I'm June Gruber, an Associate Professor of Psychology at the University of Colorado Boulder and director of this mental health experts series. I'm here today with Dr. Jacqueline Persons, Director of the Oakland Cognitive Behavior Therapy Center and clinical professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. Thanks for being here today, Jacqui. Well, thank you, June. I was wondering if you could tell me just a little bit about the kind of mental health work you do. I do several types of work, which is fun. I like to be able to do a bunch of different things. My main identity is as a practitioner. I see probably 8-10 patient hours a week. I was going to say in my office, but now it's all virtual. Somehow I've moved into doing a considerable chunk of consultation for clinicians. I do some research which I have fun doing. I am doing some teaching now over at UC Berkeley. I'm teaching cognitive behavior therapy to the clinical science students. I often am doing clinical supervision over there. I do workshop trainings. I used to go around the world and do that, but these days not so much. I think that's the whole different range of things I'm doing. It's such an impressive array of work you're doing and I just wonder, how did you go about getting started in this work? Oh, I forgot to mention a couple of other things I'm doing which is like Professional service. I head up a Committee for the Society for Science of Clinical Psychology, which I'm passionate about and so my committee is called committee on science in practice. I'm also serving for the APA on the advisory student committee for clinical practice guidelines. Now I'm ready to think about how did I get started? Well, to be completely honest I, of course, didn't actually visualize this path when I started. To be completely honest, the way it happened was that my husband is an academic and I was trained. I felt like I went to the University of Pennsylvania, which is like this program here at UC Berkeley. The goal of the training is to train academics. I felt like I was supposed to be an academic, but at the time it would've been right for me to go on the academic job market. My husband was also on the academic job market and he got a fabulous offer, all the tenure here at UC Berkeley and so we came to Berkeley. Then I had to figure it out. Okay, Jacqui, what are you going to do? For a short time I looked for a job but I didn't get one, then I realized, I think it's because I don't actually want to work for anybody else. I started my practice. I started doing clinical work, which I do enjoy and then I had three or four or five papers the data for which I have collected during my training. I started writing up. Then I started doing research. I started thinking about my work and developing my case formulation ideas. What can I say? I just kept going like that. As you're saying you kept going throughout the course of a really amazing successful career you had and will continue to have. What frustrations and failures have you encountered along the way as well as the successes that you say you've had? Maybe I could think about the successes first. That's the most fun part. I feel very fortunate and blessed actually in these days of awareness of privilege. I cannot even tell you how privileged I have been to have grown up as I did, receive the education that I did, and have the opportunities I've had to develop my ideas and develop my scholarship. I just feel so fortunate in ways that I wasn't really fully aware of, I would say until recently. I've been very fortunate to have some ability to get some professional support from my work. In a certain way, I've been alone in a certain way. Being a clinician who does research, particularly is lonely. Maybe that's a hard part and a frustration. It's lonely, at the same time, it's cool and exciting. I have a professional home at EBCT, also at the SSCP that supports it and I've been elected to be president of both those groups, which is a really big honor. My books have been very successful and well received. That's gratifying. That I would sit in my office and have ideas about my cases and my work that is helpful to other people, that's been gratifying and rewarding. The hard part is it's lonely. I don't understand why other clinicians who have the research training that I do don't also do research. I would like to have more colleagues to work with along these lines. I have found some fantastic groups. A small group of us have put together our own IRB. But it's been lonely. I would say that's the hard part. But often as you know that's the downside and upside simultaneously. It's lonely and like people look at me and they say, "Oh Jacqui, you're so unusual. " I like that. As you think about looking ahead in your own career and in the field of mental health and cognitive behavior therapy, what do you see as the most important next steps? Next steps for me in my own work? Yeah, and in the field too. In the field. Well, maybe to answer both those questions, do I like, the move away from diagnosis like [inaudible]. The diagnosis is important, so I feel like I can't let it go completely. But [inaudible] gives me permission as a clinician, and also in developing my ideas about case formulation, to think about transdiagnostic mechanisms. The field is moving in a way that's helpful. I would say it seems pretty clear we're going to be doing more video work. Than we did before. It also does seem pretty clear we need to think more about how to think about and provide effective care for underserved populations. Those are important things for us to think about. In my own work, the thing I'm doing that I'm really excited about is, because I'm starting to come to the end of my career. I'm trying to think about what legacy do I want to leave behind. I'm working here with my colleague here at the Oakland Cognitive Behavior Therapy Center, to develop an infrastructure that supports data collection. Data collection that guides the clinical work and can be used for research. Because I want to help other clinicians do that too, and so we're working to build our own system. Which actually is hard and to write up some papers so we can help other people do the same. That's amazing. What an amazing model to and template for others to follow. Well, thank you June, I would say one of my most favorite things in the entire world is, I'm sitting in my office all of these days. Of course I'm sitting in my office and the patient is somewhere else in the world. I'm collecting data. I should think a little bit more about how to collect video data because of course, it's all there just waiting. I should see to push the record button and get a release from the patient to do it. That's why I'm sitting in my office working with my patient, collecting data that's useful for the clinical enterprise, and if the patient is giving permission for me to do that, which most of my patients will also useful for research. That is the coolest thing in the world. What advice would you have for those who may be watching this interview today, who are interested in the field and maybe want to get engaged. Actually now I'm thinking about the other question you just asked which is, where is the field going? I'm hoping the field of clinical psychology and mental health more generally, is continuing to move in the direction of evidence-based care and a high value placed on evidence. Unfortunately, our larger culture isn't necessarily supporting that, but so we may have a more of an uphill battle than we would have liked. But certainly for young people coming [inaudible] , I would encourage them to stay careful and thoughtful. On my own training, I was trained as a scientist. Then I'm presented with these options for clinical learning and skill development that actually are not firmly evidence-based. I know I was talking to a clinician here in the San Francisco Bay Area some years ago, I said to him, "The reason I became a cognitive behavioral therapist, is because I was paying attention to the evidence." He said, "Really? " By which he meant many clinicians do not do that. They pay attention to who the people in their clinical world, they respect what they do, what ideas capture them. Pay attention to data, I would say to you, if you're being trained as a clinical scientist, if you're being trained as a mental health professional, because learning these skills is so difficult. Don't learn just any old set of skills. Learn skills that have an evidence-base. Please. This would be my plea. Jacqui. Thank you Excuse, could I also say. Yeah. [inaudible] evidence-based and also collect data? To think about making a scientific contribution, if you like many of us, have been trained to do that. Because otherwise all these data are slipping away and many clinicians have so many good ideas. Put them out into the world, collect some data, publish a paper, and make a larger contribution. That's my other piece of advice for the young person and I will stop talking and stop interrupting you. It's been so wonderful to talk with you, Jacqui, I feel your words of wisdom are just so important, so timely and I know always valuable to trainees in the field and including myself when I was your trainee. Really grateful for your time today. Thank you, June. Thank you, Jacqui.
