Overview of Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT)

Alicia Meyer, Ph.D., is a licensed clinical psychologist who has devoted the last decade of her career to the health and well-being of children, families, and trauma survivors. She graduated with honors from Brown University (undergraduate). In graduate school at the Catholic University of America, she earned a specialization in the “Children, Families, and Cultures” track and was awarded a fellowship through the prestigious Minority Fellowship Program. She gained specific training in cultural competency and has a personal and professional affinity with the culture of the military. To complete her graduate education, Dr. Meyer was accepted into the internship program at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC), an organization that is internationally recognized as an expert and leader in the field of trauma psychology. Inspired by the work she completed at MUSC, Dr. Meyer then devoted her post-doctoral training to child abuse (and its related branches of parenting, family transitions/reunification, etc.), in which she is now considered a clinical and forensic expert. Regarding the latter, she is experienced in writing forensic evaluations for children and adults and testifying in court.

Dr. Meyer became the Mental Health Director of the Tree House Child Assessment Center, the Child Advocacy Center in Montgomery County, Maryland. She established a training program there for psychology graduate students interested in the area of childhood trauma. She then became the Director of Mental Health at the Child Abuse Program at the Children’s Hospital of the King’s Daughters (CHKD) and completed her studies to become a National Trainer in Trauma-Focused – Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT). She is also a certified therapist and Global trainer in Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT). Simultaneously, Dr. Meyer founded Alicia’s Place, a non-profit agency that utilizes a cognitive-behavioral, multi-systemic, empirically-validated approach to the psychological assessment and treatment of children, families, and trauma survivors. Dr. Meyer is also the president of the Virginia Academy of Clinical Psychologists.