皇家华人

Martha Laughlin is professor and Program Director for the Family Therapy Program. Prior to joining the VSU faculty in 1999, Dr. Laughlin was in Florida where she was conducted a private practice and was the director of a 30-bed, adult, Baker Act receiving facility for people with acute, chronic mental illness. Dr. Laughlin holds masters degrees in Family Therapy and social work and a Ph.D. in Family Therapy. She is a AAMFT Approved Supervisor and holds a license in family therapy in the states of Georgia. Dr. Laughlin teaches systems theory, with an emphasis on systemic ethics, and practicum. She is interested in writing as thinking and qualitative research. But her first passion concerns the use of imagination and creativity in therapy and supervision and how to teach students to think creatively in family therapy. When therapists rely primarily on techniques that “work,” they narrow their ability to think creatively and  reduce the effectiveness of their therapy. On the other hand, creative thinking in therapy cannot be an “anything goes.” The challenge is teaching family therapy students to think imaginatively about their clients from within the structure of a clear, systems theoretical framework.