Become a Psychologist

An can be the doorway to a career in detective work, forensics or law. These career areas need people who can understand the mind of criminals and psychopaths. In addition to general criminal psychology degrees, specialized ones also exist, such as the forensics psychology degree, forensics mental health counseling degree and the police counseling degree. All these majors focus on the pathology of the criminal mind. In all these majors, online enrollees study human development, personality development, abnormal behavior, social influences on behavior, mental disorders, forensics psychology and case studies of known criminals, particularly serial killers. Students must also take a range of justice courses, including those on criminal law, criminal investigation, crimes against children and the judicial process. Through this coursework, students learn how to profile criminals, how to recognize the formation of criminal patterns and motives, how psychology affects witnesses’ memories and testimonies and how to distinguish between different types of legal insanity.

A bachelor’s degree in criminal psychology typically requires roughly 20 credit hours of psychology and 30 to 35 credit hours of criminal justice courses. General education classes are also necessary for undergraduates. At the graduate level, a master’s degree in criminal psychology requires roughly 35 credit hours of highly focused psychology and law courses.

When narrowing school choices down to those with the best online criminal psychology degree programs, explore the resources available for online study. While most schools use textbooks, websites and chat rooms for around-the-clock access to instruction, highly accredited schools also use tools like audio lecture recordings and videos to appeal to those who are audio-visual learners.