67th Annual Conference

Thursday, February 25
8:30 – 9:45 A.M.

Annual Anne and Ramon Alonso Plenary Address

Featured Speaker: Nancy McWilliams, Ph.D.

Psychotherapy is not simply about symptom relief. This presentation considers our larger hopes for our clients. Both traditionally and contemporarily construed elements of mental health (e.g., ego strength, affect tolerance, mentalization capacity, capacity for intimacy) will be reviewed and applied to work with both individuals and groups.

Nancy McWilliams, Ph.D., teaches at the Graduate School of Applied & Professional Psychology at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. She is author of Psychoanalytic Diagnosis: Understanding Personality Structure in the Clinical Process (1994), Psychoanalytic Case Formulation (1999), and Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy: A Practitioner's Guide (2004), all with Guilford Press. Dr. McWilliams is also the Associate Editor of the Psychodynamic Diagnostic Manual (2006).  She is Past President of the Division of Psychoanalysis (39) of the American Psychological Association, Consulting Editor of the Psychoanalytic Review, and on the editorial board of Psychoanalytic Psychology.

Dr. McWilliams has written widely on personality structure and personality disorders, psychodiagnosis, sex and gender, trauma, intensive psychotherapy, and contemporary challenges to the humanistic tradition in psychotherapy. Her books have been translated into twelve languages, and she has lectured widely both nationally and internationally. Her book on case formulation received the Gradiva Award for best psychoanalytic clinical book of 1999; in 2004 she was given the Rosalee Weiss Award for contributions to practice by the Division of Independent Practitioners of the American Psychological Association; and in 2006 she was made an Honorary Member of the American Psychoanalytic Association. A graduate of the National Psychological Association for Psychoanalysis, she is also affiliated with the Center for Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy of New Jersey and the National Training Program of the National Institute for the Psychotherapies in New York City. She has a private practice in Flemington, New Jersey.