Marya C. McCarroll
Associate Professor
Associate Director, Psychology Clinic
313-577-5694
313-577-8949 (fax)
Rands House
Department
Marya C. McCarroll
When I accepted my current position at the beginning of 2024, I was beyond pleased to return to my roots in Detroit and at Wayne State University. I first moved to Detroit in 1990 and lived here for 15 years while working on my B.F.A, my M.Ed., and at various places of employment around the city, including one position at WSU as a Research Assistant in the early 2000s. While I moved to Ypsilanti in 2006 to complete my Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at Eastern Michigan University (EMU), my heart has remained here in Detroit and at WSU. It’s fantastic to be back in midtown and seeing all the development in the area in recent years.
Research interest(s)/area of expertise
As an associate professor and associate director at the psychology clinic, I am primarily focused on providing training and supervision to the student clinicians who are doctoral candidates in the clinical psychology program here. However, I continue to directly provide therapy to a few community members to keep my clinical skills up to par. I began my career as an art therapist working with individuals living with serious mental illness (SMI) at Kingswood Psychiatric Hospital and continued that focus during my first job as a staff psychologist at Hawthorn Center Psychiatric Hospital for children and adolescents, where I worked for eight years.
As a therapist, it has always been my goal to support those living with SMI and trauma to help find meaning in life alongside the pain that inevitably comes with it. I continue to specialize and receive training in trauma treatment. I also have expertise in treating individuals diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder, with a focus on suicidal ideation and non-suicidal self-injury. Though I consider my theoretical orientation to be integrative, third-wave behavior therapy approaches like acceptance and commitment therapy and dialectical behavior therapy align well with my experiences as a clinician and a human.
In my current role, I do not conduct research. However, I remain passionate about the research areas I investigated during graduate school. All those projects incorporated my dedication to feminist psychology and psychotherapy. At EMU, I taught Psychology of Women for 16 semesters, and I identify as a feminist psychologist/psychotherapist. It is my goal to have an egalitarian relationship with my clients and students and to help all individuals to understand the impact of culture and context on their lives. Here at WSU, I have been able to continue my focus on addressing gender inequities as a Commissioner on the President’s Commission on the Status of Women.
Research
- Dissertation: A Pilot Study on the Effects of Mentoring on Disordered Eating Behavior and Its Correlates
- Clinical Psychology Master’s Thesis: The Influence of Safety Messages on Women’s Perception of Risk, Fear of Rape, and Precautionary Behaviors
- Art Therapy Master’s Thesis: A Heuristic Inquiry into Designing a Creative Journal for Adolescent Girls
Education
- Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Eastern Michigan University, 2012
- M.Ed. in Art Therapy, Wayne State University, 1998
- B.F.A. in Metal Arts, Wayne State University, 1995