Omar Gelo

Dr. Omar Gelo graduated in 2000 in Psychology at the University of Urbino (Italy). He earned his Ph.D. at the University of Ulm (Germany) in 2007, where he also worked as a research assistant. In 2007 he begun to work as assistant professor at the Department of Psychotherapy Science of the Sigmund Freud University Vienna (SFU) (Austria). In 2008 he became Assistant Professor for Dynamic Psychology at the University of Salento (Italy). Since 2014 he is Associate Professor for Dynamic Psychology at the same university, where he is also – since then –the director of the Bachelor and Master Program in Psychology. He is the director of the International Ph.D. Program in Psychotherapy Science at the Sigmund Freud University Vienna (Austria), where he also lectures research methods in psychotherapy and coordinates a research group in the field of psychotherapy training. His research interests concern: (a) the epistemological reflection on the scientific status of psychotherapy and psychological intervention; (b) the methodological reflection on the application of quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods in psychotherapy and clinical research; (c) the empirical investigation of the psychotherapeutic process in different therapeutic schools (comparative process-outcome research); (d) psychotherapy integration; and (e) the application of dynamic systems theory to the study of psychotherapy; (e) the investigation of psychotherapy training. He recently co-edited the volume “Psychotherapy Research: Foundations, Process, and Outcome” (Vienna, Springer).
I was born close to Milan, I spent the first years with my grandparents in Sicily, came back to the North of Italy with 4. With 19 I went to Urbino (the home town of Raffaello), in the Centre of Italy, to study Psychology. Right after, I moved to Germany until 2007 for my PhD and research activity. Thereafter, in 2007 I lived for one year in Vienna. Since 2008 I have been living between Vienna and Lecce. As a consequence of all this, I have been steadily confronted with the issue of multiplicity: multiple places, multiple people, multiple ways of living, multiple habits, multiple worldviews, multiple cultures, etc. This was, of course, connected to a steady feeling of being-in-between. Multiplicity and being-in-between are basic forms of human experience; in my case, these experiences have been even more meaningful in shaping myself. It is not easy to deal with these forms of experience, that carry many risks with them, but also possess an enormous potential. The challenge of multiplicity is to learn to recompose the several parts our experience is necessarily made of; the challenge of being-in-between is to use these boundary zones to learn to explore and make the unknown known. Overcoming these challenges results in a richer, more articulated, and more differentiated identity. What I have learned by means of my constant multiple being-in-between is pluralism. In my view, pluralism deals with the acknowledgment and engagement with multiplicity and diversity (i.e., otherness), together with the ability of tolerating the unavoidable feeling of being-in-between connected with such attitude. Pluralism is not an easy attitude to achieve and maintain. It requires the ability of tolerating the feeling of disorganization and fear that legitimately arises when we confront ourselves with unfamiliar or unknown. However, pluralism – in whatever form (personal, social cultural, political, scientific, etc.) – is almost a moral attitude, toward which every individual (but also every society) should strive. My personal pluralism has lead to a professional pluralism, which is reflected in my research interests. The SFU has been always characterized by this very same pluralistic attitude (pluralism of research methods, pluralism of psychotherapy schools, etc.). This is the reason why there could not have been more fertile ground for me and my professional development than SFU.