The dissertation enables students to develop in-depth understanding of an important clinical problem, and advance their professional identity as scholarly clinicians and psychologists. The dissertation is an original, independent investigation or exposition of a topic relevant to clinical psychology. It may be an original study that contributes new information to the field, or a scholarly synthesis with original applications of existing information to a significant clinical problem.

Sample Dissertation Titles

• The Relationship Between Clinician Training and Treatment Outcomes of Clients in DBT Skills Group at the San Francisco DBT Center
• Adjustment to Disability for Individuals With Spinal Cord Injury: A Comparison of the Minority and Medical Models
• Exploring Clinical Psychology Doctoral Students' Attitudes Towards Adults With Substance Use Disorders
• A Qualitative Study of Therapists' Experiences Practicing Multicultural Psychotherapy
• Families in the ICU Conference: Conflict, Resolution, and the Impact on Decisions at the End of Life
• An Examination of the Relationships Between Conventional and Novel Assessments of Attention and Functional Outcomes in Patients with Unilateral Neglect
• Second Opinions: A Model of Supervision Drawn From Wilfred Bion's Concept of Container/Contained
• The Long-term Effects of Emotionally Focused Therapy Training on Knowledge, Competency, Self-Compassion, and Attachment Style
• Integrating Story Time into the Treatment of Children with Social Phobia
• Control Mastery Theory and Anti-Racism: Interviews with White Control Mastery Therapists about Anti-Racism as a Therapeutic Stance
• White Therapists Addressing White Racism in Treatment: A Theoretical Analysis and Integrative Treatment Model
• On the Process of Psychospiritual Development, Old Age, and the Narrative Theory Model of Personality Development
• What Has Theory Done for Me Lately?: A Qualitative Study of Therapists' Reasons for Preferring Their Theoretical Orientations
• Anger and Depression Among Incarcerated Juvenile Delinquents: A Pilot Intervention
• Eating Disorders in Gay Men: The Link to Shame and the Risk of Suicide
• South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission: A Reckoning of Psychology's Contribution
• Separation Guilt and Recidivism Among Incarcerated Mothers
• Grief and the Foreclosure of Hope: A Phenomenological Investigation of Violent Loss among Inner-City African American Women
• Memory Functions of Youth with Prodromal Schizophrenia
• Ethnic Role Guilt and Academic Underachievement of African American Students
• The Relationship Between Sensory Processing and Play in Children with Autistic Spectrum Disorders
• The Serial Visuospatial Learning Test (SVLT): A Psychometric Study
• The In/visible Race in Multicultural Psychology Literature: A Recognition of Whiteness and Power
• Asian Sisters in Action: The Psychosocial Development of Asian American Female Adolescents
• Seeking Meaning from the Past: Examining the Psychological Effects of the Tule Lake Pilgrimage on Japanese American Former Internees and Their Descendants
• What are You? A Qualitative Study on Multiracial Identity Development
• Survivors of Torture and Survivors of Gender Persecution: A Comparative Study of Symptom Severities at Intake