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Modern Attachment Theory: A Clinically Integrated Paradigm

In-Person
On Demand
1 CE Hour On Demand
Clinical

Presented By

Recorded On

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Location

  • On Demand
    Sessions will be available On-Demand
Description

Attachment theory has undergone a profound evolution since its inception over 70 years ago. For clinicians to remain effective, they must adapt their understanding and application of attachment concepts to integrate contemporary research and the shifting complexities of the modern world. This cutting-edge workshop provides a reconceptualization of attachment that builds on its history and addresses nuances that have emerged across decades of study and clinical practice. Rather than relying on attachment categorizations, this new framework examines attachment activation as a dynamic process that varies across the lifespan, relationships, and contexts. By weaving in the latest findings from relational neurobiology, trauma science, and cultural studies, this approach offers a holistic perspective that keeps practical clinical application as the central focus. It recognizes how societal systems and lived experiences of oppression based on race, ethnicity, social class, gender and gender expression, and sexual orientation can contribute to feelings of “insecurity” in ways that go beyond the individual or family unit. This inclusive, affirmative paradigm provides clinicians with powerful tools to enhance therapeutic attunement, build secure relating abilities, and improve outcomes for all clients, regardless of their clinical background. Deeply informed by years of clinical experience, this workshop will equip you with immediately applicable strategies while expanding your understanding of attachment through a contemporary lens.

Target Audience
  • • Counselor
  • • Marriage & Family Therapist
  • • Nurses
  • • Physicians
  • • Social Worker
  • • Substance Use Disorder Professionals
  • • Psychologist
Learning Objectives

At the end of this course, participants will be able to:

  • Identify at least two limitations of traditional attachment categorizations within today's clinical landscape.

  • Summarize an alternative, spectrum-based framework of attachment activation.

  • Explain how defensive activation patterns present neurologically and learn targeted interventions.

References

  • John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth, Patterns of Attachment: A Psychological Study of the Strange Situation (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1978)

  • Carol George, Julie Wargo Aikins, and Melissa Lehman, eds., Working with Attachment Trauma: Clinical Application of the Adult Attachment Projective Picture System (New York: Routledge, 2023).

  • Patricia Crittenden and Andrea Landini Assessing Adult Attachment: A Dynamic-Maturational Approach to Discourse Analysis Norton 2011.

  • Dan Siegel The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are (New York: Guilford Press, 1999);

  • Choi EJ, Taylor MJ,Vandewouw MM, Hong SB, Kim CD, Yi SH. Attachment security and striatal functional connectivity in typically developing children. Dev Cogn Neurosci. 2021

  • Stephen Porges, The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-regulation

  • Stephen Porges Polyvagal Safety Attachment, Communication, Self-regulation (New York: W. W. Norton, 2021);

  • Cindy Hazan and Phillip Shaver, “Romantic Love Conceptualized as an Attachment Process,” Journal of Personality and Social. Psychology 52, no. 3 (March 1987): 511–24.

  • Bartholomew, K., & Horowitz, L. M. (1991). Attachment styles among young adults: a test of a four-category model. Journal of personality and social psychology, 61(2), 226.

  • Fraley, R.C., Waller, N. G., & Brennan, K. A. (2000). An item-response theory analysis of self-report measures of adult attachment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78, 350-365.

  • Arancibia M, Lutz M, Ardiles Á, Fuentes C. Neurobiology of Disorganized Attachment: A Review of Primary Studies on Human Beings. Neurosci Insights. 2023

  • Bessel A. van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma New York: Viking, 2014

  • Peter Levine Trauma and Memory: Brain and Body in a Search for the Living Past—A Practical Guide for Understanding and Working with Traumatic Memory (Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books), 2015

  • Paul Conti, Trauma: The Invisible Epidemic—How Trauma Works and How We Can Heal from It (Boulder, CO: Sounds True, 2021).

  • Caoilte, Lambert et al An investigation of mental health-related podcasts Mental Health & Prevention Volume 30, June 2023.

  • Kenneth Hardy, Racial Trauma: Clinical Strategies and Techniques for Healing Invisible Wounds (New York, W. W. Norton, 2023)

  • Fantasy T. Lozada et al., “Black Emotions Matter: Understanding the Impact of Racial Oppression on Black Youth’s Emotional Development: Dismantling Systems of Racism and Oppression During Adolescence,” Journal

  • H Keller, N Chaudhary, Is mother essential for attachment? Models of care in different cultures. The Cultural Nature of Attachment: Contextualizing Relationships and Development (Strüngmann Forum Reports) Keller Bard [Ed] 2018 MIT Press

  • Cinzia Perlini et al., “Disentangle the Neural Correlates of Attachment Style in Healthy Individuals,” Epidemiology and Psychiatric Sciences 28, no. 4 (August 2019)

  • Long et al., “Functional Neuro-Anatomical Model of Human Attachment (NAMA),” 281–321.

Clinical
Counselor

TPN.health is approved by the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists (Provider #1000101) to sponsor continuing education for LPCCs. TPN.health maintains responsibility for this program/course and its content. Course meets the qualifications for 1 hours of continuing education credit for LPCCs as required by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences.

TPN.health has been approved by NBCC as an Approved Continuing Education Provider, ACEP No. 7267. Programs that do not qualify for NBCC credit are clearly identified. TPN.health is solely responsible for all aspects of the programs.

Trusted Provider Network, LLC is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Mental Health Practitioners as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed mental health counselors. #MHC-0220.

Marriage & Family Therapist

TPN.health is approved by the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists (Provider #1000101) to sponsor continuing education for LMFTs. TPN.health maintains responsibility for this program/course and its content. Course meets the qualifications for 1 hours of continuing education credit for LMFTs as required by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences.

Trusted Provider Network, LLC is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Mental Health Practitioners as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed marriage and family therapists #MFT-0097.

Nurses

In support of improving patient care, this activity has been planned and implemented by Amedco LLC and TPN.health. Amedco LLC is jointly accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME), the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE), and the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC), to provide continuing education for the healthcare team. Amedco LLC designates this activity for a maximum of 1 ANCC contact hours.

Physicians

In support of improving patient care, this activity has been planned and implemented by Amedco LLC and TPN.health. Amedco LLC is jointly accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME), the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE), and the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC), to provide continuing education for the healthcare team. Professions in scope for this activity are listed below. Amedco Joint Accreditation Provider Number: 4008163. Amedco LLC designates this live activity for a maximum of 1 AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™ for physicians. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

Social Worker

TPN.health, #1766, is approved to offer social work continuing education by the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB) Approved Continuing Education (ACE) program. Organizations, not individual courses, are approved as ACE providers. State and provincial regulatory boards have the final authority to determine whether an individual course may be accepted for continuing education credit. TPN.health maintains responsibility for this course. ACE provider approval period: 03/31/2022 – 03/31/2025. Social workers completing this course receive 1 Clinical continuing education credits. ASWB ACE Credit is not available in NY and NJ.

Trusted Provider Network, LLC is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Social Work as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed social workers #SW-0654.

TPN.health is approved by the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists (Provider #1000101) to sponsor continuing education for LCSWs. TPN.health maintains responsibility for this program/course and its content. Course meets the qualifications for 1 hours of continuing education credit for LCSWs as required by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences.

Substance Use Disorder Professionals

This course has been approved by TPN.health, as a NAADAC Approved Education Provider, for educational credits. NAADAC Provider #198061, TPN.health is responsible for all aspects of the programming.This course has been approved by TPN.health, as a NAADAC Approved Education Provider, for educational credits. NAADAC Provider #198061, TPN.health is responsible for all aspects of the programing. Counselor Skill Group: Counseling Services

Psychologist

Trusted Provider Network is approved by the American Psychological Association to sponsor continuing education for psychologists. Trusted Provider Network maintains responsibility for this program and its content.

TPN.health is approved by the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists (Provider #1000101) to sponsor continuing education for LEPs. TPN.health maintains responsibility for this program/course and its content. Course meets the qualifications for 1 hours of continuing education credit for LEPs as required by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences.

Trusted Provider Network, LLC is recognized by the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Psychology as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed psychologists #PSY-0125.

CE Policy
This course is fiscally sponsored by Exchange Events. There may be potential biases or conflicts of interest inherent to this relationship, and it must be disclosed to participants. These conflicts of interest have no bearing on the course content and have been resolved.
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Sue Marriott, LSCW, CGP

Sue Marriott, LCSW, CGP, is a clinical social worker, author, educator, and podcaster who enjoys live music, van camping, and writing in Austin TX (and when possible, Asheville, NC where she loves to spot black bears and occasionally her three young adult kids). Professionally, her passion is bridging the life-changing relational sciences to those who would otherwise not have access to it. In that spirit, she co-founded an organization that brings attachment and relational neurobiology to students, local therapists, and the public called Austin Interpersonal Neurobiology (IN) Connection and served on the Board of The Global Assn for Interpersonal Neurobiology Studies (GAINS). The top-rated podcast, Therapist Uncensored, is an outgrowth of this passion and a partnership with her wife, Dr. Ann Kelley. In it, they enjoy deep conversations with many of the most prominent researchers and clinicians in the field. Sue has taught nationally on intersubjective therapy, attachment, trauma, and the translation of relational neuroscience to clinical practice. In her private practice, even after thirty years, she continues to enjoy working with individuals, couples, and groups, as well as providing professional study and consultation for therapists.

Ann Kelly, Phd

Ann Kelley, Ph.D. is a licensed clinical psychologist who received her doctorate from the University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Kelley started her career as a Director of treatment for a juvenile justice facility that provided intensive and specialized treatment for the youth. In her position, she supervised specialized treatment programs for youth with significant trauma histories, provided workshops, training, staff supervision, and assisted in agency-wide program development. She now runs her own psychotherapy practice specializing in couples therapy and relational work since 2006. She is the co-founder and co-host of Therapist Uncensored Podcast, which is an independent, internationally recognized podcast that translates complex relational science to both therapists and interested learners. It remains in the top-ten of Apple’s social science-related podcasts. Dr. Kelley has presented training on Attachment and secure relating principles to therapists as well as podcasters. She and her wife and co-author, Sue Marriott, live in Austin, Texas where they raised their three now-launched children and love roaming the country and writing. Her professional and personal writing is motivated by her ongoing concern of the toxic and divisive strategies being used by media and political forces designed to intentionally provoke our nervous systems toward fear, anger and polarization. Her biggest hope and desire for this book is to ignite an open resistance to this path and promote deep and wide conversations promoting secure relating.

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