Angela has been engaged in the field of psychology since 1995. After an MSc in Health Psychology, Angela decided that working therapeutically with people was her interest and thus she engaged in training in Counselling Psychology.
Angela Ioanna Loulopoulou
Angela has been practising counselling psychology since 2000, fully qualifying in 2004. Angela has worked in the NHS, in schools as well as voluntary organisations such as Cruse Bereavement care and Mind. She has been holding a private practice since 2006, offering psychotherapy to individuals, couples and families and clinical supervision to trainee and qualified counselling psychologists, counsellors and psychotherapists. Angela finds her clinical work highly enriching, because she gets to know people from all walks of life and she accompanies them on their journey of self-awareness, through helping them understand their issues and cope with them. In parallel, Angela cultivates her clinical skills and expands her knowledge of herself and of humanity in general. Angela learns something new about herself, society and life from every client she has.
A catalyst in Angela's career was engaging in a PhD in Refugee Care at Essex University, in collaboration with the Tavistock Centre. Angela had to do a placement with a refugee-related organisation and she started working within the Freedom from Torture Foundation in London. Angela was meant to work there for three months; she stayed for seven years and would have still been there had life commitments not changed. Through working therapeutically with families and individuals who have experienced and seen the worst of human nature, Angela saw the best of human nature: the huge reserves of the human spirit and the innate need for self-growth and development.
Angela's PhD was on the relationship between positive psychology and the refugee experience and she had developed a strong passion and interest in all matters related to mass movements of human population. Angela has been working at London Met since 2011; she started as a Senior Lecturer in Counselling Psychology and eventually became Programme Director of the Counselling Psychology Professional Doctorate. Angela enjoys working in a team of committed colleagues and engaging in a learning journey with the students on the course. Angela watches the students grow and develop, transform from unconfident trainee practitioners to competent and reflective clinicians and experts in research areas. Along with every trainee, Angela also learns and flourishs as a clinician, as a researcher and as a person.
As an academic counselling psychologist and programme director, Angela is actively involved in training matters and the improvement and development of training courses in counselling psychology; Angela is a member of the training committee in counselling psychology of the British Psychological Society and she engages in the accreditation of professional doctorate counselling psychology programmes across the UK.
Angela has taught positive psychology at undergraduate and postgraduate programmes at other universities. However, Angela is mainly engaged in the running and teaching of the Counselling Psychology Professional Doctorate. Angela has a teaching role in pretty much all the modules on the course, from teaching the theory of various therapeutic models and the skills involved in clinical practice, to teaching advanced cognitive-behavioural therapy practice as well as third-wave approaches such as acceptance and commitment therapy.
Angela is also engaged in service user's involvement in the training programme and she delivers clinical training of contemporary and applied interventions such as Eye-Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR). Angela developed and has been leading a module which engages students in learning and thinking about difference and diversity, breaking down barriers of stereotypes and prejudices. Angela is moreover highly involved in the teaching of MSc and Doctoral-level research and research supervision. She loves engaging in research with students and moulding an initial idea close to their heart into a tangible and concrete idea that can be researched. Angela gets great joy from supervisees who gain their doctorate with her support and guidance. Her interest areas are vast and Angela is happy to work with pretty much any topic. However, were Angela to choose what to work with, she would say that topics relating to transcultural and multicultural therapy issues, immigration policies as well as topics related to training in counselling psychology are of great interest to her.
Authored
- Loulopoulou A I (submitted for publication) CBT Approaches; in Galbraith, V (ed) Topics in Applied Psychology: Counselling Psychology. London: Hodder Education.
- Sykorova, E and Loulopoulou A I (submitted for publication) “I was just in this bubble of the course disconnected from everything else.” – An interpretative phenomenological analysis into young female counselling psychology trainees’ experiences of stress. Counselling Psychology Review.
- Loulopoulou, A I (2012) Positive Psychology and the Refugee Experience: Shifting perceptions and attitudes towards Refugees and Victims of Trauma. European Journal of Psychotraumatology.
- Loulopoulou, A I and Avigad, J (2007). Attachment and Detachment: The Refugee Experience. Contexts, 91, 32-34.
Conference presentations and training delivered
- Edinburgh Napier University, June 2016, Symposium Human Rights and Wellness: The Right to be Human in Adversity – keynote speaker
- Eating Disorders International Conference (Edic), March 2016, Poster: an Exploration of Women's Experiences of CBT for Bulimia Nervosa, with supervisee Kati Halikannen
- London Metropolitan University, October 2015, Interpreters Meeting Psychologists: Short Course
- The London Art Therapy Centre, September 2015, Workshop On EMDR When Working With Trauma
- London Metropolitan University, Cultureshock conference June 2015, Working with Refugees and Asylum Seekers – Presentation
- Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies, Twentieth Anniversary Conference, A Counselling Psychologist Working with Refugees within a Positive Psychology Framework.
- Positive Psychology International Congress, Los Angeles, USA, July 2013 Positive Psychology within the Counselling Psychology Ethos and Practice. Presentation
- Positive Psychology International Congress, Philadelphia, USA, July 2011, A Positive Psychology Working Framework Applicable in Multicultural Settings – Poster and Workshop
- Division of Counselling Psychology Annual Conference, Bristol, July 2011, Positive Psychology and the Refugee Experience – Presentation
- European Conference of Traumatic Stress, Vienna Austria, July 2011, The VIA-IS: Applicability Within a Multicultural Setting – Poster
- European Conference of Traumatic Stress, Vienna Austria, July 2011, Working Within a Positive Psychology Framework with Victims of Trauma – Presentation
Dr Angela Ioanna Loulopoulou
Course leader for Counselling Psychology Prof Doc
E: a.loulopoulou@londonmet.ac.uk