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Full Schedule

  • Thursday, December 14, 2023
  • 8:00 AM – 9:00 AM
    Infidelity

    Keynote Speaker: John and Julie Gottman, PhD – The Gottman Institute

    There has NEVER been a controlled study on treating couples recovering from an extra-relationship affair. This presentation will review current approaches to this issue and present an alternative intervention, and the results of the first controlled study on the topic, with preliminary successful results post therapy, including questionnaires and observational data of conflict interactions. Couples were both same-sex and heterosexual relationships. Follow up data are now being collected.

    Keynote

  • 9:00 AM – 9:40 AM
    Author's Hour - Book Signing
  • 9:00 AM – 9:40 AM
    Break in Exhibit Hall
  • 9:10 AM – 9:40 AM
    The Therapeutic Alliance: Building Trust and Leveraging Feedback
  • 9:40 AM – 11:10 AM
    Core Tasks of Therapy: What " expert " therapists do

    Presenter: Donald Meichenbaum, PhD – University of Waterloo Ontario

    Research indicates that 25 % of therapists obtain 50 % better treatment outcomes and have 50% fewer dropouts from treatment than do their fellow therapists. This presentation will discuss what the "expert" therapists do that leads to such favorable treatment outcomes.

    Workshop

  • 9:40 AM – 11:10 AM
    Imago Dialogue

    Presenter: Harville Hendrix &. Helen LaKelly Hunt, PhD – Imago International Training Institute

    When conversation changes from monologue to dialogue, safety is created connection can occur.

    Clinical Demo w/ Discussant

  • 9:40 AM – 11:10 AM
    Learning to Focus on the Person: How Science is Changing to Finally Get it Done

    Presenter: Steven C. Hayes, PhD – University of Nevada, Reno

    Scientific approaches to clinical intervention have hidden the individual behind a fog of normative concepts, latent variables, and treating the uniqueness of people as an "error term." WIth the help of properly focused artificial intelligence and new "idionomic" statistical methods that is finally changing. In this talk I will show how badly empirical science has interfered with the kind of understanding clinicians need; how wrong headed most of our theories are as a result; but also how a revolutionary change is now clearly underway. Science can be an ally to our deepest humanistic yearnings as practitioners, but not if the normal order remains as it has been.

    Speech w/ Discussant

  • 9:40 AM – 11:10 AM
    Re-thinking the Therapeutic Alliance: Suggestibility and Treatment Responsiveness

    Presenter: Michael D. Yapko, PhD – Private Practice

    Virtually all clinicians recognize the importance of the relationship between the therapist and the client. Whether it’s called a therapeutic alliance, an attunement, or a rapport, a positive interrelationship is routinely characterized as being the most important factor shaping the client’s progress. While the alliance is certainly a key factor, a key question then is, what makes some clients more responsive to the alliance and intervention and others less so? What role does suggestibility play in the process? The art and science of clinical hypnosis offers some valuable insights into the multiple factors shaping a client’s response to clinical interventions. Some of these insights will be presented and discussed in this speech that is an ode to the merits of suggestion and hypnosis in psychotherapy.

    Speech w/ Discussant

  • 9:40 AM – 11:10 AM
    Working with Trauma in Couples Therapy

    Presenter: Ellyn Bader, PhD – The Couples Institute

    Clients coming for Couples Therapy have often been impacted by early developmental trauma, systemic or intergenerational trauma, or acute interpersonal trauma.

    Partners with early developmental trauma or acute trauma at young ages are complex to work with and take patience, and persistence from the therapist to recognize moments of exposure and self-expression in order to develop a stronger sense of self. Yet, couples therapy can be a very powerful form of therapy for alleviating shame and developing a much stronger and more integrated sense of self.

    Speech w/ Discussant

  • 11:10 AM – 11:30 AM
    Break
  • 11:30 AM – 12:30 PM
    Autobiography of Trauma - A Healing Journey
: The Evolution of Somatic Experiencing® (SE™)

    Presenter: Peter A. Levine, PhD – Ergos Institute of Somatic Education and Somatic Experiencing International

    We all have our stories to tell; and this is mine, my trauma, my truth. Like Russian nesting dolls, it is one story folded into many others. I am now at the point in my life where I am ready to share the arc of my nested stories, my soul’s journey. It is the often-lonely path taken by an unsuspecting, unlikely, and deeply-flawed missionary.

    One of the core tenets of the trauma healing method I’ve developed, {over the past fifty years} is that we don’t guide people towards confronting their traumas directly, head-on. Rather, we gently encourage them to come to the periphery of these experiences, helping them access certain pivotal positive bodily experiences first.

    During my talk, I will discuss the evolution of SE and give an example of the application of this work by sharing two of my exuberant childhood experiences filled with safety, warmth, joy, and love. Implementing these powerful resources into my felt sense with support allowed me to process and come to terms with violent and terrifying experiences that occurred throughout my youth.

    I hope you can join me in exploring how trauma affects us, influences us, and how we can move it through our bodies to find peace and connect with our authentic Self.

    Invited Address

  • 11:30 AM – 12:30 PM
    Healing the Bipolar Mind: Ancient and Modern Treatments

    Presenter: Kay Redfield Jamison, PhD – Johns Hopkins Medicine

    To treat, even to cure, is not always to heal. My talk will be about the healing of psychological suffering not only through medicine, but more essentially through psychotherapy; what makes a great healer, and the role of imagination and memory in the regeneration of the mind. It will discuss the early psychological treatment of trauma in the shell shock hospitals of the First World War; the origins of psychotherapy in religion and magic in the early rites carried out in the Egyptian and Greek temples , and the more recent practice of psychotherapy in European and American consulting rooms. The role of accompaniment, courage, and heroic exemplars will also be discussed.

    Invited Address

  • 11:30 AM – 12:30 PM
    Trauma, Illness & Healing in a Toxic Culture

    Presenter: Gabor Maté, MD – Gabor Maté M.D.

    Half of North American adults suffer from chronic illness a fact Western medicine views largely in terms of individual predispositions and habits. Western medicine imposes two separations, neither tenable scientifically. First, it separates mind from the body, largely assuming that most chronic illnesses have nothing to do with people's emotional and psychological experiences. And yet, a large and irrefutable body of research has clearly shown that physiologic and behavioural functioning of human beings can be understood only if we integrate our body functions with those of the mind: functions such as awareness, emotions, our interpretations of and responses to events, and our relationships with other people. Second, Western practice views people's health as sep arate from the social environment, ignoring social determinants of health such as class, gender, economic status, and race. Such factors, in reality, are more important influences on health and longevity than individual predispositions and personal factors such as genes, cholesterol levels, blood pressure and so on.

    This talk shows how a society dedicated to material pursuits rather than genuine human needs and spiritual values stresses its members, undermines healthy child development and dooms many to chronic illness, from diabetes to heart disease, from autoimmune conditions to cancer.

    Invited Address

  • 12:30 PM – 1:45 PM
    Exhibit Hall Break
  • 1:00 PM – 1:30 PM
    Therapy Meets AI: How Artificial Intelligence Could Support Clinical Practice in Behavioral Health
  • 1:45 PM – 2:45 PM
    Conversation Hour w/ Cloe Madanes

    Presenter: Cloé Madanes, LIC, HDL – Madanes Institute

    Join in a conversation hour with Cloe Madanes, discussing topics from her keynote address.

    Conversation Hour

  • 1:45 PM – 2:45 PM
    Conversation Hour w/ Gabor Mate

    Presenter: Gabor Maté, MD – Gabor Maté M.D.

    Join in a conversation hour with Gabor Mate, discussing topics from the invited address, Trauma, Illness & Healing in a Toxic Culture.

    Conversation Hour

  • 1:45 PM – 2:45 PM
    Conversation Hour w/ Kay Jamison

    Presenter: Kay Redfield Jamison, PhD – Johns Hopkins Medicine

    Join in a conversation hour with Dr. Kay Jamison, discussing topics from her invited address.

    Conversation Hour

  • 1:45 PM – 2:45 PM
    Conversation Hour w/ Peter Levine

    Presenter: Peter A. Levine, PhD – Ergos Institute of Somatic Education and Somatic Experiencing International

    Join in a conversation hour with Dr. Levine, discussing topics from the Invited Address: Autobiography of Trauma - A Healing Journey The Evolution of Somatic Experiencing® (SE™).

    Conversation Hour

  • 2:45 PM – 3:05 PM
    Break
  • 3:05 PM – 4:35 PM
    Alternatives to the DSM and Implications for Treatment

    Presenter: Nancy McWilliams, PhD, ABPP – Rutgers Graduate School of Applied & Professional Psychology

    Participants in this workshop will become familiar with approaches to diagnosis that are more dimensional, inferential, contextual, and clinically oriented than the DSM and ICD taxonomies. The upcoming third edition of the Psychodynamic Diagnostic Manual will be presented in some depth, with emphasis on its clinical applications, but there will also be some attention to the Power Threat Meaning Framework, the HiTOP model, the DSM Alternative Personality Disorder model, and other alternative approaches to classifying personality and psychopathology.

    Speech w/ Discussant

  • 3:05 PM – 4:35 PM
    Experiential Approaches to Empowerment.

    Presenter: Jeffrey K. Zeig, PhD – The Milton H. Erickson Foundation

    Discussant: Stephen Gilligan, PhD – Stephen Gilligan, Ph.D.

    Clients can benefit from evocative experiences more than from didactic information. Assessment and treatment can be based in the use of experiential methods.

    Clinical Demo w/ Discussant

  • 3:05 PM – 4:35 PM
    Generative Change

    Presenter: Robert B. Dilts – NLP University

    Remedial change is like pulling weeds from a garden. Generative change is about planting new seeds, Both are important to create and sustain a healthy and productive garden. The same is true for mental health, The core focus in Generative Change is creativity: How do you create a successful and meaningful work life? How do you create great personal relationships? How do you develop a great relationship with yourself—your body, your past, your future, your wounds, and your gifts? Generative change means creating something beyond what has ever existed. To do this, a person’s state of consciousness is the difference that makes the difference. Generative change involves learning how to build the generative states, for yourself and others. It then focuses on how to maintain these states in dealing with whatever challenges arise on a creative journey, so that new and meaningful results can occur.


    Speech w/ Discussant

  • 3:05 PM – 4:35 PM
    The Space-Between

    Presenter: Harville Hendrix &. Helen LaKelly Hunt, PhD – Imago International Training Institute

    Imago Relationship Therapy shifts the location of therapy from the Space-Withing to the Space-Between. The Space-Between is where life is lived, where suffering happens and where healing occurs. The Space-Within is where all this is remembered and repeated. Shifting from the Space-Within to the Space-Between moves from change to transformation.

    Speech w/ Discussant

  • 3:05 PM – 4:35 PM
    The Use of Containers in Couple Therapy

    Presenter: Stan Tatkin, PsyD, LMFT – PACT Institute

    Couple therapists must be able to organize each session in such a way that allows for measuring progress in their treatment plan. One such way is to think of placing the couple and therapist in discreet “containers” or exercises that stress the couple. These exercises, tasks, or games allow the therapist to test and retest hypotheses, test a particular capacity, or otherwise allow the therapist to view couple performance in real time. These containers include a task, timing, and possible roles casted by the therapist and may include a role the therapist must also play. An example might be a psychodrama whereby partners must replay a recent event – step by step – as the therapist, or as “the investigator,” gets the facts. Or another container might involve a deal breaker issue whereby partners are required to persuade each other out of a deal breaker while the therapist plays the role of mediating only the way partners argue their points.

    In this demonstration, attendees will learn how containers may be used within a couple sessions. This unique way of organizing therapeutic investigations/interventions can help couple therapists assess problems and progress in each session.

    Clinical Demo w/ Discussant

  • 4:35 PM – 5:15 PM
    Exhibit Hall Break
  • 5:15 PM – 6:15 PM
    A Personal and Professional Journey with Don Meichenbaum: The untold stories of Cognitive behavior therapy

    Presenter: Donald Meichenbaum, PhD – University of Waterloo Ontario

    As one of the persons " in the room" when Cognitive behavior therapy was being developed and challenging the field of behavior therapy, this presentation will share the untold stories of this development. It will trace the history and consider the critical contributors, as well as provide a critique of the current status of Cognitive behavior therapy.

    Keynote