The Department of Psychology
The Department of Psychology at Stellenbosch University has among the most productive academic psychologists in South Africa on its staff, several of whom have won prestigious awards and grants for their teaching and research. We are committed to conducting research, teaching, practice, and community service of the highest possible standard. As such, we continually measure our scholarly output against the best in the world. Our staff and students have published in the highest-ranking international academic journals and several former students have taken up positions in prestigious institutions in South Africa and around the world. Our department offers undergraduate modules in psychology, leading to a major in the discipline, and postgraduate training leading to registration as a psychologist. We also offer thesis-based research training leading towards the masters and doctoral degree. Our teaching and research programmes focus on key psychosocial issues affecting South Africa and the African continent. We are committed to contributing to the social relevance of psychology as a discipline and a profession in an academically rigorous and critical manner.
A teaching department
The psychology department is the biggest department in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences in terms of student numbers. We currently have 1200 first year students, 800 2nd-years students, 600 third year students, 37 honours students (that is obviously when selection starts), 8 clinical masters students, 40 research masters students and 40 doctoral students.
A research department
Our growth as a research department has been substantial and we have become a world-renowned and internationally acclaimed research department. Many staff members are part of local, national and global research networks. The Department participates in research with a number of partners in both the global north and in the global south, as well as with international agencies such as the World Health Organization.
A community service department
Applied psychology has been a focus of the Psychology Department since the establishment of the Masters degrees in Clinical Psychology and Counselling Psychology in 1973. These prorammes were merged into one Masters programme in 2005. In the Masters Programme in Clinical Psychology between eight and ten students are annually trained as clinical psychologists and are able to register with the HPCSA as clinical psychologists in training.
Latest News
Universiteitseminaar: Die US, rassisme en die toekoms
Chair of the psychology department and member of African Thought, Desmond Painter, published this article on racism at Stellenbosch University which can be accessed here: Universiteitseminaar: Die US, rassisme en die toekoms. An English translation [...]
Podcast: Loving Men with Kopano Ratele
The prevalence of and fear of gender-based violence really cannot be overstated. The statistics and stories and experiences invade our lives, we encounter it in the news, fiction and non-fiction. For every story we read [...]
Book Review: Why Men Hurt Women and Other Reflections on Love, Violence and Masculinity
Why Men Hurt Women and Other Reflections on Love, Violence and Masculinity by Kopano Ratele Publication Date: 1st Sep 2022 Publisher: Wits University Press This book seeks to imagine the possibility of a more loving masculinity [...]
Book Review: How I Lost My Mother – A Story of Life, Care and Dying
Does life writing offer opportunities to reveal something about the nature of care? Leslie Swartz’s award-winning book, How I Lost My Mother (2021), illuminates many insights about the nature of care. The book tells, among [...]
Making space for the unusual: A career in disability studies
One day, long after A-rated researcher Prof Leslie Swartz of Stellenbosch University’s (SU’s) Department of Psychology has retired, a practical symbol of his dedication to the disability cause will remain: an elevator in the Krotoa [...]
News 24: Where do we begin in making mental health and wellbeing a global priority for all?
Prioritising mental health is becoming more important than ever in the face of ongoing global health such as economic and social inequalities but addressing these problems can also make finding solutions seem like an insurmountable [...]