Dr Zefiro Mellacqua – The Naked Self
In this compelling and intellectually rigorous recorded presentation, filmed live at the IARTA 2021 Annual Conference, Dr. Zefiro Mellacqua — psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, and internationally respected thinker — presents key ideas from his groundbreaking book Transactional Analysis of Schizophrenia – The Naked Self. Widely recognised as “a cornerstone in contemporary transactional analysis for the understanding and treatment of a broad spectrum of psychotic disorders” (Tosi, 2021), Mellacqua’s work marks a significant evolution in how clinicians approach severe psychological disturbance.
In this keynote, Dr. Mellacqua introduces a series of relational revisions to traditional TA theory, including innovative understandings of symbiosis, ego states, and therapeutic presence. Drawing on years of clinical experience with severely disturbed clients in both the UK and Italy, he explores how his approach supports meaningful therapeutic engagement with individuals whose self-process is fragile or fragmented — including those often considered unreachable within mainstream approaches.
Accessible, conceptually rich, and grounded in clinical reality, this recording is essential for psychotherapists, psychoanalysts, and counsellors working with complex presentations or seeking to deepen their relational practice with clients across the psychotic spectrum.
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Video lecture with PowerPoint – 4hrs and 24 mins – This webinar was originally recorded on the 20th Nov 2021to a live audience.
Dr Zefiro Mellacqua is a medical Doctor, psychiatrist and psychotherapist also Certified Transaction Analyst (CTA – P) He worked as Associate Specialist (RCPsych) in General adult psychiatry for the Lambert home treatment team (South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust UK) and as a consultant psychiatrist in Switzerland, he later implemented the very first Home Treatment Team in Canton Ticino while at the same time serving in more recent years, as the head of an assertive outreach psychiatric team for the same organisation. He also lectured SUPSI University and USI on factual biomedical science in Lugano. In the past, besides his clinical activity both in the public and private sector, he worked at the Institute of psychiatry psychology neuroscience (IoPPN) in London as a research fellow in the field of first psychosis studies and served as the staff of management and leadership residential programmes at INSEAD in Fontainebleau (France). He was awarded the Eric Berne Memorial Award in 2025.
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