2025 Best General Psychology Doctor's Degree Schools in California

If you pursue a doctor's degree in general psychology, you won't be alone. The field of study is the #20 most popular program in the country. This makes choosing the right school a hard decision.

For its 2025 ranking, College Factual looked at 3 schools in California to determine which ones were the best for general psychology students pursuing a doctor's degree. When you put them all together, these colleges and universities awarded 174 doctor's degrees in general psychology during the 2022-2023 academic year.

Jump to one of the following sections: * Our Methodology

• Best Doctor’s Degree Schools List

Choosing a Great General Psychology School for Your Doctor's Degree

Your choice of general psychology for getting your doctor's degree school matters. This section explores some of the factors we include in our ranking and how much they vary depending on the school you select. When choosing a school we recommend considering some of the following factors:

Quality Overall Is Important

The overall quality of a doctor's degree school is important to ensure a quality education, not just how well they do in a particular major. To make it into this list a school must rank well in our overall Best Colleges for a Doctor's Degree ranking. This ranking considered factors such as graduation rates, overall graduate earnings and other educational resources to identify great colleges and universities.

Other Factors We Consider

In addition to the above, you should consider some of the following factors:

• Major Focus - How much a school focuses on general psychology students vs. other majors.
• Major Demand - The number of general psychology students who choose to seek a doctor's degree at the school.
• Educational Resources - The amount of money and other resources allocated to students while they are pursuing their degree. These resources include such things as number of students per instructor and education expenditures per student.
• Accreditation - Whether a school is regionally accredited and/or accredited by a recognized general psychology related body.

Our complete ranking methodology documents in more detail how we consider these factors to identify the best schools for general psychology students working on their doctor's degree.

More Ways to Rank General Psychology Schools

Since the program you select can have a significant impact on your future, we've developed a number of rankings, including this Best General Psychology Doctor's Degree Schools in California list, to help you choose the best school for you.

Best Schools for Doctorate Students to Study General Psychology in California

The following list ranks the best colleges and universities for pursuing a doctor's degree in general psychology.

Top California Schools for a Doctorate in Psychology

1

University of California - Los Angeles
Los Angeles, CA

Doctor's Degree Highest Degree Type

28 Annual Graduates

It is difficult to beat University of California - Los Angeles if you wish to pursue a doctor's degree in general psychology. Located in the city of Los Angeles, UCLA is a public university with a very large student population.More information about a doctorate in general psychology from University of California - Los Angeles

2

University of California - Davis
Davis, CA

Doctor's Degree Highest Degree Type

19 Annual Graduates

University of California - Davis is a great decision for students interested in a doctor's degree in general psychology. Located in the small suburb of Davis, UC Davis is a public university with a very large student population.More information about a doctorate in general psychology from University of California - Davis

3

Northcentral University
San Diego, CA

Doctor's Degree Highest Degree Type

54 Annual Graduates

It's difficult to beat Northcentral University if you wish to pursue a doctor's degree in general psychology. Located in the large city of San Diego, Northcentral University is a private not-for-profit university with a large student population.More information about a doctorate in general psychology from Northcentral University

Best General Psychology Colleges in the Far Western US Region

Explore all the Best General Psychology Colleges in the Far Western US Area or other specific states within that region.

State	Colleges	Degrees Awarded
Washington	216	20
Oregon	145	7
Nevada	111	12
Hawaii	65	8
Alaska	21	10

View All Rankings >

Rankings in Majors Related to Psychology

General Psychology is one of 0 different types of General Psychology programs to choose from.

Notes and References

• The bars on the spread charts above show the distribution of the schools on this list +/- one standard deviation from the mean.
• The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), a branch of the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) serves as the core of the rest of our data about colleges.
• Some other college data, including much of the graduate earnings data, comes from the U.S. Department of Education’s (College Scorecard).
• Credit for the banner image above goes to BruceBlaus. More about our data sources and methodologies.