Mahsa Movahed Abtahi

I am a psychology major that my first Master's was in Clinical psychology from the University of Isfahan, Iran, and my second Master's was in Experimental psychology from Kent State university, US. My area of research is attachment and I have authored and co-authored a number of publications in this field.

I am so passionate about this project, because I believe that introducing the Attachment-Based Family Therapy for adolescent depression to clinicians and researchers of my country, could fill a huge gap in treatment of depression in this age group. According to the collectivist culture in Iran, I think that adolescents will benefit from this treatment greater than existing individual therapies. In fact, the significant family involvement in adolescent's life that exists in my culture, would increase the likelihood of positive outcomes of family based treatments.

On the other hand, this therapy is rooted in one of the most striking and well researched theories in the history of psychology, that highlights the strong theoretical bases of the treatment. Attachment theory, has clear indications to etiology of depression that have been interestingly used by the pioneers of this intervention, to develop the current treatment.

Another appealing aspect of this project for me, is the knowledge that will be produced regarding the likely cross-cultural differences in treatment outcomes, in addition to unraveling global influencing factors in this treatment.

October 2016