Research

Globally recognised for our research strengths and innovations in teaching, our impact-driven research transforms lives and shapes the future.

School of Social Sciences

Arts Therapy and Counselling

Discipline Lead | Sheridan Linnell

Western Sydney University is a premier national and international destination for postgraduate clinical training and research studies in the fields of counselling, psychotherapy and creative arts therapies. Our experienced educators and emerging researchers have developed innovative training programs including a highly successful person-centred counselling program and an award-winning arts-led pedagogy for training art therapists and arts-in-health practitioners. We have written key texts that influence research, clinical education and professional practice, heightening discipline visibility for Arts Therapy and Counselling (ATC) within and beyond the University. Our research is spotlighted in Western Sydney Creative.

As members of the Diversity and Creative Social Change Research Cluster, ATC academics are committed to re-theorising the creative and relational psychotherapies as practices for social justice and diversity. Current projects include arts-based recovery, decolonising therapies, culturally sensitive practice, the art and science of interpersonal therapy, challenging discourses of dependency and deconstructing the therapist/client binary.

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Academics for this Discipline

Acknowledgement of Country

With respect for Aboriginal cultural protocol and out of recognition that its campuses occupy their traditional lands, Western Sydney University acknowledges the Darug, Eora, Dharawal (also referred to as Tharawal) and Wiradjuri peoples and thanks them for their support of its work in their lands in Greater Western Sydney and beyond.