Tamara Sharifov, LCSW
Licensed Clinical Social Worker | Scholar-Practitioner | Private Practice Owner
Tamara Sharifov is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW) with 13-years’ experience across diverse disciplines – including clinical psychology, academia, humanitarianism, conflict resolution, global affairs, and activism. She is an expert in the newest forms of psychotherapy – Third-Wave Contextual Behavioral therapies, including Contextual-Dialectical Behavioral Therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy - with additional expertise in PTSD, complex trauma, international armed-conflict, peacebuilding, and political unrest.
Her experience spans facilitating full model DBT and contextual therapies across mental health contexts, medical missions to the Syrian-Lebanese border, co-founding a humanitarian emergency response NGO serving Syrian Refugees in Lebanon, teaching conflict-resolution to war-affected Armenian and Azerbaijani peacebuilders, acting as primary family therapist within intensive outpatient clinics (IOP), community mental health services in Chicago, private practice, and masters level lectureship. Tamara holds a Masters in Clinical Social Work from the University of Chicago School of Social Service, and a second Masters in Conflict Management and Resolution from the Joan B. Kroc School of Peace Studies, at the University of San Diego.
Currently, Tamara runs a psychology private practice in San Diego, California, consults, and has most recently joined a Global Mental Health Task Force influencing policy around mental health targets within the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs). Tamara also acts as a lead clinical instructor teaching Third-Wave Contextual therapies to post-master’s mental health clinicians at the University of Chicago, Masters School of Social Work.
