Luciana C. Silva is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT) and a Clinical Fellow of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. She earned her Master of Science and her Doctorate of Philosophy degrees in Child and Family Development (specialization in Marriage and Family Therapy) from the University of Georgia. She has published in peer-reviewed journals and done national and international conference presentations on a variety of research topics. Her Masters thesis focused on the effects of the fear of sexual assault on women’s use of time and space, and her dissertation topic was how intercultural couples negotiate a multicultural identity for their relationship.
She has a wide-range of experience and expertise in the field of mental health and family therapy. She comes to UAB after ten years of experience in various nonprofit settings, where her work focused on trauma, addiction and co-occurring mental health recovery, intimate relationship conflict and distress, and sexuality education. Luciana works with families to witness and influence their journey toward better understanding, acceptance, and negotiation of themselves as a unit, and as relational (and relating) individuals. When treating individuals, she still conceptualizes their needs and objectives through developmental and systemic frameworks. She is both compassionate and directive in therapy, using Bowen family systems theory as a guiding framework for the practical application of cognitive-behavioral and mindfulness principles.
Luciana has advanced clinical training in Bowen Family Systems Theory, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Parent-Child Interaction Therapy, the Gottman Method of Couples Therapy, and other evidence-based practices. She is an AAMFT Approved Clinical Supervisor and has taught undergraduate and graduate level courses on various topics in mental health and family therapy. Additionally, she has interest and experience in program evaluation, project management, and qualitative research.
