Dr. Dafna Palti completed her undergraduate studies in the Interdisciplinary Program for Fostering Excellence at Tel Aviv University, and she has an M.A. in both cognitive psychology and clinical psychology, and a Ph.D. in Psychology, all from Tel Aviv University. Her PhD thesis dealt with neural representations of language processes, integrating between cognitive psychology and neuroscience. She pursued her post-doctoral studies in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT, where she studied reading processes. Dafna is also a licensed clinical psychologist. As a clinical psychologist, she completed advanced studies in psychotherapy in the Psychotherapy Program at Tel Aviv University and works in her own private practice. She joined the faculty of The Academic College of Tel Aviv-Yaffo in 2017.

Dafna’s current research focuses on ADHD, exploring factors that affect the emotional and motivational characteristics in this syndrome and the influence of the social context on self-experience in adults diagnosed with ADHD. She is also interested in the interface between psychotherapy and cultural diversity, and in the ways that cultural sensitivity can be integrated into the psychotherapeutic process. Dafna is both a lecturer and clinical supervisor in several of MTA’s experiential courses in which students reach out to the local multi-cultural community in Yaffo. In this capacity, she works with MTA’s psychology students as they get experience in implementing psychotherapeutically-oriented interventions aimed at children and youth at risk. In some of Dafna’s research projects, she seeks to identify the effects of such interventions on both the children and the students that take part in these programs.