MA

The regular program towards an M.A. degree:

The program applies to each one of the subprograms and should be fulfilled in a maximum of 3 years. In the first two years, the students attend the subprograms' mandatory and elective courses, in addition to a departmental course in statistics and computer methods (attached below is a detailed curriculum).

Each student should find an advisor from the faculty staff, and prepare a thesis research proposal until the beginning of the second year.

The final thesis has to be submitted until the end of the third year. Students who finish their coursework and defend their thesis successfully receive the M.A degree in psychology.

 

The graduate program of the psychology department includes separate subprograms:

  1. Clinical psychology
  2. Social-Organizational psychology
  3. Cognition ,emotion and brain (CEB)

Application procedure

The first two steps are valid to all subprograms and to both degree programs (M.A. program and PhD. program)

  1. The official application to the university is done through the university's M.A. committee. The student must purchase the application forms at the university store, fill out his/her details, and send the forms to the M.A. committee.
  2. Recommendation letters:

If you are applying to one of the clinical subprograms, you will have to submit one academic recommendation letter and another recommendation letter from a clinical professional with whom you have worked.

If you are applying to the Social-Organizational or the Experimental subprograms, you will only need two academic recommendations. 

The recommendations should be filled out on a specific form and should be sent directly from the recommender to the department. The form is the same for all psychology departments in Israel, and can be found here.

The student is the sole responsible for making sure his/her recommendation letters are sent. No automatic recommendations are sent, even for Bar-Ilan undergraduates.

Admission conditions

  1. Finishing all the requirements for a B.A in psychology.
  2. All the subprograms require an average grade of at least 90 in the B.A, except for the Experimental subprogram which requires an 85 average at least.

Undergraduates that majored in behavioral sciences other than psychology may apply only to the Experimental subprogram. Such candidates will be accepted based on their personal achievement, and they will be assigned additional coursework on a case-by-case basis, according to their academic background.  

  1. A grade of at least 90 for the Experimental subprogram, and at least 100 for the other subprograms, in the MITAM – the Israeli test for graduate degrees in psychology. Any student can take this test, starting at the end of the second year of undergraduate psychology studies. International undergraduate students can be accepted on the basis of their GRE-Psychology instead of the MITAM.
  2. As mentioned before, the clinical subprograms require two recommendation letters: one from an academic faculty member who is familiar with the candidate, and one from a clinical practitioner with whom the candidate has worked. The Social-Organizational and Experimental subprograms require two academic recommendation letters. The designated recommendation form can be found here.
  3. If you are applying to one of the clinical subprograms you must fill the personal questionnaire that can be found here. If you are applying to the Experimental subprogram you have to write an essay about your research purposes/interests. There is no need to fill any additional forms if you are applying to the Social-Organizational subprogram.
  4. Only 20% of applicants will be called in for an interview based on the decisions of the departmental admissions committee (there are no interviews for the Social-Organizational subprogram).
  5. Only the Experimental subprogram can be selected as a second option on the application form.

Guidelines for candidates graduating abroad - GRE

Candidates who graduated, or are about to graduate, in an academic institution outside of Israel, and which is approved by the Israeli Committee for Higher Education, are required to take the GRE-Psychology test (www.gre.org), and score at least 650 pts in order to be accepted.

In addition, these candidates have to provide proof of their B.A. degree, including an official transcript. The admissions committee will examine these items, and may ask for the exact syllabi of the courses in order to approve.  

Preliminary conditions

All candidates have to have completed a B.A. in psychology as a major from Bar-Ilan University, or from any other university in Israel or abroad. Students from universities other than Bar-Ilan might be asked for additional coursework, depending on the courses they have taken during their undergraduate studies. The clinical subprograms require that the candidate has taken the following courses during his or her undergraduate studies: psychopathology or abnormal psychology, personality theories, and developmental psychology.