Symposium Keynote Speakers

Robin Karr-Morse (USA) is a leader in the state if Oregon's child welfare system reforms in the United States. Together with Meredith Wiley, an attorney, she led Oregon's major effort to prevent child abuse statewide, designing and managing Oregon's Children Care Team. In the process, Karr-Morse and Wiley applied a growing body of new information from the brain sciences about babies' developing brains. In her co-authored book Ghosts From the Nursery: Tracing the Roots of Violence, she concludes that to understand the tide of violent behavior, we must look to our earliest experiences. Currently, with a group of colleagues, she is working to build "The Parenting Institute". Karr-Morse is currently a family therapist in private practice in Portland, Oregon.

Peter Marris (US/UK) worked with the Institute of Community Studies in London for seventeen years, and then for the Centre for Environmental Studies in London, before joining the Urban Planning Program at the University of California, Los Angeles. He has taught in major universities throughout the country and is currently at Yale University. His publications include The Politics of Uncertainty: Attachment in Public and Private Life; Meaning and Action; Loss and Change; and Dilemmas of Social Reform (with Martin Rein). A recent Monograph, Witnesses, Engineers and Storytellers, Using Research for Social Policy and Community Action, reflects on his experience as a researcher in policy and social action.

Barbara Nicholson, M.Ed. (US) is founder and President of the Board of Directors of Attachment Parenting International. She has been a leader and organizer for La Leche League for more than twenty years. She presents to many organizations, including La Leche League International, Vanderbilt University's Center for Health Services, WIC (Women, Infant, and Children's program), The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), probation officers and psychology students. Currently she is working on an initiative of the American Family Values Institute in New York City and the development committee for Vanderbilt University's Maternal Infant Health Outreach Worker (MIHOW) Program. She has special interest in attachment and societal violence.

Lysa Parker, M.S. (US) is founder and Executive Director of Attachment Parenting International, which promotes the philosophy of Attachment Parenting around the world. She has been an educator and advocate for La Leche League for many years. She served on the Family Strengthening Committee of the National Children's Advocacy Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Currently, she is a member of Mothers_ Council, an initiative of the Institute of American Values in New York. Ms. Parker makes frequent public presentations promoting Attachment Parenting to organizations including The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC); La Leche League International conference in Washington, DC; and the National Summit on Children Exposed to Violence.

Mary T. Dousette, Ph.D. (USA) is the director and founder of Vista Center for Counseling and Psychotherapy in Toluca Lake (USA) which offers individual, group, family and marriage therapy to children, adolescents and adults. She has been a Lecturer at California State University, Northridge and was instrumental in developing art therapy programs in clinical residential settings. Dr. Dousette uses art therapy in conjunction with attachment theory and studies young women and paternal attachment issues. She is an examiner for the Board of Behavioral Sciences and a Certified Family Law Mediator.

Isabelle Fox, Ph.D. (USA) received degrees from Harvard-Radcliffe and UCLA. She was a psychotherapist at Western Psychological Center for over 35 years specializing in parent-child relationships and developmental issues in children. Dr. Fox was the Senior Mental Health Consultant for operation Head Start for over 10 years and is the author of Being There: the Benefits of a Stay at Home Parent and Growing Up: Attachment Parenting from Kindergarten to College. She serves on the advisory board for Attachment Parenting International.

Marci Green, Ph.D. (USA /UK ) is a Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Wolverhampton, specialising in the Sociology of Work, social inequalities, and Attachment and Social theory. Her past publications have been on political economy, immigration, race-thinking and national identity. Over the past six years, she has been devoting her time to Attachment Theory and Attachment Therapy, and has recently co-edited and authored, Attachment and Human Survival (Karnac). She is now exploring the public sources of Attachment trauma and the conditions for enabling change.

Lindsay Heller, Psy.D. (USA) received her degree from the California School of Professional Psychology Alameda campus, where she focused in child/adolescent psychology. She is currently a Post-Doctoral Fellow at Casa Pacifica, a residential treatment center where she works with adolescent boys. She has conducted research on adolescents' response to trauma in urban environments. Currently her research focuses on success and failure in foster placement looking at 'The Best Match' in temperament as a factor for success.

Robin Mintzer, Ph.D. (USA) was graduate faculty at Pepperdine and Chapman Universities. Her attachment research with older adults has focused on exploratory behaviours, mitigating effects of attachment experiences on working models and early life experiences. As Director of Mental Health Services in Los Angeles her program offered emergency and ongoing treatment services to a children, adults and older adults. Her current research focuses on attachment and the autobiographical narratives for older adults. She has been an Advisory Committee member for the Autobiographical Studies Center at California State University, Fullerton. She has presented her work at numerous conferences. Dr. Mintzer has been a member of the Attachment Study Group since 1986.

Chris Purnell (UK) has a professional background in youth and community work, and worked with young people for 18 years in a variety of settings. He trained as an Attachment-based Psychotherapist at the Centre for Attachment-based Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy.Chris worked for eight years as a counsellor and psychotherapist with people who are living with HIV and AIDS before moving to Wolverhampton where he works as a Specialist Psychotherapist in the NHS. His particular interest is in Attachment Theory and its practical application to a range psychotherapeutic work, including work with refugees and asylum seekers. Chris is registered with the UKCP (United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy).

Kath Shubinsky (UK) comes from a background in social work, specialising in children and families and working in settings where physical, sexual and emotional abuse were significant factors. She worked for 10 years at the Barnardos, with children and women who experienced sexual abuse in childhood. Kath trained as an Integrative Psychotherapist at the Sherwood Institute and currently works as a Specialist Psychotherapist in the NHS in Wolverhampton where she has developed a particular interest in psychotherapeutic work with refugees and asylum seekers.

Nikolaos Stefanidis, Ph.D. (USA) is a member of the multidisciplinary team at Children's Hospital Los Angeles; Division of Adolescent Medicine High-Risk Youth program. Dr. Nik has been working with homeless runaway/throwaway youths for the past 18 years. He has written many articles and lectured extensively on the issues and needs of the runaways. Dr. Stefanidis is faculty at the California School of Professional Psychology at Alliant University and directs an internship program in association with CSPP. He is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Southern California Medical School.

Diana Taylor, Ph.D. (USA) was Assistant Professor at California State University, Northridge, and has published and lectured on the application Attachment Theory for twenty years. She presented her research on Loneliness and Attachment at the Tavistock Institute, London.. Dr.Taylor has been a member of the Los Angeles Attachment Study Group since its inception in 1978 and was a member of the advisory committee for the Autobiographic Studies Center at California State University, Los Angeles and Fullerton. She is currently doing research on the autobiographical narrative, mitigating attachment experiences and the attachment needs of older adults. Dr. Taylor has been in private practice in West Los Angeles for over 25 years.

Karen Trevena (UK) has been a teacher of primary school aged children for over twenty years. She is currently based in Birmingham, working with children from multi-nation and multi-ethnic populations. Karen has travelled extensively, and has taken teaching positions in Turkey and the United Arab Emirates. Through her experiences she has developed an understanding of different curriculum structures and practices, For the past five years, Karen has been running 'Nurture Groups'. Inspired by the principles of Attachment Theory, these groups provide intimate settings in which children with considerable emotional and behavioural issues can safely explore their feelings and needs.

Joan Woodward (UK) has spent most of her professional life striving to get recognition of the emotional needs of small children, young people and women, often against enormous opposition. She has played a part in setting up organisations that have helped to bring about change to help meet these needs. Joan is an Attachment-based psychotherapist, author and researcher. She started her career as a psychiatric social worker, and was a founding member of The Birmingham Women's Counseling and Therapy Centre (UK). Her current academic interest is in the psychological aspects of aging. She is the author of Understanding Ourselves (Macmillan) 1988) and The Lone Twin (FAB) in 1998, and has authored several contributions to edited collections.