I am very excited to announce a new series-within-a-series at the Master Clinician Lecture Series! For the next four months, we will be having a round of seminars applying concepts from brain science to clinical work. With the blessing of its creator, Dr. Virginia Campbell, we will be using the Brain Science Podcast (http://brainsciencepodcast.com) as a basis for learning and applying neuroscience to psychotherapy. Each in the series is a standalone topic, but of course I would invite you to come for all four to maximize interconnections within the material.
The four episodes we will focus on are
- September 11th. Episode #124, After Phrenology, with Michael Anderson. This episode discusses the idea of neural reuse and how it relates to embodied cognition. They discuss valuable concepts, including the concept of affordances (one of my favorites!), and ways in which brains and computers differ. Some questions we might tackle include: In what ways are some therapeutic approaches predicated on a linear, computational model of thought? What might be done differently when taking specifically into account the differing strengths of a brain? How does embodied cognition relate to other concepts of embodiment in psychotherapy?
- October 9th. Episode #106, Cognitive-Emotional Brain, with Luiz Pessoa. Pessoa follows some of Anderson’s thinking around neural reuse, and specifically addresses the question of whether cognition and emotion can ever be distinguished, and whether it’s conceptually helpful to do so. He challenges the notion of the high-road/low-road understanding of cognitive/emotional responses. What does it mean if all emotion is cognitive and all cognition is emotional? Is a high-road/low-road framework too pessimistic, in that it limits a person’s capacity to regulate emotional responses with reflection?
- November 13th. Episode #108, Consciousness as Social Perception, with Michael Graziano. This episode discusses Graziano’s theory of consciousness. His idea is basically that our brains are very good at attributing intentionality to others, and our consciousness is essentially our brain’s story about our own intentionality. We will unpack what that means, as well as how that changes our understanding of psychotherapy. Is there any difference in theory of mind applied to other versus oneself? When it comes to application, how does this change our interventions on a person’s narrative, or a person’s unconscious, or a person’s capacity for mentalization?
- December 11th. Episode #109, Neuromania. This episode discusses several books, all with the general theme of cautioning against the overapplication of a brain-based perspective. In this episode Campbell uses the example of addictions to discuss the strengths and limitations of taking a brain-based approach. We will discuss both what we see as the areas of psychotherapy where a brain-based perspective might be useful or limiting, and also take up the question of addictions specifically.
Each of the four in the series will consist of three parts:
- 9:00 listening to a specific episode of the Brain Science Podcast, which we will do together in the hour before the seminar usually starts. However, you are also welcome to listen on your own and skip the first hour.
- 10:00 discussing and parsing the material on its own, and
- 10:45 discussing how this applies to therapeutic work.
Each seminar will give 2.5 CEs for social workers and counselors who want them.
The cost for each seminar will be $25, but if you register and pay for all four at the first meeting, you can take a %20 discount. Yes, it’s true, I’m trying to get you to come to all four because I think it’s going to be awesome!
As always, the seminar will be held at Gifted Learning Center~North Shore, 466 Central Avenue, Suite 21 (downstairs). Please call or email me to reserve a spot.
Best,
Noriko Martinez, PhD, LCSW
Psychotherapist and Consultant