OLGA BERKOUT, PH.D.
Olga Berkout completed her graduate training at the University of Mississippi, where she first became interested in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and strategies to increase access to mental healthcare. Her internship training was conducted at the University of Vermont, where she used Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and other evidence-based approaches with refugee clients and families. Her T-32 post-doctoral fellowship was completed at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, where she received training on affective science and problematic anger. Her clinical focus is on adults struggling with difficult emotions and she has most recently worked with individuals diagnosed with anxiety and related disorders. Prior to coming to the University of Texas at Tyler, she worked as a faculty member at Texas A&M Corpus Christi. When not around kicking ideas and talking shop with her amazing lab members, Olga Berkout enjoys painting, being outside, and time with her two dogs and partner.
ETX-CBS: Aims & interests
Contextual Behavioral Science
Our scholarship is informed first and foremost by contextual behavioral science. Contextual behavioral science encompasses functional contextualist approaches to prediction and influence of behavior, such as Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and Clinical Behavior Analysis. We are also interested in how psychological flexiblity, mindfulness, self-compassion, and related concepts relate to dysfunction and well-being. More information about these approaches may be found at the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science: https://contextualscience.org
Digital Mental Health
As technology becomes a large and growing part of our environment, it offers novel opportunities for prediction and influence of behavior. Our lab aims to use digital strategies to support these aims from the perspective of contextual behavioral science.
Overcoming Barriers
Most people who experience mental health concerns don't get help and most of those who do don't access interventions with empirical support. Our lab aims to examine contextual barriers and potential avenues for overcoming these, particularly as these are relevant to rural and traditionally underserved populations.