This is the third of three major awards the dean of the Gordon F. Derner School of Psychology has received in the past three years.
J. Christopher Muran, PhD, professor and dean of Adelphi University’s Gordon F. Derner School of Psychology, doesn’t much care for dwelling on individual honors, especially his own—but he will if the accolades are meaningful to his institution, as well as colleagues and family who helped make them possible.
In August, the American Psychological Association (APA) Society for the Advancement of Psychotherapy (APA Division 29) presented Dr. Muran with its 2024 Distinguished Psychologist Award for Contributions to Psychology and Psychotherapy. The recognition, for lifetime achievement, has been presented annually since 1970 and also went to now-retired Derner dean, Jacques Barber, PhD, in 2018.
“I’ve always believed that the products of our work are the presentations, publications, grants and the mentoring of our students, and that those are more meaningful than awards,” Dr. Muran said. “But a colleague recently reminded me that these honors are important for the whole community, Adelphi, Derner, our faculty (especially junior), and our students and graduates.”
A past president of the international Society for Psychotherapy Research (SPR), and past editor of its journal, Psychotherapy Research, Dr. Muran was the recipient of its 2021 Senior Distinguished Research Career Award. The same year, he was also presented with the Alfred M. Wellner Lifetime Achievement Award for Research Excellence from the National Register of Health Service Psychologists.
“These recognitions are special to me, each in different ways,” Dr. Muran said. “The SPR has been my professional home for more than 30 years. The APA Division 29 and National Register represent large organizations with a great many practitioners, who are the target audience for my research.”
A Focus on the Therapeutic Alliance
While the three recent honors have been for lifetime achievement, Dr. Muran isn’t nearly done with his professional and academic work. His focus has largely been on therapeutic relationships, particularly the study of ruptures in the therapeutic alliance and development of intervention models and training strategies for their resolution.
He has published more than 180 papers and 10 books, including Therapist Performance Under Pressure: Negotiating Emotion, Difference, and Rupture, written with Catherine Eubanks, PhD, also a Derner professor, and Rupture and Repair in Psychotherapy: A Critical Process for Change with Dr. Eubanks and another longtime collaborator, Lisa Wallner Samstag, PhD. An upcoming book, Alliance-Focused Training, will be released with a companion video in Summer 2025. Dr. Muran calls that project “a culmination of three decades of research.”
Recognizing the importance of community for both the Derner School and his other research, Dr. Muran emphasizes the support he has received in his career. “Arnold Winston, MD, chair of psychiatry at Mount Sinai, who I worked with in my first 20 years in a hospital setting, was an incredible father figure,” he said. “Jeremy Safran, PhD, a professor of psychology at The New School for Social Research, was like a big brother, and many others have supported me, including Catherine Eubanks, PhD, a two-decade colleague; my wife, Elisa Denise Ventur, PhD, who’s also a clinical psychologist; and my son—I’ve written about our relationship, helping him grow as a person and navigate challenges in his life.”
“Not About Awards or Accolades”
Raised in an Armenian family, Dr. Muran notes that in his upbringing, “life was more about process, how you conduct yourself, not about rewards or accolades. Working hard was the aim, not so much recognition for it,” he said. “If anything, there was this evil-eye notion that comes up if you start boasting. My dad had a funny Armenian expression which characterizes my ambivalence about awards: ‘I don’t want it, but you can put it in my pocket.’”
In Fall 2022, Dr. Muran started a new chapter in his professional life as dean of the Derner School, succeeding Dr. Barber, who has also been a regular collaborator on research and writing. Dr. Muran had been associate dean and director of the PhD in Clinical Psychology program at Derner for the previous 14 years and also served as interim dean, leading the School through the COVID-19 pandemic.
Dr. Muran is optimistic about the future of the Derner School, which was founded more than 50 years ago; its PhD program in clinical psychology was established more than 70 years ago. It added a postdoctoral (now a postgraduate) program, and today has strong undergraduate (including a BS in Neuroscience, offered jointly between Derner and the Adelphi University College of Arts and Sciences) and graduate programs (general master’s, mental health counseling and school psychology), “something that is highly unusual, maybe unique, among universities,” Dr. Muran added.
“Derner is evolving, and we face challenges—such as the trend of less emphasis on psychoanalysis in the clinical setting—but we’ve developed in the last decade an excellent faculty representing diversity in other psychological disciplines and professional orientations,” he noted. “The potential for synthesis makes each area better and while there are some competing interests, we will all be more successful working together.”