Current Faculty

Heather Ferguson, LCSW is a faculty member and supervisor at the Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity, the National Institute for the Psychotherapies, and the Massachusetts Institute for Psychoanalysis.

As a certified hypnotherapist and practitioner of EMDR, she integrates embodied techniques into her psychoanalytic practice. She writes and lectures about eating disorder treatment, the role of intergenerational transmission of trauma, and the use of embodied techniques to deepen psychotherapeutic engagement.

Jackie Gotthold, Psy.D. is currently serving on the Executive Committee at the Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity in New York City, in addition to functioning as a supervisor, faculty member and training analyst.

Jackie has been a faculty member and supervisor for the Minnesota Institute for Contemporary Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis, as well as having taught for various institutes in the US and abroad.
 A longtime member of the International Association of Psychoanalytic Self Psychology (IAPSP), Jackie established the Child and Adolescent Initiative at IAPSP and has served on the International Council of IAPSP. Also a member of the International Association of Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy (IARPP), Jackie continues to serve on the IARPP Child and Adolescent interest group committee.

Arthur A. Gray, Ph.D. is an honorary member of IPSS, faculty, supervisor, and serves on its Coordinating Committee. He is also faculty and supervisor at the Postgraduate Psychoanalytic Society’s Group Therapy Department, and at the Training Institute for Mental Health, and council member of the International Association for Psychoanalytic Self Psychology.

He consults with self psychology groups in South Africa and in Japan, and conducts supervision online using his group supervisory model. His published articles apply self psychology and subjectivity theory to individual, couples, group, and supervision. He has a special interest in how improvisation informs the therapeutic process.

Amy Joelson, LCSW, is Faculty, Supervisor, and the Director of Distance Learning at the Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity (IPSS) in New York City; Associate Faculty at the Japanese Forum of Psychoanalytic Self Psychology in Hiroshima, Japan; President of the International Association for Psychoanalytic Self Psychology (IAPSP); and Member of IARPP’s Child, Adolescent and Parent Psychotherapy Committee. A frequent presenter at international conferences and author of several publications on child and adolescent development, Amy maintains a private practice in downtown New York City in adult, child and adolescent psychotherapy and psychoanalysis. 

Dr. Jones’ special interests include working with substance use and self-harming behaviors, long term survivors of HIV/AIDS, and those who are maneuvering the challenging world of the entertainment industry.

Peter Kaufmann, Ph.D. is a member of the IPSS faculty, a supervisor, and co-coordinator of the IPSS four-year program. Dr. Kaufmann has a particular interest in comparative psychoanalysis and in efforts to integrate the clinical approaches and sensibilities represented by different theoretical perspectives.  Dr. Kaufmann has also published several papers including “The Guilt of Tragic Man”, “Working with Men Who Please Too Much”, and “On Transforming the Reparative Quest” that reflect his additional interest in the topics of mourning and pathological accommodation.

Peter Lessem, Ph.D. is a psychoanalytic psychotherapist who has been treating individuals and couples for over thirty years. He has also been a clinical supervisor and faculty member at the IPSS as well as other analytic institutes.

Peter has taught courses on therapeutic action, self psychology, intersubjectivity and attachment. In addition to his textbook Self Psychology: An Introduction, he has also written and lectured on masochism, the repetition compulsion, and the relationship between attachment and self object experience.

Deborah Sherman, BC-DMT, LMHC is a certified Psychoanalyst and Dance/Movement Therapist.  She has a private practice in NYC in Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy. 

Marc Sholes, LCSW is a board member, faculty and supervisor at the National Institute for the Psychotherapies (NIP) as well as the Co-Director of Curriculum for their Adult Training Program in Psychoanalysis. He is also on the Council of the International Association for Psychoanalytic Self Psychology and maintains a private practice in New York City. 

Marc’s current interest is the relationship between Attachment Theory, Infant Research and Self Psychology.

Shaké Topalian is an ANA Board Certified Psychiatric Mental Health Clinical Nurse Specialist and psychoanalytic psychotherapist in private practice. She supervises and teaches at IPSS and PPSC, and is the Chair of the IAPSP Early Career Professional Scholarship Committee.

She has a particular interest in transmission genocide trauma developed in her published paper, Ghosts to Ancestors: Bearing Witness to “My” Experience of Genocide.

David Witten, LCSW is a faculty member and Co-Director of the Foundations of Psychoanalysis Program at IPSS. He maintains a private practice in both New York City and Westport, CT. He was a recipient of the IAPSP Early Career Professional Scholarship Program and has written and presented on Brandchaft’s Pathological Accommodation.

Bernard Brandchaft, M.D. (1916-2013) was a Founding Faculty member of the Institute for the Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity, NYC, and a training and supervising analyst at the Los Angles Psychoanalytic Institute. He was faculty emeritus of Clinical Psychiatry, UCLA School of Medicine. Dr. Brandchaft authored numerous articles and books, co-authoring (with George Atwood and Robert Stolorow) Psychoanalytic Treatment: An Intersubjective Approach (Analytic Press, 1987) and The Intersubjective Perspective (Jason Aronson, 1994) His book Towards an Emancipatory Psychoanalysis: Brandchaft’s Intersubjective Vision (co-authored by Shelley Doctors, and Dorienne Sorter) was published in 2010 (Routledge). 

The loss of Dr. Brandchaft in 2013 was deeply felt by all who knew him. The faculty of IPSS is dedicated to passing on his theoretical ideas to future generations of psychoanalysts.

James Fosshage, Ph.D Founding President, International Association for Psychoanalytic Self Psychology; Founding Faculty, Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity; Co-founder, Board Director and Faculty, National Institute for the Psychotherapies; Clinical Professor of Psychology, New York University Post Doctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis (Co-founder, Relational Track); Author of over 100 psychoanalytic publications and 8 books.

Website: www.jamesfosshage.net

Areas of Interest:  TBD

Frank M. Lachmann, Ph.D. is a member of the Founding Faculty of the Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity, New York and Clinical Assistant Professor, in the NYU Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis., and of NPAP.  He is author or co-author of more than 150 publications on topics ranging from self psychology, narcissism, music and creativity to aggression and serial killers.

He is co-author with Joseph Lichtenberg and James Fosshage of four books, including, Psychoanalysis and Motivation: A New Look (Francis and Taylor, 2010). He is co-author of two books with Beatrice Beebe, Infant Research and Adult Treatment: Co-Constructing Interactions (Analytic Press, 2002) and their recently published joint work The Origins of Attachment, (Routledge 2013). He is sole author of Transforming Aggression: Psychotherapy with the Difficult-to-Treat Patient (Aronson, 2000) and Transforming Narcissism: Reflections on Empathy, Humor, and Expectations  (Analytic Press, 2008).

He is a member of the Council of the International Association of Psychoanalytic Self Psychology and an honorary member of the Vienna Circle for Self Psychology (Austria), The William A. White Society, and the American Psychoanalytic Association.

Robert D. Stolorow, Ph.D. is a founding member of both the Institute for the Psychoanalytic Study of Subjectivity, New York City and the Institute of Contemporary Psychoanalysis, Los Angeles.

He received the Distinguished Scientific Award from the Division of Psychoanalysis of the American Psychological Association in 1995, the Haskell Norman Prize for Excellence in Psychoanalysis from the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis in 2011, and the Hans W. Loewald Memorial Award from the International Forum for Psychoanalytic Education in 2012.