Lawyer Monthly Magazine - July 2019 Edition

I obtained my BA in Experimental Psychology from the University of Oxford in 1982. I then worked for three years in a range of mental health positions, two of which were in in-patient settings, one of which was in a classroom for emotionally disturbed children in a therapeutic community in the USA and the third involved supporting vulnerable older adults in their own homes in the community in London. In 1985, I returned to the USA where I had spent my early childhood to begin my clinical training. I started graduate school thinking that psychological testing was just about pigeon-holing people – the real understanding came from the intimacy of the psychotherapeutic relationship. During the course of the training, I had the good fortune to have a wonderful instructor, Dr Clifford DeCato, who taught the Rorschach and other psychological tests. His enthusiasm for testing made me think again. His insistence on a careful scrutiny of the test data, combined with his delight in what was quirky, different or unique about a person inspired me. Thanks to him, I have had an abiding fascination in the use of psychometric techniques for the assessment of personality, especially the Rorschach, which has served me well in my role as an expert witness. I am now the President of the British Rorschach Society and I am a Fellow of the Society for Personality Assessment. I carry I am Dr Kari Carstairs. I am an HCPC registered clinical psychologist who has dedicated her whole working life to gaining a deep understanding of people’s thoughts, feelings and behaviour, with a particular emphasis on human distress in its many forms. out research in psychological testing and I have had numerous publications in this area of practice, includingmost recently in 2018 a normative study with the Rorschach for which I was the lead author with six other psychologists. I graduated with distinction for my Doctorate in Clinical Psychology from Widener University in the USA in 1991. My dissertation was on infant development and it formed the basis for an article that was published in the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis in 1992. I obtained my licence to practice in the state of Pennsylvania and worked briefly in the Philadelphia Child Guidance Clinic before returning to England in 1991 for personal reasons. My first NHS post was in adult mental health in Maidstone. It was split three ways between providing short term therapy in GP surgeries, providing long term therapy in a psychology department and provision of a psycho-diagnostic service to the in-patient psychiatric admissions ward. After five years in that post, I moved to Oxleas NHS Trust where I worked in a specialist, tertiary Integrated Psychological Therapies Service providing individual psychodynamic psychotherapy to adults with a personality disorder. I gradually began to do Court reports, receiving professional support and encouragement from a forensic psychologist from the USA who came to work in England on a “sabbatical”. I am very grateful to her. She helped me to hone my skills in testing and showed me how these skills could be applied in the Court. I found that I loved the work, with the requirement to blend careful, well-reasoned formulations, based on sound scientific findings, with an in-depth psychological understanding of the person I am assessing and then apply this to the legal setting. I started a part-time private practice in 1993 and gradually built this up, offering assessment and treatment services for adults. I left the NHS in 1998 and I set up my limited company in 2006. Now I provide Court reports in civil, criminal and family cases and I have a team of associates who assist me in this work and take cases on my behalf. In 2004, I obtained the Cardiff University/Bond Solon Certificate of Expert Witness Accreditation. In 2011, I obtained Diplomate status with the American Board of Assessment Psychology, with a speciality in forensic assessment. I have assessed over 400 clients for the Courts since 1994 when I started this work and I have a particular interest in personality disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, chronic pain and malingering and complex cases where expert evidence is contested. I have had ten associates over the years since 2001, all of whom worked under my supervision and provided over 700 reports for the Company Life as an Expert in: Clinical Psychology Carstairs Psychological Associates Ltd Registered in England & Wales No. 5657675 Registered office 7 Mayfield Road, Bromley, Kent, BR1 2HB www.carstairspsych.co.uk 020 8325 1697 CONTACT CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY JUL 2019 42 Expert Witness www. lawyer-monthly .com