Animal Behavior Major
The Department of Psychology at UNE's coastal Maine campus in Biddeford offers a major in Animal Behavior. There are only six universities in the United States to offer this degree at the undergraduate level.
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This interdisciplinary major draws on course-work from biology, chemistry, neuroscience, and psychology and helps students understand how animals behave, how these behaviors develop, and the mechanisms, explanations and consequences of these behaviors.
The Animal Behavior degree will make graduates marketable in both the areas of psychology and the biological sciences, and help prepare them for careers in zoos, aquariums, wildlife management and veterinary hospitals.
Upon graduation, students in animal behavior may also pursue graduate programs in biology, zoology, wildlife management, aquarium sciences and veterinary sciences.
Pre-Veterinary Medicine
While specific course prerequisites vary depending upon the graduate program, by strategically choosing elective courses to complement the major requirements for the Animal Behavior major, students may complete all of the prerequisites for veterinary school admission while completing this program. More information on pre-health professions and pre-veterinarian medicine.
The Program
Animal behavior involves the investigation of how an organism relates to its environment - comprised of both physical and social factors - and includes a wide variety of topics, from finding food to achieving dominance, that all influence an organism's ability to survive and reproduce.It is by its very nature interdisciplinary, drawing on techniques and concepts from multiple diverse fields such as psychology and neuroscience.
Through studying psychology (the study of behavior and mental processes) and biology (the study of the living world), you can understand how animals behave, how these behaviors develop and the mechanisms, explanations and consequences of these behaviors.
Answers to the mechanisms of behavior include not only how external stimuli in the environment affect behavior but also how the internal hormonal and neural mechanisms mediate animal behavior.
Students often enter UNE thinking they want to major in marine biology, but some students transfer majors to Animal Behavior after a short time because they find that they are mostly interested in training, managing and influencing marine animal behavior. If this is your passion, Animal Behavior might be the right major for you.
The Department also offers a minor in Animal Behavior to students in other departments or majors.
See the Catalog for specifics on major and minor in Animal Behavior Curriculum
