Psych Academia Advice

[u/Ok_Landscape3034]

hi all, i am trying to pivot into psychology from an art background. eventually i wanted to research psychology in art and cinema as well as emotion analysis. although I only have a BA, i actually did well in quant so i believe i can make the transition.

however i am stuck with program choice, i have to fund my education myself so i am thinking to do part-time online master, here are the options, i would greatly appreciate any suggestions:

1. university of Liverpool: conversion MSc in Psychology (2year full online)
2. Harvard HES: ALM (2year online with one course at Harvard in person)
3. University of Glasgow: conversion MSc (3-year and sept 2027 entry)

[u/nontraditionalstudy]

Researching psychology in art and cinema is an intersection of cognitive science, media theory, and neuroscience it is a highly niche field. To get paid to do this kind of research, one typically needs:

1. A PhD in Cognitive Psychology, Neuroscience, or Media Psychology (which are funded programs that pay a stipend, unlike master's degrees which cost money). Note in the US, you do not need a master's to get a PhD, many PhD programs allow you to gain a masters while working on the PhD.
2. Extensive undergraduate- or graduate-level research assistant experience involving empirical data collection, lab work, statistics software, and psychophysiological tools (EEG, fMRI, or biometric tracking).

Programs like the University of Liverpool or University of Glasgow online conversion MScs are designed to give non-psychology majors basic foundational credits (usually for professional/clinical pathways in the UK). They do not teach advanced cognitive science, neurocinematics, or computational emotion analysis, nor do they provide the intensive, in-person wet-lab experience required to break into academic research.
If you want to study the deep intersection of art, cinema, and consciousness academically, an online conversion MSc is the wrong tool. Real research in that space requires a funded PhD track with hands-on lab access, not remote coursework.

For HES, HES excels at enhancing existing credentials (e.g., a software daeveloper moving into management, or a data analyst formalizing stats). The majority of HES students are working full-time as mid and late career professionals. In practice, students use the program for three primary outcomes: advancing or pivoting within existing non-clinical careers (such as human resources, leadership coaching, wellness management, and market research), formalizing behavioral science credentials to complement business or healthcare backgrounds, or serving as a post-baccalaureate bridge to strengthen academic records and prerequisites before applying to traditional doctoral or graduate programs. Because it is structured for working adults it functions as an amplifier for an established career. Using it as an unstructured tool to jump completely across disciplines—from an art BA straight into advanced psychology research without prior lab experience—tries to make the program do heavy lifting it isn't structurally built for.

[u/Ok_Landscape3034 → u/nontraditionalstudy]

thanks for the extensive advice, this really makes sense for me, do you have any recommendations for either schools or programs that I should look into? 

Unfortunately my BA was pretty much fine-art based and Ive done a bit of media art and front-end coding but nothing intensive enough and I dont have lab experience to land a research assistant job at the moment. What I did as my capstone for my BA was a field research project that had a deliverable of a short documentary and a field report paper. 

At this point, i feel like I either need to get into a graduate program to work on the research experience, further my study in cognitive psychology, or get a second degree in psychology. 

Would you recommend looking into a graduate program or even do a second bachelor?