This marks the first time Luxembourg has hosted the event and the timing couldn’t be better, as on Friday 11 May, the council adopted the Government Bill on the Establishment of Psychotherapists, which are not currently recognized in the Grand Duchy.

The University of Luxembourg is proud to host the 30^th Symposium on Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, from 17 to 19 May, 2012 at Neumünster Abbey.

Nearly 400 research scientists and practitioners are set to attend this free, open to the public event. Three highly-acclaimed experts, Professors Julian Thayer (Ohio State University) Allan Hobson (Harvard), and Andrea Danese (Kings College London) will give lectures ranging from sleep and dream science, to childhood risk for depression.

This congress offers an excellent opportunity to advance research in Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy at a national level, facilitating the translation of scientific results into clinical practice, in Luxembourg and la Grande Région.

The global burden caused by mental disorders is currently estimated to be the largest (28%) of all non-communicable diseases. “No health without mental health” is now a recognised approach world-wide, stressing the importance of providing better health care for those with mental disorders for disease prevention, health promotion, diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation.

 Who’s That Girl? Body perception research

University of Luxembourg PhD student, Annika Lutz is conducting body perception research – the study of how young women in Luxembourg perceive their own body and how this is related to attitudes and behaviour.  In her pilot study, she asks healthy volunteers to recognise a photograph of their own body with their face digitally removed. Next to the original photograph, digitally manipulated images of thinner or fatter versions of the participant’s body are also shown. On average, healthy volunteers could pick out their own body, with a slight bias for choosing the thinner image. In the next phase of the study, she aims to uncover what exactly occurs in the brain when we see photographs of our body and how this process differs in those suffering from an eating disorder.

Using EEG, an electroencephalogram which records electrical waves of brain activity, Ms. Lutz describes, “we can see what the brain does in reaction to a stimulus (a photograph of the body) even before a conscious thought occurs. Concerning anorexic patients, we would like to find out whether their pre-conscious processing of their own body is altered”.

Her professor, Dr. Claus Vögele, who is also the conference organiser, explains, “If we can pinpoint in the EEG when a body image fear response is evoked in Anorexic patients, we will have new insights in the processes that maintain the disease, and possibly the thought processes that put people at risk for Anorexia”.

Professor Claus Vögele has been a practising Clinical and Health Psychologist for over 20 years. His research is conducted in the Integrative Research Unit: Social and Individual Development, INSIDE, Faculty of Language, Literature, Humanities, Arts and Education. For more information please visit: www.symposium-klinische-psychologie-2012.eu.