Research Overview
My main research focus is on how clients change in humanistic-experiential psychotherapies, especially Person-Centred and Emotion-Focused therapies for social anxiety. By necessity, this encompasses studying the outcome of these therapies, as well as clients' experiences of what they found helpful or unhelpful. I believe that a range of research methods are appropriate for studying change processes, including quantitative and qualitative, group designs and single case studies, measure development research, meta-analyses and meta-syntheses, and even, where appropriate, randomised clinical trials.
Academic / Professional qualifications
1968-1972 University of California, Santa Cruz, B.A., Highest Honors in Psychology.
1972-1978 University of California, Los Angeles, Ph.D., Clinical Psychology.
1979-present Licensed Psychologist, State of Ohio, USA.
Professor Elliott's research interests include:
- the process and outcome of person-centred and experiential psychotherapies
- giving voice to clients' experiences of counselling and psychotherapy
- the process and outcome of counselling training
- research methodology with interests in both qualitative and quantitative research methods, as well as group and single-case research designs
Professor Elliott teaches counselling and psychotherapy research methods and person-centred/experiential counselling and psychotherapy.
Robert Elliott, Ph.D., is Professor of Counselling in the Counselling Unit at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland. He received his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from UCLA in 1978. He taught at the University of Toledo 1978-2006, where he is now Professor Emeritus of Psychology. He has also held visiting faculty positions as Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium), York University (Canada), University of Sheffield (UK), and La Trobe University (Australia). He served as President of the Society for Psychotherapy Research (2000-2001) and as co-editor of the journal Psychotherapy Research (1994-1998). He is co-author of Facilitating emotional change (1993, with Leslie Greenberg and Laura Rice), Learning process-experiential psychotherapy (2004, with Jeanne Watson, Rhonda Goldman, and Leslie Greenberg), and Research methods in clinical psychology (2nd ed., with Chris Barker & Nancy Pistrang), as well as more than 100 journal articles or book chapters. He is a Fellow in the Divisions of Psychotherapy and Humanistic Psychology of the American Psychological Association and winner of the 2008 Carl Rogers Award for Contributions to Humanistic Psychology. He also served as co-editor of the journal, Person-Centered Counseling and Psychotherapy (2001 – 2005)
Professor Elliott offers basic and advanced training workshops in emotion-focused therapy and consultancy on psychotherapy/counselling research.
Professor Elliott is a Fellow of the Divisions of Humanistic Psychology and Psychotherapy of the American Psychological Association. He is a past president of the Society for Psychotherapy Research and has served on the Board of the World Association for Person-Centred and Experiential Psychotherapy and Counselling.
- Member of management team, Counselling Unit;
Professor Elliott is a Fellow of the Divisions of Humanistic Psychology and Psychotherapy of the American Psychological Association. He is a past president of the Society for Psychotherapy Research and has served on the Board of the World Association for Person-Centred and Experiential Psychotherapy and Counselling.
Professor Elliott is:
- Scientific Director of the International Project on the Effectiveness of Psychotherapy and Psychotherapy Training;
- Chair of the Scottish Consortium for Counselling & Psychotherapy Research;
- Member of the steering committee for the UK Chapter of the Society for Psychotherapy Research.