Talking with Machines: Making Sense of AI, Bias and Psychotherapy – Femma Ashraf
Event Overview
AI is beginning to enter therapeutic spaces, raising new questions about identity, ethics, culture, and the future of practice. This seminar offers psychotherapists a clear, jargon-free introduction to what AI is, how it works, and why it’s becoming relevant to clinical practice.
AI is already showing up in areas that touch our work, for example, many clients now use AI for journaling, emotional check-ins, or exploring psychological concepts before they bring issues to therapy. Some have or continue to use AI as a stand-in therapist. This means therapists increasingly encounter clients who arrive with AI generated interpretations of their symptoms or relationships, making it important for clinicians to understand how these tools shape meaning, emotion, and identity.
Femma will demystify core AI concepts and address common concerns, while introducing several tools she is developing for psychotherapy practice, including:
- A generative client simulator that recreates racialised client experiences, helping trainees practise responding to micro-aggressions, racial trauma disclosures, and culturally shaped expressions of distress
- A culturally informed trauma-planning tool that prompts therapists to consider factors such as migration histories, family stories, community context, and collective trauma
- The “Decolonising the Mind” GPT, designed to challenge Eurocentric assumptions, broaden clinical imagination, and support culturally attuned formulations
Using simple, real-life examples, such as how the simulator might help a therapist recognise an implicit bias during a rupture repair, or how cultural context shifts the meaning of a trauma narrative, the webinar explores how AI can support reflective, trauma-sensitive, and anti-oppressive practice. It also looks at where AI has limitations and how systemic bias can show up in technological tools. By the end of the session, participants will have a solid, accessible foundation in what AI is (and what it is not), gain insight into its therapeutic possibilities and risks, and have space to reflect on the cultural, ethical, and identity-based questions that arise as AI becomes more visible in psychotherapy.
Femma is a third-year trainee psychotherapist in Transactional Analysis at Metanoia. She has over twenty years of experience in artificial intelligence and technology, and is the founder of Astronomical AI, a healthcare-focused AI startup, and Clinical Director at Patterns Institute, where she runs trauma-sensitive practice workshops. Her work explores how AI can be used ethically in psychotherapy, with a focus on trauma, decolonisation, and culturally attuned practice. She is particularly interested in helping therapists engage with issues of race, identity, and systemic bias, and in shaping responsible, inclusive approaches to emerging AI tools in therapeutic settings.
This webinar will focus on the psychotherapy field, although other fields may find the discussion of interest.
£24.00 members/£48.00 non-members.
The Zoom Link will be sent out to all participants the day before the event.
PLEASE NOTE – A recording of the event will be made, which, once processed, can be purchased on the IARTA website. Please do not sign up for the live webinar if you are unable to attend; instead, wait until the recording is ready and then make your purchase. You will receive a notification when we add a new recording. Please note that payment cannot be transferred from one account to another, and in some cases, the recording may be edited to ensure confidentiality.
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