Bio

JOAN KOSS-CHIOINO is a Professor of Anthropology (Emerita) at Arizona State University, and Research Professor of Psychology at George Washington University in Washington, DC.  As a psychological anthropologist she works at the interface between anthropology, psychiatry and psychology. Her primary interest is the treatment of illness and emotional problems, whether traditional, alternative or psychotherapeutic ,  in Latino cultures in the Southwest (treatment research), in Puerto Rico, and Spain.  Currently, she is studying medical doctors who are Spiritists or use spirituality in their clinical work in Puerto Rico and their relationships with patients.  She continues to explore the inclusion of the construct “culture” into studies of spirituality and religion. An example of this direction is illustrated in her forthcoming APA handbook chapter, in press.

Her publications include: Women as Healers, Women as Patients: Mental Health Care and Traditional Healing in Puerto Rico (Westview Press, 1992), Working With Culture: Psychotherapeutic Interventions with Ethnic Minority Children and Adolescents (Jossey Bass, 1992); Working With Latino Youth: Culture, Context and Development (Jossey Bass ,1999), and Medical  Pluralism in the Andes, (Edited.) (Routledge, 2003).Her  most recent book is Spiritual Transformation and Healing (Rowman and Littlefield,2006) edited with Philip Hefner).