception and behaviour. Stereotypes, prejudice and discrimination.

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Brief description

Human resource management theory and practice.

Indicative content

  • Introduction to HRM: Theoretical perspectives to HRM; practical approaches to HRM.
  • Context and HRM: National, international, occupational, organisational and individual contexts of HRM in theory and in practice.
  • Strategic HRM: Introduction to strategic human resource management; ‘best fit’ and ‘best practice’ approaches.
  • HRM, work and wellbeing: Fair work; dignity at work; mental health and stress at work; the benefits and challenges of flexibility.
  • HRM, equality and diversity: Inequalities in the labour market and in the workplace; managing diverse workforce.
  • Managing conflict in the workplace: Conflict in the employment relationship; misbehaviour, discipline and grievance procedures; bullying and harassment; disputes.
  • Contemporary HRM trends and future challenges: Continuity and change in work and employment; gig economy; (ir)responsible HRM.

Brief description

The tools and techniques associated with managing projects. Carry out an investigation into a project failure and recommend alternative actions which could have been taken.

Indicative content

  • Project management and project teams: Interpreting project specifications and objectives, and the requirements of project stakeholders; Key project challenges for individuals and groups: reviewing the key priorities of time and project management; Understanding the role of a project leader; Understanding team work and how effective teams function; Creating and contributing to effective project teams; Managing teams through project delivery; maintaining goal focus, and managing problems.
  • Project analysis and planning: Analysing project requirements and sub-tasks; Estimating timelines; deadlines and milestones and activity durations; Constructing a project schedule; Resourcing projects; Allocating and smoothing resources; Using Gantt charts to allocate and monitor resource allocation; Project management tools; Using project management software.
  • Managing projects: Dealing with project risk; Evaluating the probability and potential impact of risk; contingency planning for risk management; project tracking and revision to completion; Evaluating project delivery and management: Analysing the effectiveness of project management processes and the impact of project delivery and non-delivery.
  • Project management methodologies: The use of project management methodologies such as Prince2 and SCRUM.

Brief description

Introduction to the cognitive and social aspects of the British Psychological Society (BPS) core curriculum. Cognitive psychology encompasses much of what are considered ‘mental processes’. These processes range from relatively low-level processes of perception to higher level things like memory and decision making. Social psychology is the study of how we process information about others, and the biases that influence this processing.

Indicative content

  • Conceptual and historical perspectives in cognition: Origins of research in cognition, and cognitive neuropsychology. Understanding how cognitive processes operate in different brain areas.
  • Neural architectures: Neurones, receptive fields and vision. How does the brain connect the world outside with our thoughts and experiences?
  • Perception and recognition: The recognition of objects and faces.
  • Attention: Is cognition a limited resource to be allocated carefully or do we attend to everything?
  • Learning and memory: What circumstances determine how we learn new information? How is this information stored in our brains and how do we access this information while reasoning?
  • Decision making and problem solving: How do we choose responses; how do we solve problems?
  • Conceptual and historical issues in social psychology: Defining social cognition and social behaviour. Understanding classic and contemporary approaches, and the social processing biases they reveal.
  • Pro- and anti-social behaviour: Exploring the influence of social learning on aggression and the social factors that influence helping behaviour.
  • Attitudes and social influences: Understanding attitudes and the attitude-behaviour link, routes to attitude change. Conformity and obedience.
  • Social identity, stereotypes and prejudice: Exploring the impact of social identity on perception and behaviour. Stereotypes, prejudice and discrimination.

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Brief description

Introduction to a range of theoretical approaches that explain crime, deviance and criminal behaviour. The particular focus is on the construction of the positive criminal. 

Indicative content

  • Classical criminology: Crime as free will. Social Contact, Beccaria and Bentham.
  • Biological positivism: Explores the work of Lombroso and the Italian School of Criminology and  the continued attraction of biological explanations of Criminality. 
  • Anomie and crime: Durkheim, Merton and Anomie. 
  • Social disorganisation theory: Chicago School, particularly the work of Clifford Shaw. 
  • Differential association and differential organisation: Sutherlands critique of Social Disorganisation.
  • Juvenile delinquency and subcultural explanations of criminality: Examine both the American and British research on Subcultures and Crime. 
  • Matza and the critique of positivism

Brief description

The emergence and development of key criminological perspectives of continuing relevance for the understanding of crime and processes of criminalisation. 

Indicative content

  • Challenging criminological positivism: Labelling perspectives, Marxism and crisis, The New Criminology / Radical Criminology. 
  • Theorising and managing crime and criminality: Left realism, Right realism, Control theories, Situational crime prevention. 
  • Innovation in criminological theory: Feminist criminology, Critical criminology / Green Criminology, Cultural criminology.

Brief description

The overall purpose of this module is to develop students’ understanding of the core concepts of sport and exercise psychology and how these apply to real world environments. This will be achieved by explicitly addressing students’ knowledge of affect, behaviour and cognition within relevant contexts.

Indicative content

  • Definition of the field of sport and exercise psychology
  • Fundamentals of sport and exercise psychology
  • The role of personality in sport: models of achievement motivation and competitiveness; motivational climates; stress, arousal, anxiety and other emotional processes.
  • Group processes: Group and team dynamics, group cohesion, communication, leadership.
  • An introduction to psychological skills

Brief description

Key social issues in physical activity and health contexts.

Indicative content

  • Interdisciplinary nature of social sciences: Students will explore the ways in which various disciplines within social science help us to understand and explain issues relating to physical activity and health.
  • Critically engage with the notion of ‘healthy’ lifestyles: Students will question the social construction of what bodies are defined as ‘healthy’ and which activities are seen to create a ‘healthy’ body.
  • Social Inequalities: Students will explore how social inequalities affect our physical activity and health opportunities/choices, and how our physical activity and health opportunities/choices re-create social inequalities.
  • Research topics within the social sciences: Students will explore how social inequalities affect our physical activity and health opportunities/ choices, and how our physical activity and health opportunities/choices re-create social inequalities.
  • Qualitative methodologies: Students will be introduced to qualitative research and how it has developed our understanding of physical activity and health.

Brief description

Human resource management theory and practice.

Indicative content

  • Introduction to HRM: Theoretical perspectives to HRM; practical approaches to HRM.
  • Context and HRM: National, international, occupational, organisational and individual contexts of HRM in theory and in practice.
  • Strategic HRM: Introduction to strategic human resource management; ‘best fit’ and ‘best practice’ approaches.
  • HRM, work and wellbeing: Fair work; dignity at work; mental health and stress at work; the benefits and challenges of flexibility.
  • HRM, equality and diversity: Inequalities in the labour market and in the workplace; managing diverse workforce.
  • Managing conflict in the workplace: Conflict in the employment relationship; misbehaviour, discipline and grievance procedures; bullying and harassment; disputes.
  • Contemporary HRM trends and future challenges: Continuity and change in work and employment; gig economy; (ir)responsible HRM.

Brief description

The tools and techniques associated with managing projects. Carry out an investigation into a project failure and recommend alternative actions which could have been taken.

Indicative content

  • Project management and project teams: Interpreting project specifications and objectives, and the requirements of project stakeholders; Key project challenges for individuals and groups: reviewing the key priorities of time and project management; Understanding the role of a project leader; Understanding team work and how effective teams function; Creating and contributing to effective project teams; Managing teams through project delivery; maintaining goal focus, and managing problems.
  • Project analysis and planning: Analysing project requirements and sub-tasks; Estimating timelines; deadlines and milestones and activity durations; Constructing a project schedule; Resourcing projects; Allocating and smoothing resources; Using Gantt charts to allocate and monitor resource allocation; Project management tools; Using project management software.
  • Managing projects: Dealing with project risk; Evaluating the probability and potential impact of risk; contingency planning for risk management; project tracking and revision to completion; Evaluating project delivery and management: Analysing the effectiveness of project management processes and the impact of project delivery and non-delivery.
  • Project management methodologies: The use of project management methodologies such as Prince2 and SCRUM.

Brief description

The overall purpose of this module is to develop students’ understanding of the core concepts of sport and exercise psychology and how these apply to real world environments. This will be achieved by explicitly addressing students’ knowledge of affect, behaviour and cognition within relevant contexts.

Indicative content

  • Definition of the field of sport and exercise psychology
  • Fundamentals of sport and exercise psychology
  • The role of personality in sport: models of achievement motivation and competitiveness; motivational climates; stress, arousal, anxiety and other emotional processes.
  • Group processes: Group and team dynamics, group cohesion, communication, leadership.
  • An introduction to psychological skills

Brief description

Key social issues in physical activity and health contexts.

Indicative content

  • Interdisciplinary nature of social sciences: Students will explore the ways in which various disciplines within social science help us to understand and explain issues relating to physical activity and health.
  • Critically engage with the notion of ‘healthy’ lifestyles: Students will question the social construction of what bodies are defined as ‘healthy’ and which activities are seen to create a ‘healthy’ body.
  • Social Inequalities: Students will explore how social inequalities affect our physical activity and health opportunities/choices, and how our physical activity and health opportunities/choices re-create social inequalities.
  • Research topics within the social sciences: Students will explore how social inequalities affect our physical activity and health opportunities/ choices, and how our physical activity and health opportunities/choices re-create social inequalities.
  • Qualitative methodologies: Students will be introduced to qualitative research and how it has developed our understanding of physical activity and health.

Brief description

Introduction to a range of theoretical approaches that explain crime, deviance and criminal behaviour. The particular focus is on the construction of the positive criminal. 

Indicative content

  • Classical criminology: Crime as free will. Social Contact, Beccaria and Bentham.
  • Biological positivism: Explores the work of Lombroso and the Italian School of Criminology and  the continued attraction of biological explanations of Criminality. 
  • Anomie and crime: Durkheim, Merton and Anomie. 
  • Social disorganisation theory: Chicago School, particularly the work of Clifford Shaw. 
  • Differential association and differential organisation: Sutherlands critique of Social Disorganisation.
  • Juvenile delinquency and subcultural explanations of criminality: Examine both the American and British research on Subcultures and Crime. 
  • Matza and the critique of positivism

Brief description

The emergence and development of key criminological perspectives of continuing relevance for the understanding of crime and processes of criminalisation. 

Indicative content

  • Challenging criminological positivism: Labelling perspectives, Marxism and crisis, The New Criminology / Radical Criminology. 
  • Theorising and managing crime and criminality: Left realism, Right realism, Control theories, Situational crime prevention. 
  • Innovation in criminological theory: Feminist criminology, Critical criminology / Green Criminology, Cultural criminology.

Brief description

Human resource management theory and practice.

Indicative content

  • Introduction to HRM: Theoretical perspectives to HRM; practical approaches to HRM.
  • Context and HRM: National, international, occupational, organisational and individual contexts of HRM in theory and in practice.
  • Strategic HRM: Introduction to strategic human resource management; ‘best fit’ and ‘best practice’ approaches.
  • HRM, work and wellbeing: Fair work; dignity at work; mental health and stress at work; the benefits and challenges of flexibility.
  • HRM, equality and diversity: Inequalities in the labour market and in the workplace; managing diverse workforce.
  • Managing conflict in the workplace: Conflict in the employment relationship; misbehaviour, discipline and grievance procedures; bullying and harassment; disputes.
  • Contemporary HRM trends and future challenges: Continuity and change in work and employment; gig economy; (ir)responsible HRM.

Brief description

The tools and techniques associated with managing projects. Carry out an investigation into a project failure and recommend alternative actions which could have been taken.

Indicative content

  • Project management and project teams: Interpreting project specifications and objectives, and the requirements of project stakeholders; Key project challenges for individuals and groups: reviewing the key priorities of time and project management; Understanding the role of a project leader; Understanding team work and how effective teams function; Creating and contributing to effective project teams; Managing teams through project delivery; maintaining goal focus, and managing problems.
  • Project analysis and planning: Analysing project requirements and sub-tasks; Estimating timelines; deadlines and milestones and activity durations; Constructing a project schedule; Resourcing projects; Allocating and smoothing resources; Using Gantt charts to allocate and monitor resource allocation; Project management tools; Using project management software.
  • Managing projects: Dealing with project risk; Evaluating the probability and potential impact of risk; contingency planning for risk management; project tracking and revision to completion; Evaluating project delivery and management: Analysing the effectiveness of project management processes and the impact of project delivery and non-delivery.
  • Project management methodologies: The use of project management methodologies such as Prince2 and SCRUM.

Brief description

Introduction to a range of theoretical approaches that explain crime, deviance and criminal behaviour. The particular focus is on the construction of the positive criminal. 

Indicative content

  • Classical criminology: Crime as free will. Social Contact, Beccaria and Bentham.
  • Biological positivism: Explores the work of Lombroso and the Italian School of Criminology and  the continued attraction of biological explanations of Criminality. 
  • Anomie and crime: Durkheim, Merton and Anomie. 
  • Social disorganisation theory: Chicago School, particularly the work of Clifford Shaw. 
  • Differential association and differential organisation: Sutherlands critique of Social Disorganisation.
  • Juvenile delinquency and subcultural explanations of criminality: Examine both the American and British research on Subcultures and Crime. 
  • Matza and the critique of positivism

Brief description

The emergence and development of key criminological perspectives of continuing relevance for the understanding of crime and processes of criminalisation. 

Indicative content

  • Challenging criminological positivism: Labelling perspectives, Marxism and crisis, The New Criminology / Radical Criminology. 
  • Theorising and managing crime and criminality: Left realism, Right realism, Control theories, Situational crime prevention. 
  • Innovation in criminological theory: Feminist criminology, Critical criminology / Green Criminology, Cultural criminology.

Year 3 Core Modules

You must study and pass two core modules

Brief description

The arguments of leading schools of social theory. Develop your analytical capacities by discussing and further elaborating some of the main developments in social thought over the past half century.

Module content:

  • Norbert Elias and the Civilising Process: The Civilising Process in Context; The State and the De-Civilising Process.
  • The Frankfurt School and Critical Theory: Traditional and Critical Theory; Walter Benjamin: `Theses on the Philosophy of History’.
  • Relational Sociology of Pierre Bourdieu: `The Real is Relational’: Habitus, Doxa, Field and Capital; Bourdieu and the Field of Culture.
  • Foucault: History, Power, Knowledge; Discipline and Punish.
  • Postmodernism: Postmodernism & Postmodernity; Habermas: Rejecting Postmodernism and Reconstructing Modernity.

Brief description

The importance of empirical research to the social sciences. Learn to identify and use appropriate data collection tools, apply analysis techniques to data generated and reflect upon their meaning, relevance and ethical implications.

Module content:

  • Principles of quantitative research: The elements of statistical data, how quantitative data is collected, structured and presented, how inferences and conclusions can be drawn through the application of basic statistical tests and how SPSS software can facilitate the organisation and analysis of quantitative data.
  • Qualitative data collection skills: An overview of qualitative data-collection methods, how such techniques are applicable in an array of different ways to different research contexts and how you should reflect upon yourself as an active participant in these kinds of research endeavours.
  • Approaches to qualitative data analysis: Engage in the analysis of data produced using qualitative data collection techniques. The main emphasis here will be on thematic coding and how qualitative researchers use sociological knowledge to inductive derive systematic meaning from the data they generate. The use of NVivo computer software in qualitative data analysis.
  • Research ethics and ethical issues: Research ethics and ethical issues in terms of research subject matter, the application of data collection methods, how research can impact in different ways upon research participants and wider society, as well as the formal ethical guidelines and requirements that govern sociological research.

Year 3 Option Modules

You must study and pass four option modules. Select modules from your two chosen subjects in Yr 2. Or, if you’re joining Abertay for the first time and going directly into Yr 3, choose two subjects from Psychology, Sport, Business or Criminology.  

Psychology in the Real World

Brief description

Psychological research related to 'real life' situations showing how psychology can be practiced in environments such as industry, law, education, health and social work.

Module content:

  • Psychology and technology: How has psychology research influenced technology development such as artificial intelligence and security systems?
  • Psychological therapies in the real world: Understanding the applications and impact of psychology therapies, such as cognitive behavioural therapy, and speech and language therapy. 
  • Psychology in the public sector: Understanding the ways in which local and national governments use psychology research. 
  • Psychology in the workplace: Exploring the impact of psychology on human resource management in the workplace, focusing on issues of equality, diversity and inclusion. 
  • Environmental psychology: To what extent are the environments we live and work in influenced by psychology? 
  • Sports psychology in the real world: What is sports psychology and how is it applied to issues like duty of care? 
  • Applied forensic psychology: Applying psychology theory to crime to help answer questions like ‘why do offenders offend?’ 
  • Applied educational psychology: How can psychology theories be applied in teaching, such as supporting children with learning difficulties? 

Human Development across the Lifespan

Brief description

Theories, methods and empirical data relevant to psychological development throughout the lifespan.

Module content:

  • Biological basis of development; theories and milestones: Pre-and postnatal brain development, brain maturation, biological basis of ageing.
  • How to study development?: Designs and approaches.
  • Infancy: Methods for studying infant development, physical development in infancy, cognitive development in infancy: Memory and pre- cursors to language, social and emotional development in infancy.
  • Early childhood: Methods for studying early childhood, physical and cognitive development in early childhood, language development in early childhood, social and emotional development in early childhood, moral development in early childhood.
  • Middle childhood: Physical and cognitive development in middle childhood, social development and peer relations in middle childhood. Emotional and Moral Development in middle childhood.
  • Adolescence: Physical and cognitive development in adolescence, social and emotional development in adolescence.
  • Adulthood: Biological, cognitive and social changes in middle adulthood. Theories and data on midlife crisis.
  • Ageing: Biological, cognitive and social changes in late adulthood; models of cognitive decline; emotional and personality changes, dementia, death, longevity.

Social Science Issues in Sports and Exercise

Brief description

Contemporary issues in sport and exercise, particularly those you are likely to encounter and have to navigate in future employment.

Module content:

  • Social theory: Key aspects of social theory that can be/ have been used to explain phenomena in sport and exercise.
  • Inequality and discrimination: The main sources of inequality and discrimination in sport and exercise (e.g., gender, social class, ethnicity, LGBTI).
  • Sport and politics: How various political systems/ ideologies and governing bodies use sport/athletes as a vehicle for social control.
  • Ethics and sport: Moral and ethical issues in sport and exercise (e.g., child protection). Sport and exercise cultures provide a unique environment for moral and ethical issues.

Physical Activity and Health Promotion

Brief description

The complexities of health promotion and the potential for participation in physical activity to both alleviate and exacerbate contemporary health issues.

Module content:

  • Defining health: Students will understand the different ways in which health can and will be defined.
  • Complexity of health promotion in contemporary society: Students will explore the ways in which health promotion has the potential to both reduce and exacerbate existing social inequalities.
  • Physical activity, its determinants and importance for health promotion: The factors that influence physical activity and its fundamental role in health promotion.
  • Critical engagement with the obesity ‘epidemic’: Why obesity is prioritised on the health policy agenda.
  • Health promotion, physical activity and the environment: The environmental factors that influence the promotion of health and physical activity participation.

Operations and Supply Chain Management

Brief description

Operations and supply chains in many different settings and markets.

Module content:

  • Operations management in its organisational context: The operations function within the organisation and its relationship with other functional areas; The role of the operations manager.
  • Introduction to supply chain management: The supply network; designing the supply chain (make or buy); supply chain stages; uncertainly and risk factors, value chain.
  • Organisations and processes: Analysing operations and processes; organisation type and its effect on operations; process operations and types; characteristics of process types, process and layout strategies.
  • Capacity management: Demand v. production, models of capacity planning, measuring capacity (utilisation and efficiency calculations).
  • Inventory management: Why hold stock? Costs of inventory, ABC analysis, economic order quantity, inventory management strategies.
  • Technology in operations processes: E-supply chain, IT application in supply chain system, enterprise resource planning, technology strategies.
  • The end-to-end supply chain: Purchasing and supply, materials and distribution management, logistics, balancing flow within a supply chain, managing bottlenecks and restrictions.
  • Outsourcing: Make or buy decisions in sourcing strategy; supplier selection; outsourcing supply chain management; co- ordinating supply and managing supplier relationships & partnerships, supply chain risks management.
  • The customer interface: Meeting customer requirements, forecasting demand, lean operations and JIT, lean principles, reducing waste.
  • Contemporary supply chain dynamics: Supply chain measures, six sigma, strategic alliances and collaborative partnerships, characteristics of supply chains in the contemporary global economy.

The Future of Work

Brief description

How the complexities, dynamics and uncertainties of the contemporary business environment impact on the organisation of work and the contemporary employment relationship.

Module content:

  • The post-bureaucratic organisation: Globalisation and cross-cultural management. The rise of the information/knowledge society; network organisations and communities of practice. Post- bureaucratic organisation structures.
  • The new employment relationship and new forms of control: The changing nature of work; flexibility and A- typical work arrangements, changing nature of psychological contracts in knowledge intensive contexts; diversity management; work as performance - the implications of aesthetic and emotional work; high skill, low skill work and the hour glass organisation; hard and soft control systems.
  • Conflict in the workplace: The changing nature of power and politics in organisational decision-making and management practice. The changing nature of contemporary employee relations; organisational misbehaviour and counter-productive work behaviours.
  • Human capital development: The learning organisation and organisational learning, technology mediated work processes, talent sourcing and human capability and knowledge management; career planning and development, rewards and recognition.
  • Outcomes: Learning from high performance organisations; Engaging employees, employee engagement and discretionary effort; building organisational resilience.

Gender and Crime

Brief description

Learn about the relationship between gender and crime.

Module content: 

  • The feminist critique of criminology: The emergence of the feminist critique and the challenge to the feminine 'other'.
  • Women and crime: The pattern of women's crime. Deviance, femininity and the response to female transgression.
  • Men and crime: Masculinity and crime, crime as structured action, crime as a resource for doing gender. The situational context and crime.

Penal Institutions

Brief description

The prison system, the experience of imprisonment and penal policy and practice in the UK.

Module content:

  • Contemporary developments in penal theory, policy and practice: Penal institutions in contemporary society. The crises of legitimacy in penal institutions. Reorganisation and reform. Privatisation of the prison system.
  • Prison life - the reality: ‘Doing time’ the actuality of prison life, the ‘total institution’? Strategies for survival, regime activities, ‘banged up’ prisoners, prison staff and civilian staff. Dealing with social exclusion. The diversity of the prison population. Stratification and power within prisons.
  • Alternatives to imprisonment - the way forward?: Reducing risk or protecting the public? Reducing fear of crime? Human or humane containment and warehousing. Therapeutic prisons. Electronic tagging, community service orders, mediation/reparation.
  • Attitudes to imprisonment: Why do we have prisons? Why are they at the centre of penal policy? Are they culturally ‘acceptable’? Abolitionism.
  • Foreign nationals: Detention centres; foreign national prisoners and race relations in prisons; are immigration detention centres new types of penal establishments; critical issues surrounding foreign national prisoners in the UK.

Year 4 Core Modules

Choose one of two core modules

Brief description

Conduct and present a simple research investigation into a sociological topic of your choice. Write a 10,000 word dissertation and publicly present your research findings.

Module content:

  • Research design: Selecting the appropriate method for a specified topic and conducting actual research - with guidance from project supervisor.
  • Reviewing literature: Collecting evidence within relevant field of research and its application to the field of study.
  • Analysing and interpreting data: Collecting, dealing with and understanding data; turning data into words and/or numbers - with guidance from project supervisor.
  • Presenting findings: Making research findings ‘public’; writing-up your project - with guidance from project supervisor.

Brief description

A volunteer/work placement with an external organisation over two terms. Learn to apply academic learning to ‘real world’ situations.

Module content:

  • Student defined content: The learning will be shaped by the organisation in which you are placed and the role you are assigned.
  • Work experience: Gain valuable employability skills.
  • Job-seeking skills: Guidance on job applications and CVs are built into the organisation of the module.
  • Research and synthesis: Combine knowledge gained from your placement organisation with academic knowledge from your degree to produce a report.

Year 4 Option Modules

You must study and pass four option modules, two each from your chosen subject pathways, or from the Sociology options. For your two chosen subject pathways, choose one module from Group A and one from Group B. If you wish to graduate with a BA Social Science (with subject) then at least 60 credits must come from the same named subject pathway.

GROUP A

Brief description

The criminal justice system involves a variety of organisations and professionals, e.g. the police, the courts and offender services. How psychological theories and investigation can inform procedures followed in these organisations.

Module content:

  • Introduction and context: An introduction to investigative psychology and the importance of recognising how other people can influence our behaviour and cognitive processes, including an overview of both theory and application of social influence research in this exciting and developing area of applied psychology.
  • Investigative processes: An overview of the key stages and issues in relation to police and wider criminal justice system investigative processes including some of the key legal powers associated with these.
  • Offender profiling: What is offender profiling and how is it undertaken? Evaluate difference approaches to offender profiling and consider the future for this topical approach to investigation. What is serial homicide and how can offender profiling be applied to this major crime?
  • Investigating missing persons: What do missing people do and where do they go? What role is there for psychological theories in explaining missing person behaviour and helping the police investigate cases?
  • Eyewitness testimony: The effects of social influence on memory: stress, suggestibility, alcohol, conformity. Applications of this research to real life (e.g., accuracy of memory in a forensic investigation).
  • Identification: The role of human memory, face processing, and communicative styles on the construction of facial composites and identification of suspects. Discussion of the appropriateness of the use of CCTV footage as evidence in courts of law.
  • False and recovered memories: How and why do people recall events which did not occur or recall events at a later date which they were previously unable to recall? What can the study of human memory tell us about this interesting debate? What implications does this have for the criminal justice system?
  • Interviewing: How should we best interview witnesses to ensure reliable and complete statements are made? What differences might there be in interviewing suspects rather than witnesses? Critical evaluation of the tools and techniques psychologists developed to aid interviewing (e.g. the Cognitive Interview).
  • Child witnesses: What can the study of child development tell us about the appropriateness of having children as witnesses in court? Critical evaluation of appropriate questioning techniques.
  • Expert witnesses: What is/should be the role of the psychologist as an expert witness?

GROUP A

Brief description

Pursue a topic of interest, different from any other work either submitted or proposed, relevant to your work or voluntary experience. Reflect on it, identify an issue that can be informed with reference to published psychological literature, negotiate and agree a chosen area for review. Complete the review and report on it.

Module content:

  • General: Content will be individually agreed dependent on the work or volunteer placement, topic and study plan.

GROUP B

Brief description

Child development in the first eight years covering language development, number and counting knowledge and reading from a cognitive and educational perspective. In addition, look at the influence of play and the media during these early years. 

Module content:

  • Child cognition and brain growth: The development of the brain in early childhood and its links to language and numerical skills.
  • Conceptual issues in learning: Domains (modules), critical periods, learning mechanisms (e.g. statistical learning, bootstrapping, innate constraints), nature-nurture.
  • Speech and sounds: Auditory perception, acquisition of phonemes, and the effects of prosody on acquisition of other parts of the language system.
  • Acquisition of words: Words, concepts and categories. Child-directed speech, literacy acquisition, language impairments.
  • Rules of language: Acquisition of morphology and syntax.
  • Learning to read: Theories of normal reading; dyslexia and hyperlexia.
  • Early numerical skills: Theories of mathematical development; early number and counting skills.
  • The role of play: Play inside and outside the classroom. How play influences cognitive and social development.
  • Media: The role of television viewing and computer games on children’s development.

GROUP A

Brief description

The role of physical activity for special populations. and how participation has the potential to enhance physical, social and mental health and well-being.

Module content:

  • Guidelines: Population physical activity guidelines.
  • Benefits: Physical, social and mental health benefits associated with physical activity.
  • Needs and challenges: Identification of Physical activity needs and challenges associated with engaging different groups in physical activity.
  • Participation: Examine participation trends associated with different populations.
  • Exploration of attitudes, beliefs and values: Exploration of attitudes, beliefs and values of different populations regarding physical activity.

GROUP A

Brief description

Gain knowledge and understanding related to duty of care in sport.

Module content:

  • Safeguarding: What more could be done to strengthen sport’s position in relation to the protection of young people and adults at all levels of sport.
  • Equality, diversity and inclusion: Specific aspects of duty of care with relevance to equality, diversity and inclusion.
  • Injuries: How the likelihood of injury can be lessened and whether improvements can be made to how sporting injuries are treated in the short and long term.
  • Career transitions: The support people receive as they transition through the sport system, including entering and leaving top-level sport.
  • Mental health: Issues relating to the prevention, identification and management of mental health issues in sportspeople.
  • Education: How sportspeople can be supported to help them balance education with their sporting activities.
  • Representation of the participant’s voice: How the views of sportspeople are considered in decisions affecting them in sport.

GROUP B

Brief description

The way sport can be used to address social issues, some of the problems with this approach, and how these issues can be overcome. Gain a theoretical and practical toolkit for sport development work.

Module content:

  • Community development: Introduce a community development approach to sport delivery.
  • Ideologies of sport for development: Explore the political ideologies associated with sport development work.
  • Community practice: Understand the community practice approach to sporting provision.
  • Sport and urban regeneration: Explore the use of sport as a tool of urban development.
  • Sport for development and peace: Explore the use of sport as a tool of international development.
  • Sport, globalisation and development: Explore recent changes in societies and their implications for sport and development.
  • Sport, capitalism and inequality: Explore the links between sport, capitalism and inequality.
  • Liberating education and critical consciousness: Understand the notion of liberating education and how it can be applied to sport development work.
  • The politics of development: Explore the political nature of development work and the utility of social movements for development.

GROUP B

Brief description

Enhance communication skills to support behaviour change intervention strategies to elicit lifestyle change and promote positive health and wellbeing.

Module content:

  • Effective communication, Self-awareness, Listening skills.
  • Management skills: Practicalities of management, administration and organisation of client.
  • Behaviour change: Identify Influences on behaviour. Understanding and assessing behaviour, Individual behaviour and motivation, Determinants and factors that impact on behaviour and motivation.
  • Time management: Aspects of time management. Changing time management. Effective planning.
  • Goal setting: Identifying Goals. Developing Practical Realistic goals. Short long term goals. Achieving goals.
  • Behaviour change models: Models of behaviour change. Social cognitive theory, relapse prevention model, ecological theories of behaviour, stages of readiness. Moderators mediators of change. Behaviour change process.
  • Promoting adherence: Self-efficacy. Social Support. Behaviour change skills, Impact of habitual behaviour, Factors that affect adherence. Overcoming barriers.

GROUP A

Brief description

Undertake some practical research in response to a current business need of a real company and produce a suitable management report with recommendations.

Module content:

  • Analysing a problem: Using different analysis techniques such as data flow diagrams, entity relationship modelling and process mapping, examine problems to better understand the current position of the business.
  • Innovation and innovation techniques: Using different creativity and innovation tools to help find solutions to business problems.
  • Innovation for global growth (IGG): During this event, students will work with multiple organisations - public, private and third sector, on a challenge they currently face. This will provide a scoping opportunity for the problem and a chance to test possible solutions. Prior to this event discussions on professional behaviour and communication will take place.
  • Developing and presenting the solution: Students will take the solutions identified during IGG and further investigate their suitability. They will work to develop one or more solution to provide an implementation plan for the organisation.

GROUP A

Brief description

The challenges of managing in complex international business environments.

Module content:

  • Introduction: The theoretical background: Globalization and international business; Analysis of international external business environment; political factors; economical factors; social factors; technological factors and implications for international managers; International trade theories and practices.
  • International business strategies: Strategy and international business; Country evaluation and selection; Export and Import strategies; Direct investments and collaborative strategies.
  • International and cross-cultural management: International Dimensions of Culture: Understanding various dimensions of culture; Hofstede’s (1980) National Culture Approach and Trompenaars (1993) Cultural Dimensions. Implications for International Managers.
  • Managing in international contexts: Culture and Communications: Understanding of cultural characteristics and how they influence patterns of communications; communication process and important considerations; issues arising from cross-cultural and intercultural communication. Culture and Negotiations: Understanding the relationship between culture and negotiations; how to reconcile possible conflicts regarding differences in culture and negotiations.
  • Contemporary issues in managing international business: Managing international human resources; Managing diversity in international business; Environmental issues and international business; the use of IT in international business and management.

GROUP B

Brief description

The resources and capabilities needed to gain and sustain advantage in competitive markets. Learn to identify tools of strategic analysis, strategic choice available to a firm, and elements and complexities involved in strategy formulation and implementation.

Module content:

  • Introduction to strategic management: What is strategy; strategic analysis; classical and emergent schools; strategic thinking; levels of strategy.
  • Strategy context. Competitive advantage of a firm: Defining the business environment. Industry analysis: turbulences and dynamics. Porter’s five forces; new dynamics in the 21st century.
  • Business level strategy: Sources of competitive advantage: Competitive stance, business level strategy, corporate level strategy; generic strategies; hybrid strategy; value chains.
  • Beyond competition: The nature of competition; co-operation; co-opetition; strategic alliances and joint ventures; mergers and acquisitions.
  • Managing change through effective leadership: Leadership - values and ethics. Managing stakeholders, change and uncertainty. Change management approaches.
  • Individual as a leader: Overview of trait, behavioural and situational theories. Moral aspects of leadership.
  • Leading as a team: Leader’s role, coaching, conflict.
  • Organisational leadership: Charismatic and transformational leadership, crisis leadership.
  • Global and cross-cultural leadership: Leadership in multinational business environment and in the cross-cultural context.
  • Leadership and value creation: The role of leadership in creating value for a competitive advantage, strategy formulation and implementation.

GROUP B

Brief description

How transformational change can be delivered for the purposes of long-term organisational improvements in complex operating contexts.

Module content:

  • Analysing change contexts and drivers: The change context: globalisation, technology, and changing market dynamics; change management and sustainability.
  • Theories of change and approaches to change management: Models of change and change management; trans-formational change and organisations; Critical discourse in change management.
  • Human resources issues in transformative change: Participative change; managing psychological contracts, social identity, stakeholder positioning and dynamics in times of radical change ; voice, dialogue and rethinking resistances in radical change; Culture, habits and unlearning.
  • Transformative change in context: (this will change each year and will form the basis of the guest lectures): Transforming public sector services in times of resources uncertainty (as an example).
  • Leading and managing transformational change: Transactional and transformational leadership; a competency framework for transformational leadership; values and value-based systems in transformational change.

GROUP A

Brief description

Contemporary theoretical approaches in criminology and their application to key issues that characterise contemporary criminal justice policy and practice.

Module content:

  • Contemporary issues in criminal justice policy and practice: Victimology and the ‘victim’; hate crime; semiology; restorative justice – 1.
  • Contemporary issues in criminal justice policy and practice: Community safety; anti-social behaviour; restorative justice – 2.
  • Insecure state: The insecure nature of `policing’ and law making.
  • Antisocial behaviour: Key issues, debates and challenges regarding the regulation of antisocial behaviour.

GROUP A

Brief description

Analysis of the socio-ideological discourses contained in popular cultural narratives that deal with crime, justice, punishment and morality.

Module content:

  • Morbid fascination: The social world, crime and culture.
  • Popular culture and ideologies of crime: The criminal body to the social body in accounts of crime.
  • The emergence of the detective: Modernity and the rise of the detective, from the science of deduction to the hard-boiled tradition and beyond.
  • Crime and the city: The construction of the city as criminogenic; surveillance and danger.
  • Punishment, order and justice: Law versus order, retribution and justice.
  • Moral orders: The criminal as an ambivalent figure, serial killers and modernity.

GROUP B

Brief description

Key issues and debates in policing and criminal justice matters for the 21st century.

Module content:

  • Gang research: What is the issues regarding contemporary research into gangs and violence both in US and UK?
  • Policing gangs: What are the key and emerging tactics that have been developed to deal with gangs and violence over time?
  • Eco crime: Provide an overview of emerging trends in criminology, including eco-crime or environmental crime.
  • Policing borders: How do we deal with cross border issues in policing in a modern and cultural world?
  • Policing immigration: How do we deal with immigration? Is it a crime or a humanitarian problem?
  • State crime: How do we tackle state and corporate crime?

GROUP B

Brief description

Changing attitudes to death, dying and killing. The connections between power and the right to take or preserve life, how death and killing are represented and legitimated in various contexts.

Module content:

  • The death-denial thesis: Changing ideas of death and dying from pre-modernity to postmodernity Death denial and ambivalence the sequestration of death The ‘revival’ of death.
  • Social, political and legal constructions of death: State crime and deviance, militarism.
  • Death and representation: Conflict, commemoration and public memorialising; Death and popular culture, representations of war and death in news.
  • Death and power: The social mechanisms of oppression, consent and legitimation that determine when, how and why people kill and die; Terror Genocide.
  • Bioethics and politics: The sanctity of life versus the quality of life; The politics of ‘ethical’ decisions about life and death; Capital punishment.

GROUP B

Brief description

The principles, practices, applications and critiques of conversation and discourse analysis with respect to the language of crime. Consider philosophical issues, contemporary studies, debates and critiques in relation to crime and other issues.

Module content:

  • Conversation analysis: This aspect of the module considers the roots of conversation analysis in ethnomethodology and the study of social order at the local level. The nature of the conversation analytic approach is examined alongside in terms of classic and contemporary studies. Studies examined include topics such as police interrogations, counsel and witness courtroom interaction, sexual consent and refusals.
  • Discourse analysis: This aspect of the module considers the different approaches to discourse analysis: from conversation analytic to critical approaches. The nature of these are explored through contemporary studies including topics such as: criminal speech acts such as conspiracy, threats, solicitation, swearing and offensive language; police talk about trauma; youth crime in the media; constructing the legitimacy of whistleblowers; phishing emails; the reporting of intimate partner violence.
  • Wittgenstein and Ordinary Language Philosophy: This aspect of the module considers the resurgence of interest in Wittgenstein's approach to language use. The focus here is on the reference to language games and includes consideration of topics such as the law and vagueness; the problem of abusive language, the conceptual instability of consent.

GROUP A

Brief description

Key economic and social processes from a critical sociological perspective.

Module content:

  • Work: Work in classical and contemporary social theory, work or labour, the ontology of labour, abstract and concrete labour, intellectual and manual labour, the accumulation of labour and the degradation of women, unemployment and the refusal of work.
  • Class: The sociological approaches to class from Adam Smith to Max Weber; class and the stratification of British society; class as a critical concept; class, social constitution and the logic of separation.
  • Global economy: Globalisation and critical political economy, Fordism and Post-Fordism, the rise and fall of Keynesianism, Neo-liberalism, the politics of money and the expansion of credit, global capital and crisis.

GROUP B

Brief description

The significance of human rights in the world today. Gain a grounding from a social theoretical perspective, including current debates and trends in human rights. 

Module content:

  • History and theory of human rights: Classical Origins in Greece and Rome, Classical Liberal Thought, The French and American Revolutions, Marx, Critical Social Theory, Postcolonialism.
  • Human rights in transition: Human Rights in Armed Conflict, Responsibility to Protect, Refugees and Asylum Seekers, Genocide and Torture, The International Criminal Court.

GROUP B

Brief description

Culture has become the watchword of our age. Build on earlier level study of the sociology of culture to inform a critique of the relationship between culture, crisis and civilisation.

Module content:

  • Civilisation and crisis: The relationship between the concepts of crisis and civilisation.
  • Civilisation, civil society and the Enlightenment: The role of the concepts of civilisation and civil society in political change and the emergence of the public sphere in Europe and America.
  • Culture and the critique of civilisation: The role of the aesthetic as a special lens for the critique of modernity and morality.
  • Sociology of culture: The role of classical sociology in the crisis of and disenchantment with European civilisation and nationalism.
  • Relational sociology and culture: A sociology of cultural relations turns attention to issues of power, process, symbolic and physical violence, and the roles of nationalism, economy and the state.

How the Course Works

Learning and Assessment 

The diversity of our social science programme is its strength.   

Reflecting its range of subject areas, this degree also offers a wide variety of teaching and assessment styles. 

This includes formal lectures and tutorials, industry placements, sports science laboratories, essays, business portfolios, and psychological testing.

A wide variety of assessments will be used to assess you throughout your degree, including essays, reports, critical reviews, case studies, examinations, presentations and the opportunity to do a final year dissertation or a community work placement.

Around a third of the course is assessed through examination, although the precise proportion will be dependent on your module choices.

Entry Requirements

Please note: September entry to this course is available to Year 4 only with the appropriate qualifications.

Qualification Grade Requirement Essential Subjects
Ordinary Degree in Learning Disabilities/Difficulties from Fife College Pass Learning Disabilities/Difficulties from Fife College
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Support for Ukrainian students

We're keen to offer help to Ukrainian students who may wish to transfer from their existing institution in Ukraine or to register with us as new students for intake in September. There will be no tuition fees charged for the duration of the degree programme, as those with refugee status are treated as ‘Home/Scottish’ students and will also have access to the Student Awards Agency for Scotland bursary and student loans. Our Recruitment Team can help guide applicants.

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Not sure if you're eligible for entry?

If you have the potential and motivation to study at university, regardless of your background or personal circumstances, we welcome your application.

We understand some people have faced extra challenges before applying to university, which is why we consider the background in which your academic grades have been achieved when making an offer.

If you expect to receive passes in three Scottish Highers (grades A-C) and have either ...

  • been in care
  • participated in a targeted aspiration-raising programme such as LIFT OFF, LEAPS, FOCUS West, or Aspire North
  • no family background of going to university
  • attended a school or lived in an area where not many people go to university

... we encourage you to submit an application.

Fees and funding

The course fees you'll pay and the funding available to you depends on factors such as your nationality, location, personal circumstances and the course you are studying. 

More information

Find out about grants, bursaries, tuition fee loans, maintenance loans and living costs in our undergraduate fees and funding section.

 

Scholarships

We offer a range of scholarships to help support your studies with us.

As well as Abertay scholarships for English, Welsh, Northern Irish and international students, there are a range of corporate and philanthropic scholarships available. Some are course specific, many are not. There are some listed below or you can visit the Undergraduate scholarship pages.

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Abertay RUK Scholarship: Science and Social Science

A scholarship for prospective undergraduate Science and Social Science students applying from England, Wales or Northern Ireland.

Abertay International Scholarship

This is an award of up to £12,000 for prospective international undergraduate students.

The Robert Reid Bursary

Two £1,000 awards for students who have overcome challenges to attend university.

Career Opportunities

This degree prepares you for people-oriented jobs that require an understanding of how people think and act, and have high levels of interaction with others.

Our graduates have successfully gone into diverse fields such as social work, community education, teaching, care services, the police service and public relations work.

We’re proud of our social science graduates who leave us with the ability to ask more questions than when they arrive. Our aim is not simply to produce graduates who ‘know’ the world, but who can interrogate ideas and generate creative and novel ways of dealing with issues and problems.

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Industry Links

A significant feature of the BA Social Science programme is its emphasis on skills required for the workplace.

This culminates with the opportunity to complete a final year placement module that enables you to put your acquired knowledge and abilities to use in a workplace suited to your individual skills and interests.

You’ll be placed with a third sector, NGO employer in your final year, giving you experience of the world of work first hand, in preparation for your graduation and entry into employment.

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Get inspired

Meet some of our Social Sciences graduates and find out what they've gone on to do.

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Evie Dalrymple

Evie works as a Prison Psychologist at the Scottish Prison Service.

Find out more

Vikki in FIFA Assistant Referee uniform holding a whistle and cards

Vikki Allan

Vikki is a Service Delivery Manager and FIFA Assistant Referee.

Find out more

A photo of David Proctor in a shirt

David Proctor

David realised journalism was the right pathway for him during his time at university.

Find out more

Unistats

Unistats collates comparable information in areas students have identified as important in making decisions about what and where to study. The core information it contains is called the Unistats dataset (formerly the Key Information Set (KIS)).

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