About

Uzm. Klinik Psikolog Fatma Bakır has more than nine years of academic, research and clinical experience in psychology. She works with children, adolescents, young adults and families, structuring psychotherapy and psychological assessment processes on the basis of evidence-based approaches, tailored to each client's developmental characteristics and individual needs.

She completed her undergraduate degree in the Department of Psychology at Istanbul Commerce University. At the same university, she completed a master's degree in Family Counselling and Education on an academic merit scholarship, and completed a second master's degree with high honours in the Clinical Psychology Programme at Fatih Sultan Mehmet Vakıf University. Bringing together her background in clinical psychology and family counselling, she adopts a holistic approach that considers children and young people together with their developmental characteristics, family relationships and the environment they live in.

Her academic work has focused on child mental health, trauma, forced migration and intergenerational transmission. In her master's thesis, she examined risk factors associated with post-traumatic stress disorder among Syrian refugee children and adolescents within an ecological model framework. She has taken part in international research on the psychological effects of war and forced migration on children, adolescents and parents, and has presented her work at national and international scientific conferences. As part of her academic work, she served as a visiting researcher at the Department of Psychology of Kingston University London and at Koç University's Migration Research Center (MiReKoc).

She completed her core specialist training in psychotherapy in the four-year Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for Adults programme led by Prof. Dr. Mehmet Zihni Sungur. Following the programme's theoretical training and supervision process, she earned the title of Europe-Accredited Cognitive Behavioural Psychotherapist.

She completed clinical supervision in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for Children and Adolescents with Prof. Dr. Vahdet Görmez, and furthered her clinical training in trauma through Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for Children and Adolescents training with Dr. David Trickey. She has completed EMDR training, and has continued her play therapy training and clinical supervision with Reyhana Seedat.

In her clinical work she draws on Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, EMDR and play therapy approaches. Her main areas of practice include attention and executive function difficulties, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive symptoms, trauma, emotion and behaviour regulation problems, peer relationships and developmental differences.

In the therapy process, she places importance not only on reducing symptoms but also on understanding the cognitive, emotional, developmental and environmental factors underlying the difficulties experienced. She aims to create a safe, collaborative process in which the client feels safe and understood, recognises their own strengths, and develops lasting skills they can use in daily life.

Certifications & Training

• Cognitive Behavioural Therapy training and therapist certification accredited by the European Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Therapies (EABCT)
• Europe-Accredited EMDR Training (children/adolescents and adults)
• Practitioner training in ADOS-2 autism assessment, WISC-4 intelligence test, MOXO attention test and Denver developmental screening
• Child-Centred Play Therapy, Trauma-Focused Play Therapy and Expressive Therapy training (to International Play Therapy standards)
• Crisis, Trauma and Grief Counselling training
• UCLA PEERS for Adolescents training