Learning Content:

• Theoretical underpinnings of the Adaptive Internal Relational Model

• Neurology of development, attachment, and information processing

• Neurological and epigenetic impact of trauma

• Developmental impact of trauma

• Core Survival Networks and the continuum of Neuro-dissociative States

• Interventions for self-relational, somatic, and neurological regulation and interactional skills

• AIR Resourcing Strategies for all phases of therapy

• Integrated memory processing interventions for people with neuro-dissociative states

• The impact of traumatic bonding on clients, therapists, and the therapeutic relationship

• Compassion fatigue and therapist self-care

• Programming and conditioning used by perpetrators in families, organized systems (cult, gang, human trafficking)

• Programming and conditioning embedded in societal systems such as (racism, misogyny, religious persecution)

​Learning Outcomes

• Gain a working knowledge of the neurology of development, stress-danger response system and attachment strategies

• Practice using developmental information and neurology to explain trauma symptoms and activation patterns

• Apply the Adaptive Internal Relational (AIR)  Network Model to case conceptualization

• Integrate existing forms of trauma treatment with the AIR Network Model of therapy

• Use competency based language in conceptualization and treatment interventions

• Recognize the range of neuro-dissociative states and the adaptive developmental nature of such

• Utilize effective intervention strategies across the spectrum of neuro-dissociative states

• Understand the continuum of programming, from Limiting beliefs to Intentional Conditioning and Programming, as it is used in families and systems of violence

• Develop intervention strategies for recognizing and intervening with the continuum of Conditioning/Programming

• Formulate effective strategies around traumatic bonding and compassion fatigue as it relates to the self of the therapist

• Integration of AIR Network therapy with EMDR and other memory processing interventions appropriate to various neuro-dissociative states  (EMDR training is NOT required for this course)

Instructional methods:

• Lecture including multimedia presentations

• Experiential exercises to enhance practice and understanding of concepts

• Interactive consultation including conceptualization and development of  treatment strategies

• Interactive small group practica including skills building around competency based  intervention and therapeutic stance

AIR Network: A Feminist Multicultural Model in the Professional Training Space

Phyllis C. Solon, PsyD, LP © 2021

AIR Network is a theory grounded in feminist and multicultural pedagogies, philosophies, perspectives and research.  It is not, as such, a culturally specific theory or treatment model.  It is a model for understanding who people are and how they get that way from a complex interconnected set of considerations and factors which include neurological, developmental, experiential, familial, cultural, and societal dimensions.  AIR therapy is a model of seeing people who have been traumatized across multiple dimensions – individual, family, cultural, societal, historical - in the context of systems of domination that are ascendant in the world and have been for millennia. This is a feminist and multicultural lens on the world explicating how people, all people within their different settings and systems, are impacted by the systems in which we live. The theoretical perspective and the therapy take into account both adverse/risk and protective/resilience factors and assume that we are wired to connect, repair and heal, which happens best and most fully in the context of compassion, care and community.  Those assumptions are based in an understanding of the cross-cultural reality that neurodevelopment and childhood sequences of development happen in the same way across the world.