Team
Assoc. Prof. Zeynep Maçkalı
Zeynep Maçkalı, completed her undergraduate education in the Department of Psychology at Boğaziçi University, her master’s degree in the Applied Psychology (Clinical Psychology) Program at Okan University, and her PhD in the Clinical Psychology Program at Hacettepe University. She was awarded the title of Associate Professor in Clinical Psychology in 2024.
Since 2015, she has been teaching at the undergraduate and graduate levels at various universities. She has been a faculty member in the Department of Psychology at Istanbul Bilgi University since 2020. In her clinical work, she adopts a relational integrative psychotherapy approach and is an Internationally Certified Integrative Psychotherapist (CIIP). She is also continuing her professional development toward becoming a trainer and supervisor in Integrative Psychotherapy.
Since 2007, she has been working with art therapy and creativity-based approaches, incorporating the expressive power of art into individual and group-based preventive and promotive interventions. She serves as a trainer and supervisor in the Psycotherapy with Arts and Creativity Training Program organized by the Psycotherapy with Arts and Creativity Association and is a member of the association’s executive board. In addition, she is a member of the Istanbul Branch of the Turkish Psychological Association and a board member of the Autism Association.
She has taken part as a researcher, trainer, and group facilitator in various research and applied projects related to autism and bipolar disorder. In her academic and applied work, she aims to develop integrative approaches that strengthen individuals’ creative potential, support relational contexts, and address psychological well-being at both individual and societal levels. Her recent research focuses on the associations between relational needs satisfaction and risk and protective factors such as adverse childhood experiences, difficulties in emotion regulation, loneliness, and psychological resilience.
Şafak Ebru Toksoy, PhD
Şafak Ebru Toksoy, PhD, completed her undergraduate education at Gazi University and her master’s degree in Guidance and Psychological Counseling at Marmara University. She began her professional career in educational institutions in 1992. Between 1999 and 2007, she worked at the Darüşşafaka Educational Institutions, where she served as the Director of the Guidance and Psychological Counseling Services for six years.
Since 2008, she has focused on the role of mental health within therapeutic services and began working at the Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Kocaeli University. Until 2015, she provided psychological counseling and psychotherapy services primarily to individuals with trauma histories. In 2015, she joined the Trauma and Disaster Studies Unit within the Institute of Health Sciences at Kocaeli University and began her doctoral studies in the Applied Mental Health Program in Trauma and Disaster Studies, which was established for the first time in Türkiye within the Institute of Health Sciences at Kocaeli University. She completed her PhD in 2021 and continued working at the university until her retirement in 2022.
She has been actively working on the psychological impacts of trauma on individuals and communities since the 1999 Marmara earthquake. She conducts both field-based and academic work in preventive, supportive, and therapeutic approaches to trauma. She has served as a trainer and program developer in numerous national and international projects related to trauma and disasters. Most recently, following the 2023 Maraş earthquakes, she developed a group-based psychosocial support program aimed at supporting women in the affected regions and provided consultancy for this program.
Currently, she teaches a course on Relational Psychotherapies in the Applied Mental Health Master’s Program in Trauma and Disaster Studies at Istanbul Bilgi University. Since 2009, she has been providing supervision for staff working in the boarding division of Istanbul Robert College. She continues to work with individuals and groups and offers supervision and training for mental health professionals in her areas of expertise.
Her primary therapeutic approaches include Relationally Focused and Developmentally Based Integrative Psychotherapy and Transactional Analysis. She is an Internationally Certified Integrative Psychotherapist, Trainer, and Supervisor (CIIPTS). She received her training in Integrative Psychotherapy directly from Dr. Richard G. Erskine, the founder of the approach and her supervisor. Her doctoral dissertation was grounded in one of the core concepts of Integrative Psychotherapy—Relational Needs. In her dissertation, she examined the measurement of relational needs based on Erskine’s model and their relationship with traumatic stress symptoms. Her research interests include relational needs, psychological trauma, psychosocial support models, and relationally oriented psychotherapies and interventions.
She is a board member of the International Integrative Psychotherapy Association (IIPA) and is responsible for the association’s activities related to university partnerships and scientific research.