University of Colorado Denver College of Liberal Arts and SciencesUniversity of Colorado Denver

Ph.D. Program Course Work

Prerequisite Coursework

  • A minimum of 15 hours of coursework at the college senior or graduate level in social or behavioral sciences (sociology, psychology and/or anthropology);
  • A minimum of 6 hours of coursework at the college senior or graduate level in human biology or physiology;
  • A minimum of 3 hours of statistics or biostatistics at the college senior or graduate level. Course content will include probability theory, parametric and non-parametric methods and acquaintance with basic multivariate techniques;
  • One course in basic epidemiology. All students are now required to have completed this prerequisite prior to beginning the program.

The maximum number of transfer credits shall be 9 hours. Courses taken anywhere in the CU system are considered to be resident, not transfer, and therefore fall outside of the limits on transfer credits. All requests to transfer credits (or to use University credits taken prior to admission to the Program) must be approved by the HBS Faculty Executive Committee.

THE CURRICULUM

There are three dimensions to the required curriculum:

  • A problem-oriented, interdisciplinary and practicum-oriented approach to theory and method (26 semester hours)
  • Elective course work intended to provide the student with a solid base from which to launch the dissertation research (at least 6 semester hours);
  • Dissertation research and writing (at least 30 semester hours).

Theory and Method Core Course Requirements (26 semester hours)

The core curriculum should be completed by students by the end of their second year of full-time study. It consists of the following series of courses which, together, constitute 26 credit hours:

I. Health and Behavioral Sciences Colloquium: HBSC 7001. Each fall, the HBSC program will organize a series of presentations by scholars working in the health and behavioral sciences. The presentations provide students with the most current science and theory in the field. Required of all first- and second-year students. (2 credit hours)

II. Theoretical Perspectives in the Health and Behavioral Sciences: HBSC 7011, 7021, and 7071. This series is designed to give students a thorough background in how the principles of the social and behavioral sciences have been applied to health issues. Topics include: the interplay between structure and agency in creating and maintaining health; social epidemiology; critical theory and social determinants of health; issues affecting Western biomedicine and
public health systems; diffusion of healthy behavioral change among populations; social construction of health and illness; health policy and bioethics; social networks; and stress. (9 credit hours)

III. Human Ecology and Environmental Adaptation: HBSC 7031. This course focuses primarily on the interplay of biology, environment, and culture in the causes and exacerbation of disease. This course will emphasize the biological/physiological dimensions of human health and disease. The course includes the following topics: health within environmental and evolutionary contexts; models of causation in biomedicine and other medical systems; individual, community, and population manifestations of health and disease; and biocultural interaction in disease processes. Specific case studies drawn from contemporary health problems will be used to illustrate in detail the nature of these processes. (3 credit hours)

IV. Research Design, Methods, and Analytic Procedures in the Health and Behavioral Sciences: HBSC 7041, 7051, and one additional advanced methods course of student’s choosing. This series covers the philosophy of science and the structure of scientific inquiry, procedures for hypothesis-testing, quantitative
and qualitative methodological strategies commonly employed in the field, epidemiology, and program evaluation. Students must further develop specialized methodological skills by completing an independent study (HBSC 6840) or taking one additional course in advanced epidemiology, advanced biostatistics, health economics, survey research design, or qualitative methods and data analysis. This requirement will be tailored specifically to the student’s particular interests by his/her advisor. (9 credit hours)
V. Applications of the Social and Behavioral Sciences to Health Issues: HBSC 7111. This course offers students the opportunity to focus on individual research interests with guidance from faculty and input from peers. (3 credit hours)

Electives

Each student will develop a research application by means of additional coursework in an area or areas related to the student’s selected doctoral thesis research topic. Students must take a minimum of 6 hours of elective coursework. HBSC offers a variety of electives each semester; students should consult the catalog and on-line schedule listings. The electives listed below are intended to give prospective students an idea of the range of courses from which students may choose. Elective courses other than those listed here may be taken upon consultation with the student's advisor.

Downtown Denver Campus:

  • HBSC 5001 Introduction to Epidemiology (can be used to meet program prerequisites in epidemiology)
  • HBSC 5014 Global Health Studies I: Biocultural Basis of Health
  • HBSC 5024 Global Health Studies II: Comparative Health Systems
  • HBSC 5xxx Community Health Assessment
  • HBSC 5060 Evolutionary Medicine
  • HBSC 5080 Global Health Practice
  • HBSC 5090 Political Economy of Drug Culture
  • HBSC 6/7320 Human Genetics: Legal, Ethical, Social Issues
  • HBSC 7210 Human Health and Environmental Pollution
  • HBSC 7235 GIS Applications in the Health Sciences
  • HBSC 7310 Environmental Epidemiology
  • HBSC 7400 Topics in the Health and Behavioral Sciences
  • HBSC 7340 Risk Assessment
  • HBSC 7360 Toxicology
  • HBSC 7420 Violence Prevention: A Systems Perspective
  • URP 6640 Community Development Process
  • URP 6641 Social Planning
  • ANTH 5560 Human Ecology
  • ANTH 5520 Human Biological Variation
  • ANTH 6040-Advanced Topics in Medical Anthropology
  • BIOL 5154 Environmental Ecology
  • BIOL 5165 Neurobiology
  • ECE 5090 Neuromotor Development/Disorders in Young Children
  • ECE 6100 Medical/Physiological Aspects of Devel. Disabilities
  • GEOG/HBSC 5235/7235
  • GIS Applications in Health Sciences
  • HLTH 6010 Health Care Systems PAD 7350 Program Evaluation
  • PAD 7615 Health Policy
  • PAD 7617 Health Economics
  • PAD 7633 Seminar: Natural Resource/ Environ Health Law
  • PHIL 5242 Bioethics
  • PSY 5150 Seminar on Organizational Psychology
  • SOC 5290 Seminar: Sociology of Aging

Health Sciences Campus (9th & Colorado)

  • PRMD 6606 Community Health Practice
  • PRMD Community Diagnosis
  • PRMD 6629 Clinical Epidemiology: Studies in Diagnosis, Prognosis and Treatment
  • PRMD 6614 Introduction to Occupational/Environmental Health
  • PRMD 6636 Chronic Disease Epidemiology
  • BIOM 6648 Design of Experiments and Clinical Trials
  • PATH 7600 Mechanisms and Models of Disease
  • PRMD 6603 Health Care Systems
  • PRMD 6604 Health Care Systems II
  • PRMD 6605 Health Policy
  • PRMD 6611 Scientific Basis of Health Promotion: Intervention Strategies
  • PRMD 6619 Perspectives in International Health
  • PRMD 6620 Questionnaire Design

The Dissertation

Students typically spend the last three semesters of their program engaged in the dissertation process. For more complete information, visit the Ph.D. Dissertation page.