Cognitive Science M.S.

The Cognitive Science Department offers a Master of Science degree in Cognitive Science. The degree is open only to two groups of students. The first group is those who are already admitted to Rensselaer in a doctoral program. This includes students in the Cognitive Science doctoral program as well as students in other doctoral programs (e.g., Decision Sciences and Engineering Systems, Computer Science, and so on). Rensselaer doctoral students who desire a Master’s in Cognitive Science should contact the department directly. Other students able to obtain a Master of Science degree in Cognitive Science are those in the five-year program that combines the Bachelor of Science in Psychology or Philosophy with the Cognitive Science master’s degree. 

Outcomes of the Graduate Curriculum

The successful student in the Master of Science in Cognitive Science program will:

• cultivate a mentor-mentee relationship with a faculty member in that faculty’s area of expertise.
• demonstrate mastery of the research literature most relevant to the topic.
• demonstrate understanding of the methodological approaches most appropriate to the topic as well as the threats to the reliability and validity of these approaches.
• conduct some combination of problem analysis, data collection, data analysis, and/or modeling (as appropriate to the question of interest) under the guidance of the faculty adviser.
• produce a written Master’s Thesis following the form and format expected by other researchers in the area of interest (in consultation with the faculty adviser).
• present and defend the thesis in an oral presentation that is open to the academic community.