Dr. Mawson received her PhD in Counselling Psychology from UBC in 2005. Her Masters and Doctoral studies were supported by fellowships from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. For her doctoral research, she explored married couples’ experience of voluntary childlessness.  She received the Canadian Psychological Association Award of Excellence for her dissertation.

Dr. Mawson started her career in the field of employment counselling and career development working with designated groups – women returning to the workforce, persons with disabilities, new Canadians, and First Nations persons.  She subsequently entered the field of correctional/forensic clinical psychology where she practiced as a psychologist and manager of mental health services for 23 years.  Dr. Mawson then undertook a faculty position as Associate Clinical Professor in the Counselling Psychology graduate studies program at SFU.  In this capacity she was director of the SFU Surrey Counselling Centre that provided counselling services to underserved populations. She also taught the following courses: Ethics in Psychology, Group Psychotherapy, Supervised Counselling Clinic I/II, and Counselling Practicum.

Since 1989, Dr. Mawson has maintained a part-time private practice with a focus on adults and couples.  Over the past thirty years, she has extensive experience in providing individual and group therapy, crisis counselling, mental health/psychological assessments, as well as couple therapy.  She also has extensive experience providing clinical supervision to graduate students in psychology, early career psychologists, and clinical counsellors.

In her clinical practice, Dr. Mawson utilizes evidence-based therapies to treat anxiety, depression, trauma, relationship distress, health-related issues, grief/loss, and workplace challenges.  Therapies include Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, EMDR, Mindfulness practices, ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy), and EFT (Emotionally Focused Therapy).  As a Certified EFT therapist for couples, Dr. Mawson welcomes couples seeking relief from distressing relationship dynamics, feelings of disconnection, communication difficulties, and entrenched patterns of conflict.  She utilizes a direct, pragmatic and experiential approach to explore clients’ problems and to help clients to set and achieve goals that are relevant and sustainable.