BA in Criminal Psychology

This course provides an Introduction to the Criminal Justice System, including its basic components: policing, the courts, and corrections. The primary goal is for students to develop a basic understanding of the justice system and its response to crime at the State and Federal levels. This class explores historical and emerging issues involved with the nature and measurement of crimes, patterns of offenders, and victimization.

This course will provide an in-depth examination of the crimes and actions most encountered by the private industry and the public law enforcement officer. We will also examine recent court decisions. Students will become acquainted with concepts of search and seizure, individual restraint, and limitations of personal freedom and expression.

This course will focus on the development of the skills necessary to elicit information from victims, potential witnesses and/or offenders. Topics include the art of interviewing, deception detection, and the use of legal and ethical interrogation techniques to obtain factual information regarding a crime. You will learn critical listening and questioning skills and sharpen their application through practical exercises in class and field assignments.

Within the field of criminal justice, it is necessary to understand why some people commit crimes and others do not. Crime rates throughout the world are continuously monitored and everyone wants to know the profile of the typical offender; yet it is relevant that we explore the principles and theories that correlate with crime rates and its offenders. This course will explore historical and contemporary theories of the causes of crime; including theories derived from biological, psychological, sociological, geographic, economic, and political perspectives.

Forensic psychology offers fascinating insights into the origins and motives of criminal behaviors and the practical applications of psychological principles. Perhaps you want to be a forensic psychologist, or maybe you are just curious about how people behave in criminal and legal settings, and why they behave in these ways. Either way this course is designed to meet your need for information. It provides a comprehensive overview of forensic psychology, bridges the gap between research and application, and explores the 'mystique' that surrounds the topics of the field. Through a focus on global research, examples, and real-life cases studies, you will learn about fascinating topics such as the reliability of eyewitness testimony, indicators of deception and methods of lie detection, the willingness of innocent people to confess to crimes, and our ability to profile and capture offenders. Disclaimer: In this course you will be viewing and reading material that contains profane language and, in some cases, sexual content, racist stereotypes, and references to drug abuse/use. Should there be things you feel uncomfortable with reading or viewing - then this course may not be suitable for you.

This course's purpose is to develop knowledge of when to apply the correct statistical techniques. Emphasis is placed on the "real world" applications of statistical methods through projects. Topics include descriptive and inferential statistics, multivariate, parametric, and nonparametric techniques. This course makes extensive use of statistical analysis software. This course is a core requirement for all psychology majors, is the prerequisite for Applied Research Methods II, and is offered in the fall semester.

The major forms of abnormal behavior are described. They are discussed in light of an integrative bio-social model. Disorders include anxiety disorders, personality disorders, sexual deviance, and dysfunction, dissociate and somatoform disorders, mood disorders, childhood disorders, substance use disorders, schizophrenia, and cognitive disorders. Treatment approaches are discussed as well.

Students will integrate the knowledge they have accumulated in their first three years as psychology majors through the development and investigation of their own applied psychology hypotheses. In collaboration with the instructor and classmates, students will proceed through the stages of research from hypothesis development to literature review, to proposing their research methods, to data collection, with their semester-long project culminating in a written APA (American Psychological Association) format research paper and presentation of findings via a faculty-judged poster session. This course is offered in the spring semester and is a core requirement for all psychology majors and satisfies that program writing intensive and information literacy and experiential learning requirements.

Students engage in individually supervised work-study arrangements and learn to apply criminal psychological theory and principles in a work environment. Students must work at least 10 hours per week on the job, meet periodically with a supervising faculty member, research literature related to the field of the internship, and prepare a substantive report on their internship experiences and the studies involved.

The United States Constitution is the operating manual of our government. This course examines how the criminal justice system is underpinned by that great document. Since the United States Constitution determines the processes and definitions of Criminal and Social Justice in our society, it is necessary to study the history and origins of applicable legal doctrines as they relate to the practices of today's criminal justice system. We will utilize court cases involving the constitutionality of the administration of justice. We will examine these topics in a layered approach incorporating legal, empirical, and policy implementations. Ethical, procedural, and political issues will also be examined and debated.

Specialty courts are defined as those courts that provide custom treatment to specific challenges, such as drugs, veterans, mental health, homeless, domestic abuse, etc. This course examines how specialty courts operate within the criminal justice system. Emphasis is placed on the definitions and processes of specialty courts within both the Commonwealth of MA and the United States. We will utilize court cases to explore specialty courts in depth and will provide experiential learning opportunities for students to immerse themselves within specialty courts.