Psychology Combined Majors

An undergraduate degree in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences requires that a student complete at least 120 credit hours in courses. Typically, a student will dedicate about 40 hours to a major, about 35 credit hours to courses in the core curriculum, and the remaining 45 credit hours to other, “elective” courses. This provides a student with several options:

  • The student may use all 45 credit hours to sample courses in a broad range of fields, thus contributing to the student’s general education.
  • The student may use about 20 of these credit hours to complete a minor in a second discipline, leaving about 25 truly elective credit hours.
  • A student may use almost all of these 45 credit hours to complete a second major, specializing in two disciplines, but leaving little opportunity for a broader education.

The Combined Major provides a fourth option—one that may be preferable to any of those above. Combined majors require more coursework than a regular major, but less coursework than completing a major in each subject area separately (i.e., double majoring). Students completing a combined major receive one degree in a combination of disciplines rather than two degrees in different disciplines.

A student in a Combined Major completes about 30 credit hours—the most important courses—in each of two disciplines. A student with such a degree is often more appealing to a prospective employer or graduate program than a student with a major in one discipline and a minor in the other (even though the Combined Major requires the same number of credit hours as a major in one field and a minor in the other).

For course descriptions, visit the online Class Search. Visit LAS Core Curriculum for general LAS degree requirements.

The information found on this website with respect to major/minor/program requirements is primarily directed at providing prospective students a general roadmap of the curriculum.  Current Butler students are expected to review their degree audit report at my.butler.edu and speak with their advisor regularly for detailed information regarding their specific degree requirements and their progress toward degree completion.