Friday 15 May 2009
Professor Peter Fonagy

Professor Peter Fonagy will be presenting, 'Can mentalisation provide a common framework for the psychotherapies'.

Peter Fonagy, PhD, FBA, is Freud Memorial Professor of Psychoanalysis and Head of the Research Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology at University College London; Chief Executive of the Anna Freud Centre, London; and Consultant to the Child and Family Program at the Menninger Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Baylor College of Medicine. He is Chair of the Postgraduate Education Committee of the International Psychoanalytic Association and a Fellow of the British Academy. He is a clinical psychologist and a training and supervising analyst in the British Psycho-Analytical Society in child and adult analysis. His work integrates empirical research with psychoanalytic theory, and his clinical interests center around borderline psychopathology, violence, and early attachment relationships. He has published over 300 chapters and articles and has authored or edited several books. His most recent books include Psychoanalytic Theories: Perspectives from Developmental Psychopathology (with M. Target); What Works for Whom? A Critical Review of Psychotherapy Research (with A. Roth); Psychotherapy for Borderline Personality Disorder: Mentalization-Based Treatment (with Anthony Bateman); Mentalization-Based Treatment for Borderline Personality Disorder: A Practical Guide (also with Anthony Bateman); Reaching the Hard to Reach: Evidence-Based Funding Priorities for Intervention and Research. (with Geoffrey Baruch & David Robins) and Handbook of Mentalization-Based Treatment (with Jon Allen).

Saturday 16 May 2009
Professor Paul Gilbert

Professor Paul Gilbert will be presenting, "Introduction to compassionate focussed therapy: research and outcome"

Paul is a full Professor at the University of Derby and consultant at Derbyshire Mental health trust. He has a visiting Professorship at the University of Fribourg (Switzerland) and Coimbria (Portugal). He has been a Fellow of the British Psychological Society since 1993. He is a past committee member and then president of the International Society for Evolutionary Approaches to Psychopathology (1992) and a committee member and past president of British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapy (2001-2004). He was also on the NICE committee for the Depression Guideline (2002-2004). He has authored over 100 academic papers and book chapters’ and authored/edited 12 books. He has researched and written extensively in the areas of mood disorder, social anxiety and psychosis. His Overcoming Depression self-help book is now a book on prescription scheme. In addition he has a specific interest in cross diagnostic processes relating to shame and stigma. Through his career he has focused on evolutionary mechanisms underpinning vulnerabilities to psychological problems with a specific focus on attachment and social ranking systems. Individuals who have been unable to develop secure attachment may often use social ranking systems to organise self-other information and roles. A third focus in therapy has been to help people from troubled backgrounds, who have high shame and self-criticism to develop self-compassion based on self-reflection self-empathy, warmth and kindness.  This is called Compassion Focused Therapy. To help advance compassionate approaches to psychological and other human problems he established a charity called the compassionate mind foundation. www.compassionatemind.co.uk.

His recent books include: Gilbert , P. (2005). Compassion: Conceptualisations, Research and Use in Psychotherapy. London. Routledge, Gilbert, P. (2007). Psychotherapy and Counseling for Depression: London Sage, Gilbert P & Leahy, R  (2007). Therapeutic Relationship in the Cognitive Behaviour Psychotherapies London. Routledge. He has recently developed a series of talks to be used in self-help contexts (Overcoming Depression) and is researching their usefulness.