Advisory Board Members
George Atwood, Ph.D
George Atwood is a professor of psychology at Rutgers University and a founding faculty member and supervising analyst at the Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity. He is a chief theoretician of the intersubjective approach to psychoanalysis. This approach is widely regarded as one of the most significant developments in psychoanalytic thought since Freud. Dr. Atwood is co-author (along with Robert Stolorow and Donna Orange) of Worlds of Experience: Interweaving Philosophical and Clinical Dimensions in Psychoanalysis.
Paula Caplan
Paula J. Caplan received her A.B. with honors from Radcliffe College of Harvard University, and her M.A. and Ph.D. in psychology from Duke University. Currently, she is Visiting Scholar at the Pembroke Center at Brown University and Adjunct Professor at Washington College of Law, American University. Dr. Caplan has been recognized by the American Psychological Association as an "eminent woman psychologist." She does expert witness work for a variety of court cases, both civil and criminal, including cases in which psychiatric diagnosis is an issue. Dr. Caplan is the author of They Say You're Crazy: How the World's Most Powerful Psychiatrists Decide Who's Normal, and co-editor of Bias in Psychiatric Diagnosis.
Larry Davidson, Ph.D.
Dr. Davidson is one of the world's preeminent researchers on schizophrenia recovery. He is Senior Clinical Officer and Mental Health Policy Director for the Connecticut Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, the Director of Yale University's Program for Recovery and Community Health, and Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Yale University. He is the author of Living Outside Mental Illness: Qualitative Studies of Recovery in Schizophrenia. His work provides a blueprint for our day programs.
Daniel Dorman, M.D.
Dr. Dorman is Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA. He has over 30 years of clinical and teaching experience, including success with medication-free approaches to recovery. His background includes family medicine and conducting research in neurophysiology. He is the author of Dante's Cure: A Journey Out of Madness, the compelling chronicle of a young woman's recovery from schizophrenia through intensive psychotherapy.
David Oaks
David Oaks directs MindFreedom International, an alliance of nearly 100 groups in 14 countries defending the human rights of psychiatric survivors. For three decades David has been a mental health activist, promoting humane empowering alternatives for psychiatry. Currently he is editor of MindFreedom Journal, an award winning newspaper produced by psychiatric survivors, which began in 1988 and now reaches an estimated 20,000 readers internationally.
Kirk Schneider, Ph.D.
Dr. Schneider is Vice-President of the Existential-Humanistic Institute, a leading spokesperson for contemporary humanistic psychology and Editor of the Journal of Humanistic Psychology. He has authored/ edited five books and published over 60 articles and chapters. He maintains a private practice in San Francisco and is the author of Rediscovery of Awe. Dr. Schneider was a close associate of the late Rollo May and is a leader of the existential therapy tradition.
Sally Zinman
Sally Zinman is the Executive Director of the California Network of Mental Health Clients (CNMHC), the statewide client advocacy organization in California. Sally has been active in the mental patient rights movement for almost 30 years. She has dedicated her life to insure that what happened to her as a person labeled "mentally ill" would not happen to other people. In 1977 Sally founded one of the first client-run drop-in centers and supportive housing projects in the country. In 1985 she helped found the Coalition for Alternatives in Mental Health, known as the Berkeley Drop-In Center, one of the first funded self-help agencies in the country. Her books Reaching Across: Mental Health Clients Helping Each Other, and Reaching Across II have been used by mental health clients and professionals throughout the country as manuals for understanding and starting self-help programs. Sally is a workshop presenter, keynote speaker and consultant on public policy and self-help issues throughout the country.