MSc Social and Public Communication

About the MSc programmes

To be considered for a place you should normally have a good honours degree in one of the social sciences and have relevant professional experience.

This programme will explore communication as a social psychological process central to the conduct of everyday life. Communication is both the foundation of social life as well as a professional activity to influence and persuade, to gain advantage, to build and sustain trust, and to reach a common understanding on a controversial issue. You will be provided with an overview of various theories of public communication that enable you to analyse communication events and the practical dilemmas faced by those working in different domains of public communication. Central themes will include:

• The psychological and societal process involved in public communication.
• Conceptual frameworks for analysis, evaluation and design of public communication.
• Developments in the analysis, evaluation and design of public communication in politics, business, development, health and science and technology.

The programme is not simply a training programme in social marketing offering you a box of tools and tricks for efficient and effective persuasion. It is an academic, research based programme that will enable you, through a range of core and topical courses to engage critically with existing tools of analysis, evaluation and design of communication endeavours. We offer a comparative approach across a range of domains where public communication is pivotal. This includes an awareness of international attempts to establish professional competence in public communication. The programme is exclusively recognised by the professional certification of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations.

The programme involves completing four course units, including a research report of 10,000 words.

Graduates can find employment in a range of fields involving public communication including consultancy, journalism, publishing, advertising, public relations, education and international organisations. Several former graduates have created their own business.

Compulsory courses

(* half unit)

• Social Psychology of Communication
• Fundamental Research Methods for Social Psychology* or another approved methodology course  
• Research Report

Options

Options will allow students to specialise in communication issues arising in health communication, corporate communication, science and technology communications, inter-cultural encounters. Choose courses to the value of one and a half units:

• Social Representations*
• Current Communication Research*
• The Social Psychology of Economic Life*
• Social Psychology of Health Communication*
• Issues in Social Psychology: Evolutionary and Social Psychology*
• Knowledge Processes in Organisations*
• Representations, Institutions and Communities*
• Corporate Communications*
• Science, Technology and Resistance* 
• Organisational and Social Decision Making*
• Issues in Organisational and Social Psychology: Organisational Life*
• Psychoanalysis and Communication*
• Cognition and Culture*
• Inter-cultural Relations and Racism*
• Theory and Practice of Organisational Development*
• Societal Psychology*
• Consumer Psychology* 
• A half unit from another programme (with approval) including additional research methods

Not all these courses may be available in any one year.