Research Training Program
Introducing the Research Training Program
This training program is a new, needed initiative to introduce a rigorous research approach into psychoanalysis. APsA will hold a two-day, in-person Research Training Program on January 26 and 27, 2026 at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco, just before the Association’s 2026 National Meeting. Individuals interested in conducting psychoanalytically oriented treatment research are invited to apply for this exciting program. The distinguished faculty will comprise Manfred Beutel, MD, Eric Fertuck, PhD, Barbara Milrod, MD, and John Markowitz, MD.
The program will provide brief background talks in seminar format, but focus on intensive mentoring of applicants’ research projects, intended to help participants to successfully apply for research funding. A program completion certificate will be provided.
Requirements for Participation
1) An interest in conducting psychoanalytically oriented research;
2) A plan or at least an idea for a treatment process/outcome or mechanism study; and
3) $150 participant fee.
Applicants will be asked to send a curriculum vitae and a brief outline of the proposed project. The program will provide brief background talks in seminar format, but focus on intensive mentoring of applicants’ research projects, intended to help participants successfully apply for research funding. A program completion certificate will be provided.
How to Apply
In one pdf please provide a brief CV, a description of current research interests and involvement, and a summary (not more than 3 pages in length) of the proposed project or idea you will bring for consultation. Research that is part of a collaborative team is acceptable.
Although a full grant proposal is not expected, a project summary for process/outcome research might include items such as the following:
- a) Description of the proposal (e.g., “a randomized clinical trial comparing X weeks of A to B for patients with diagnosis C”) and why the study is important. What is innovative about the study?
- b) Methods: What are the study hypotheses? How will patients be recruited? Which assessment measures will be used and who will administer them? How will therapists be trained and monitored for adherence?
- c) Results: Anticipated findings and
- d) Significance: How these will be important for psychoanalysis and move the field forward?
For other types of research, concepts describing a study of some rigor and depth should be addressed.
Deadline Extension: December 1, 2025
Send applications to tnewman@apsa.org
Questions? Contact Charles Fisher: charlep@aol.com
Research Training Program Faculty
Manfred E. Beutel, MD, Dipl. Psych. has been the medical director of the Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy from 2004 to 2024, vice dean for research, PI of the Gutenberg Health Study and founder and director of the Psychoanalytic University Training Program WePP, University Medical Center Mainz, Germany. He has been PI of numerous clinical trials on psychodynamic psychotherapy and has developed and edited many psychodynamic treatment manuals (e.g. social anxiety, depressive disorders; online interventions). Dr. Beutel is currently working as a senior research professor on psychoanalytic, epidemiological and clinical trials and as a supervising and training psychoanalyst. Other research fields are psychodynamic treatments in medical settings (psychooncology, psychocardiology), internet addiction, pedophilia and epidemiology of mental disorders and environmental exposures. Among his awards were the 2001 Fulbright Scholarship at Cornell University in New York and the 2012 Best Scientific Paper Award of the APsA. Dr. Beutel has served as a faculty member of the Research Training Program of the IPA for many years and is a current member of the IPA Research Committee.
Eric A. Fertuck, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor of Psychology at the Clinical Psychology Ph.D. Program of the City University of New York (CUNY) Graduate Center and a graduate of the Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research. Dr. Fertuck is a psychopathology researcher who utilizes a social cognitive neuroscience approach to investigate the mechanisms of psychological disturbance and their treatment. He has been funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, the International Psychoanalytic Association, the American Psychoanalytic Association, and has been the recipient of several awards including the Young Investigator Award of the International Society for the Study of Personality Disorders (ISSPD). He has authored and co-authored more than 60 clinical and scientific articles and book chapters. Dr. Fertuck is a certified Teacher and Supervisor in Transference Focused Psychotherapy (TFP), and has been practicing TFP for the last 25 years. Over last several years Dr. Fertuck supervised/ co-supervised non-research TFP groups in Boston, NYC, Poland, Australia, United Kingdom, Italy, and Mexico at multiple levels of training. He is currently the Associate Editor of Psychoanalytic Psychology (the Journal of Division 39 of the American Psychological Association).
John C. Markowitz, M.D., a Professor of Clinical Psychiatry at Columbia and Research Psychiatrist at New York State Psychiatric Institute, has spent his career involved in psychotherapeutic clinical trials. He trained in psychodynamic psychotherapy during residency at the Payne Whitney Clinic and had four years of personal psychoanalysis. Supported by an NIMH Faculty Scholar Award, he trained in psychotherapy outcome research while learning interpersonal psychotherapy (IPT) from the late Gerald L. Klerman, M.D. and cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) at the Beck Institute in Philadelphia. With funding from NIMH and other sources, he has since conducted comparative research trials comparing IPT, CBT, and other psychotherapies for patients with diagnoses of mood disorders, anxiety disorders, borderline personality disorder, and PTSD. He was also an (adherent) psychodynamic psychotherapist in a Panic-Focused Psychodynamic Psychotherapy trial led by Barbara Milrod, M.D.
Barbara Milrod, M.D. I am an unusual academic in psychiatry, in that I am both a rigorous clinical researcher and a psychoanalyst. Over the past several decades, I have developed and spearheaded a research program focusing on manualizing, efficacy testing, and disseminating efficacious, brief psychodynamic psychotherapies for use in multiple clinical settings, including at three VA hospitals in the New York City area. I developed and wrote the manual for the first operationalized, brief, now demonstrated efficacious form of dynamic therapy for any DSM-IV Axis I anxiety disorder, Panic-Focused Psychodynamic Psychotherapy (PFPP). I served as Principal Investigator throughout efficacy testing of PFPP and consulted on international studies that replicated its efficacy. Supporting these studies were my NIMH K 23 and linked NIMH R01 awards, American Psychoanalytic Association Fund for Psychoanalytic Research awards, and a Distinguished NARSAD award. I also developed PFPP-eXtended Range, a manualized, trans-anxiety modification of PFPP for a range of anxiety disorders, focused on attachment dysregulation, a prominent problem in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). I have been PI on six grants on the development and testing of various psychotherapies including dynamic therapies, two funded by the NIMH. I have served in primary and secondary mentorship roles on post-doctoral grants, doctoral grants and theses, and as K award-level mentor to researchers in the US and Europe. I have trained and supervised over four hundred therapists, supervisors, doctoral, pre-doctoral, postdoctoral, resident, and faculty-level trainees across eight countries.
