What I love most about research: The collaborative process

I maintain an active research lab with ongoing projects at all stages of development with the support of a large group of students and internal/external research assistants. As a result of these activities, my students have the opportunity to engage in all levels of the research process. This allows students to understand how the planning and execution of research are reflected in the analysis of data and dissemination of results, and hopefully gets them excited about psychotherapy research for many years to come.
 
I scaffold student experiences so that newer and more junior students begin with clearly structured tasks (typically related to observer-codings of therapy data) supervised by more experienced research students.  As students gain skills and understanding about the research process, they move into roles which involve active literature review, and collection of data.
 
I am similarly able to support a range of student engagement in psychodynamic process research more generally. Newer and more junior students typically hear about research projects led by me or a more advanced student.  In turn, advanced students are encouraged to formulate research questions which can be addressed by existing data, accelerating their ability to develop conference presentation proposals and manuscripts for publication. There are many exciting events and conferences related to psychotherapy research and training, that I encourage the students to participate in (e.g. SPR, SEPI, DIv39, APsaA). When students are interested, I help them prepare for conference posters, presentations and journal submissions.