Professor Brett Deacon is a highly experienced practitioner, researcher, teacher, and supervisor. Originally from the United States, he earned his PhD in clinical psychology at Northern Illinois University (2002) and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Mayo Clinic (2004). He has worked as a professor at universities in the US and Australia and was most recently associate professor and convener of the clinical psychology program at the University of Melbourne. Brett has maintained a private practice for over 20 years and is a registered psychologist in Australia and the state of Texas in the US. 

Brett specialises in working with clients seeking help for anxiety-related issues including OCD, social anxiety, panic attacks, agoraphobia, generalised anxiety and worry, phobias, and health anxiety. He has devoted his career to becoming an expert in exposure therapy, a form of cognitive-behavioural therapy that is the most scientifically supported approach available for these problems. In this approach, clients gradually approach feared situations while fading their use of safety-seeking behaviours to learn that feared outcomes are less likely to occur than expected, that anxiety and uncertainty are tolerable, and that values-consistent behaviours can be performed even while anxious. Brett is recognised internationally as an authority on the nature and treatment of anxiety and is co-author of Exposure Therapy for Anxiety: Principles and Practice (2nd ed.), published in 2019 by Guilford Press. 

Brett is kind, compassionate, and engaging and emphasises forming a strong therapeutic alliance with his clients. His approach is practical, present-focused, and action-oriented. He believes in “doing therapy,” not simply “talking therapy.” He frequently leaves the office during sessions to help clients face their fears in real-world settings. Brett’s core values are: (1) the needs of the client come first, (2) the practice of psychology should be science-based, and (3) problems of thinking, feeling and behaving are not medical diseases. His goal is to help clients live a rich, full, and meaningful life in accordance with their values while learning to accept the psychological ups and downs that show up along the way.