Mark Beitel, PhD

I am a Research Scientist in the Child Study Center, Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, and Lecturer in Ethnicity, Race, and Migration at Yale University. I am also a licensed clinical psychologist and psychotherapy researcher with more than 65 authored or coauthored scientific publications. I am interested in patient variables (demographic and diagnostic), therapist variables (technique use), and patient-therapist interaction variables (working alliance) that affect psychotherapy process and outcome. I conduct qualitative and quantitative research and have a longstanding interest in patients who present with co-occurring chronic physical pain and opioid dependence. My colleagues and I have published widely on the demographic, clinical, and treatment-related correlates of these intersecting problems. For the past decade, I have been very involved in Native American mental health and regularly consult to Tribal governments regarding matters of policy and practice. I co-direct the Program for American Indian Health and direct The Native American Psychotherapy Research Project at Yale, which provides a forum to study psychotherapy process and outcome with Native American patients. For a variety of reasons, Native Americans have largely been left out of psychotherapy research, yet receive hundreds of thousands of behavioral health contacts per year. To fill this gap in the literature, my lab has fostered connections with both urban and reservation-based Native clinical partners. To date, we have investigated expectations about counseling (Beitel et al., 2013), therapist technical activity (Beitel et al., 2018), working alliance (Beitel, et al., 2021), and session quality (Beitel, et al., in press) with Native psychotherapy patients. We have just completed a scoping review and clinical case comparison of published case studies of Native American patients in psychotherapy. I designed and regularly teach a course titled Native American Mental Health (ERM 412 / PSYCH 312) for undergraduates in Yale College, offer an elective (Psychotherapy Research Seminar) for Psychiatry residents at Yale, and am this year a visiting professor (virtual) at Aaniiih Nakoda College, a Tribal college in Montana where I offer a course titled Clinical Topics Seminar for Social Service professionals.