Matt Englar-Carlson Associate Professor (657) 278-5062 Office: EC-426 mattec@fullerton.edu

Personal Biography

I am so happy to be a member of the counseling department at California State University at Fullerton. I believe our program epitomizes the best of what graduate education can be: collaborative and active faculty, motivated and purposeful students, and a university dedicated to bettering the social welfare of the surrounding community. Of course the sunny weather is an additional bonus.

As a mental health professional, I am much more interested in focusing on mental health, rather than mental illness. My roots in Adlerian psychology coupled with my Midwestern upbringing have forged an emphasis on strength-building and making the best better in people. In my capacity as a teacher and clinician, I try to facilitate personal and interpersonal functioning across the life span with a holistic focus on individuals, groups, and families. Being trained as scientist-practitioner, I look to carefully integrate theory, research, and practice with a constant attention and awareness to multicultural issues.

In terms of my career path, I have actively sought experiences that would push me to better understand myself in order to work effectively with an increasingly diverse clinical population. I completed my undergraduate studies at the University of California- Santa Cruz with an emphasis in social psychology and sociology. After completing two Master’s degrees at Stanford University (Health Psychology Education) and the Pennsylvania State University (Counselor Education), I worked for two years as an elementary school counselor in the San Francisco Bay Area. In my capacity as a school counselor I focused my preventive efforts on conflict resolution and mediation, cooperative learning experiences, and group counseling. My favorite program was a yearlong mother-daughter group I co-led with junior high girls and their mothers. Although this job was wonderful, I knew further education was calling me. For my doctoral studies I attended the Pennsylvania State University and received my doctoral degree in the American Psychological Association (APA) accredited program in counseling psychology. My doctoral studies focused on the psychology of men and multicultural counseling. I completed my clinical internship at the Student Counseling Center at the University of Southern California and spent one year as a visiting assistant professor in educational psychology at the University of Washington before coming to California State University- Fullerton. Over the past few years I have been a teacher at Esalen Institute in Big Sur facilitating experiential men’s groups and father-son weekends.

Although my professional identity is important to me, I further define myself by broad interests outside my profession. As a lifelong athlete (I began running at age 5), I always have some athletic pursuit captivating my focus. My passion for over 25-years has focused on two wheels as I am cycling fanatic. As active mountain biker and road rider, my daydreams consist of storied mountaintops like Mont Ventoux, Alpe d’Huez, and the Passo Stelvio. There is nothing better than riding with friends and sharing the pain and glory of suffering on a bike. My love for sports is pretty strong, and in terms of professional sports, I am true to my roots and always cheer on teams from Wisconsin.  Music is often playing in my head or around me. If I could relive any music period, it seems hard to be the punk music of 1977. Spend a little around me, and it won’t be long until the conversation turns to my two favorite culinary loves- coffee and donuts. All of these interests, however, take a back seat to time spent with my family: my wife Alison, my five-year old son Jackson, and my one-year old daughter Beatrix.

Teaching

As a professor, I teach a variety of classes but like to focus on classes that emphasize the core theoretical concepts that underlie the field. I tend to teach from a constructivist and relational perspective, encouraging students to blend their own emerging views of counseling and education with the dominant discourse on best practices, current research, and developmental theory. In addition, I work to create a classroom atmosphere in which the pluralism inherent in modern clinical practice and life is addressed and enhanced. I believe that effective teaching is focused on helping students become critical thinkers who can assess ideas from multiple viewpoints and perspectives. However, counseling is not about remaining in one’s head, thus I tend to teach experientially allowing each student to “try on” and practice concepts and strategies in a supportive setting. Counseling is a verbal profession in which the classroom must allow for interaction and observation of individual and group processes.  I teach Counseling Theory, Family Systems, Groups: Practice and Process, Beginning and Advanced Practicum, and Final Project. One of the greatest joys of working at a university is the time spent mentoring students in an effort to assist students towards meeting their goals. Don’t be a stranger, stop by my office and let me know if I can be of assistance.

Scholarship

My scholarly interests are broad, yet mainly focused on finding creative and practical ways to teach and train mental health professionals about counseling male clients. My scholarly work on men and masculinity has covered a number of clinically related topics such: qualitative research to better understand the process of psychotherapy with men, social justice theory and men, men as fathers, understanding gender roles through the media, positive psychology and masculinity, cultural diversity and men, men and intimacy, and help seeking behaviors of men.  Other areas of scholarly work include the broad realm of social class and how it comprises and is often omitted from discussions of diversity and multiculturalism within the field of counseling and psychology, group psychotherapy, Adlerian psychotherapy, and child counseling.

Other achievements include being a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, and receiving the Researcher of the Year Award and the Student of the Year Award from the Society for the Psychological Study of Men and Masculinity (Division 51 of APA). I serve on the editorial board for Psychology of Men and Masculinity and previously served on the editorial boards for The Family Journal and Individual Psychology.  I have been active on several professional committees including the writing committee for developing psychological practice guidelines for working with boys and men, the first national psychotherapy with men conference steering committee and the divisional representative to the APA Divisions of Social Justice. At CSUF, I am a member of Intuitional Review Board.

Selected recent publications include:

Recent scholarly work includes:
Englar-Carlson, M. (2009). Engaging men in psychotherapy: A stimulus video. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Englar-Carlson, M., & Rath, S. (2009). The conflict of navigating cultural expectations: The case of Sam. In M.E. Gallardo & B. McNeill (Eds.).  Intersection of multiple identities: A casebook of evidence-based practice with diverse populations (pp.197-232). New York: Routledge.

Englar-Carlson, M. (2009). Men and masculinity: Cultural, contextual, and clinical considerations. In C. Ellis & J. Carlson (Eds.), Cross cultural awareness and social justice in counseling (pp. 89-120). New York: Routledge.

Englar-Carlson, M., & Englar-Carlson, A.J. (2009). Multimodal child counseling in school settings. In A. Vernon & T. Kottman (Eds.), Counseling theories: Practical applications with children and adolescents in school settings (pp. 85-122). Denver, CO: Love Publishing.

Kottler, J.A., & Englar-Carlson, M. (2009). Learning group leadership (2nd ed.).Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Kiselica, M.S., Englar-Carlson, M., & Horne, A.M. (Eds.) (2008). Counseling troubled boys: A guidebook for professionals. New York: Routledge.

Nelson, M.L., Englar-Carlson, M., Tierney, S., Hau, J. (2006). Class jumping into academia: Multiple identities for counseling academics. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 53, 1-14.

Englar-Carlson, M., & Stevens, M. (Eds.). (2006). In the room with men: A casebook of therapeutic change. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Englar-Carlson, M., & Shepard, D.S. (2005). Engaging men in couples counseling: Strategies for overcoming ambivalence and inexpressiveness. The Family Journal, 13, 383-391.

Sperry, L., Lewis, J., Carlson, J.D., & Englar-Carlson, M. (2005). Health promotion and health counseling: Effective counseling and psychotherapeutic strategies (2nd ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Mahalik, J.R., Good, G.E., & Englar-Carlson, M. (2003). Masculinity scripts, presenting concerns and help-seeking: Implications for practice and training. Professional Psychology: Research & Practice, 34, 123-131.