Froma Walsh

Froma Walsh, MSW, PhD, is Co-Director and Co-Founder of the Chicago Center for Family Health, and is the Mose and Sylvia Firestone Professor Emerita in the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice and Department of Psychiatry, Pritzker School of Medicine, at the University of Chicago. She is a licensed clinical psychologist and an AAMFT approved supervisor.

Dr. Walsh, an internationally respected leader in the field of family therapy,  is the foremost authority on family resilience. She has developed a resilience-oriented, community-based practice approach to strengthen families in crisis (e.g. major trauma; loss); in disruptive transitions (separation, divorce; migration); and facing challenges of persistent, multi-stress conditions (e.g. illness, disability; economic hardship; discrimination). Her research-informed Family Resilience Framework is widely applied in intervention and prevention efforts. She is also a noted expert on contemporary family diversity; on  multi-faith spiritual perspectives, and on the relational significance of the human-animal bond.

Her approach addresses developmental, systemic, cultural, and spiritual influences in suffering, healing, and resilience. Dr. Walsh is a frequent speaker and consultant nationally and internationally on resilience-oriented community mental health training, practice, and research.

With 120+ publications, her books include: Strengthening Family Resilience (3rd edition, October 2015); Spiritual Resources in Family Therapy (2nd ed., 2009); Normal Family Processes: Growing Diversity and Complexity (4th ed., 2012/2016); Living Beyond Loss: Death in the Family (with McGoldrick) (2nd ed. 2004); Chronic Disorders and the Family and Women in Families (with McGoldrick & Anderson). Her books have been translated into many languages, including Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, German, Japanese, Korean, and Chinese.

Dr. Walsh is past editor, Journal of Marital and Family Therapy and past president, American Family Therapy Academy (AFTA). Among honors for her distinguished contributions to family systems theory, research, and practice are awards by AFTA; American Psychological Association (APA), Society for Family Psychology; American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT): American Orthopsychiatric Association; and the Society for Pastoral Counseling Research.

Dr. Walsh received a BA with honors in Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. After serving in the Peace Corps in Morocco, she received an MSW at Smith College, with fieldwork at Yale Department of Psychiatry and Yale Child Study Center. She received her PhD in Human Development and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Chicago.

For more view Dr. Walsh’s Curriculum Vitae