About
Professor Thomas R. Lynch is an Emeritus Professor of Clinical Psychology at the University of Southampton.
Research
Current research
Professor Lynch’s research interests are in the understanding and treatment of mood and personality disorders using a “translational” line of inquiry.
His research team’s overall goal is to combine basic science and behavioural laboratory findings with the most recent technological advances in intervention research, in order to develop and test more effective interventions for treatment refractory clients. A major focus has been an interest in understanding emotion and emotion regulation (e.g., emotion inhibition, experiential avoidance; threat and reward sensitivity) using fMRI, psychophysiological, and behavioural laboratory paradigms.
Recently, his group has developed a neuroregulatory model of socio-emotional functioning with transdiagnostic implications that accounts for problems associated with both under-controlled disorders (e.g., borderline personality disorder, substance abuse, externalizing disorders) and over-controlled disorders (e.g., anorexia, obsessive compulsive personality disorder, paranoid personality disorder, chronic depression).
A second major research focus revolves around the treatment of disorders characterized by excessive self-control or overcontrol--e.g., chronic depression, anorexia nervosa, obsessive compulsive personality disorders, and autism spectrum disorders.
He is the developer of a new treatment approach known as radically open dialectical behaviour therapy (RO-DBT) for over-controlled disorders based on 20+ years of clinical and experimental research—including the recently funded Project REFRAMED—a multi-centre randomized clinical trial of RO-DBT for treatment resistant depression that is ongoing in the UK.
He has ongoing research collaborations with a wide range of research teams internationally.
Research projects
Completed projects
Publications
Biography
Professor Lynch received his PhD in clinical psychology at Kent State University (1996; USA) and completed postdoctoral training at Duke University (1997; USA).
He was the Director of the Duke Cognitive Behavioral Research and Treatment Program and member of the Departments of Psychology and Psychiatry at Duke University from 1998-2007.
He moved to the UK in 2007 to the University of Exeter and now is located at the University of Southampton, School of Psychology.
He has received five research grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH USA), a National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression (NARSAD) research award, an American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) research award, and a John A. Hartford Foundation award.
He is the Principal Investigator on two National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA R01s) while at Duke University. One was a multi-site study of dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) for borderline personality disorder with opiate dependence and the second a virtual reality study examining novel methods to enhance cue exposure treatment for cocaine addiction.
Currently he is the Chief investigator of a multi-centre RCT funded by the Efficacy and Mechanism Evaluation programme and Medical Research Council—Project REFRAMEd—REFRactory depression: Mechanisms and Effectiveness of radically open-dialectical behaviour therapy.
He has been a standing Member of the Interventions Committee for Schizophrenia Spectrum Disorders, Personality Disorders, and Disorders of Late Life at the National Institute of Mental Health Grant Review Committee (ITSP NIMH; USA; 2005-2007) and his research has been recognized in the Science and Advances Section of the National Institute of Health FY 2005 Congressional Justification Report.
He is a recipient of the John M. Rhoades Psychotherapy Research Endowment, is a Beck Institute Scholar, is a Grandfathered Fellow in the Academy of Cognitive Therapy, and a the treatment developer of Radically Open-Dialectical Behaviour therapy as well as a senior international trainer in Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT).
Professor Lynch is also well-known for being an authoritative, entertaining and charismatic speaker. He is in frequent demand as a speaker internationally—e.g., Europe, USA, and Canada.
For more information on RO DBT please visit Radically Open website .