Forthcoming Public Engagement Events

2008 Annual British Psychological/British Academy Lecture

Effective psychological treatments for anxiety disorders: science, policy and economics

Where: 5.30 p.m. on Friday 17 October 2008. London School of Economics, 54 Lincoln's Inn Fields, London, WC2 3LJ.

The lecture is free and everyone is welcome to attend. Seating is on a first-come-first-served basis.

Lecturer: Professor David Clark FBA FMedSci of the Institute of Psychiatry, Kings College London.

Abstract: Anxiety disorders are common and disabling. Government, clinicians and sufferers are starting to look to psychological research for a solution.

Professor Clark will start by describing and illustrating a cognitive science approach to developing new and effective psychological treatments.

Excessively negative beliefs about the dangerousness of certain situations and/or internal states (thoughts, images, body sensations) lie at the heart of anxiety disorders. Cognitive therapy focuses on changing such beliefs and the factors that maintain them.

Trials have established that cognitive therapy is highly effective. However, it is often not available.

Professor Clark will outline the economic and clinical arguments for increasing the availability of cognitive therapy and other effective psychological treatments within the NHS. Ways of overcoming obstacles to disseminating therapy will be discussed, with a particular emphasis on the Government’s new "Improving Access to Psychological Therapies" initiative.

Past events

Details of the Society's previous public engagement events are available on a separate page.