Diana Foșha is a Romanian-American psychologist, known for developing accelerated experiential dynamic psychotherapy (AEDP),[1] and for her work on the psychotherapy of adults suffering the effects of childhood attachment trauma and abuse.[2][3][4][5]
Education and career
Fosha was born in Bucharest, but her family emigrated to the United States when she was 12 years old, settling in New York.[citation needed] She studied psychology at Barnard College and then went on to complete a doctorate in clinical psychology at the City College of New York. She also undertook post-doctoral training with Habib Davanloo, the developer of a form of psychodynamic psychotherapy called intensive short-term dynamic psychotherapy.[6]
In her early career Fosha held teaching positions at the City University of New York and Adelphi University. She was also an adjunct professor of psychiatry at Bellevue Hospital, and was on the faculty of New York University and the St. Luke's–Roosevelt Hospital Center.[6]
Accelerated experiential dynamic psychotherapy
Fosha developed a theory and technique of psychotherapy, AEDP, based upon several conceptual premises as points of departure from the prevailing psychodynamic psychotherapies.[7] Her theory of how healing occurs in psychotherapy derives from her interpretation of research findings in several areas: the neuroscience of attachment, caregiver–infant interaction research, positive psychology, emotion research, psychotherapy research findings on therapist qualities associated with positive therapy outcomes, and phenomenology of the psychological experience of sudden change.[8] The AEDP Institute is actively engaged in ongoing research evaluating the effectiveness of AEDP.[9][10]
Her core premise is that the desire to heal and grow is a wired-in capacity, which she calls the transformance drive.[11] Emotional healing and brain re-wiring[12] the patient, with the help of the therapist, is able to experience, in a regulated manner, emotions that had been blocked due to traumatic overwhelm.[13] Healing is accelerated through a tracking of emerging affect, so the patient can have a complete emotional experience, and then reflect upon the experience of healing change itself, with the help of the therapist. Fosha terms this technique meta-therapeutic processing. This repeated and prolonged amplification of the experience of change has been called one of AEDP's "unique" contributions to the psychotherapy literature.[14]
The AEDP Institute was formed in New York City in 2004. The institute has satellite institutes throughout the US, and in Brazil, Canada, France, Italy, Sweden, Israel, China, and Japan.[15]