Dr. Olga Sutherland
Family Relations & Applied Nutrition, MH:251, 519-824-4120 x56336
Dr. Olga Sutherland is a clinical/counselling psychologist and registered marriage and family therapist. Her research program has centered on generating evidence-based guidelines for practitioners and educators wishing to enhance the quality of therapeutic and mental health service provision to the public. She uses primarily qualitative (or mixed) methods to examine what occurs in interactions between psychotherapists and their clients. She is also interested in the topics of professional competency and counsellor training and education. She examines how theory influences the analysis and interpretation of research results and intends to focus her research career in the next several years on the contribution of relationship and communication between clients and psychotherapists to outcomes. From the common sense assumption that change in counselling owes something to the conversational interactions of clients and counsellors, she examined these interactions microdynamically. Her specific research interests include: couples therapy, parent-child interaction and relationships, therapy process, counsellor education and training, therapist's positioning, and therapeutic alliance. Dr. Sutherland is particularly interested in examining postmodern, psychodynamic, process-experiential, and systemic therapies and supervision practices.