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Watching TV Together Can Bring Couples Closer August, 2026
SPSP online community

Our lab is excited to share recent research exploring how a simple everyday activity like watching TV together - may contribute to connection between romantic partners. The study found that shared TV watching was associated with a stronger sense of shared reality, or the feeling that partners experience and understand the world in similar ways. Importantly, this association was even stronger when couples talked with one another after watching. This work, authored by Ravid Haruvi, Yael Bar-Shachar, Noam Shuv, Yahel Dan, and Prof. Eran Bar-Kalifa, highlights how ordinary shared experiences can play a meaningful role in fostering connection in romantic relationships.

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Clinical panel, February 2026
Kfar Blum, Israel

We’re happy to share a recording of the panel in which Dr. Irit Kleiner-Paz, Dr. Ron Nissim, and Prof. Eran Bar-Kalifa discussed couples therapy from psychodynamic, narrative, and Emotion-Focused Therapy (EFT) perspectives.

PhD graduation ceremony , June 2026
Ben Gurion university, Israel

We’re delighted to share that on June 10, 2026, Sagi Lopata and Yael Bar-Shachar were awarded their PhDs, following years of hard work, dedication, and meaningful contributions to our lab. We are proud to welcome them to our community of PhD alumni.

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PhD graduation ceremony , September 2025
Ben Gurion university, Israel

We’re proud to share that on September 9th, 2025, our very own Ophir Leshets Katzenelenbogen received her PhD after six years of hard and dedicated work, becoming the very first PhD graduate from our lab.

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Change in Emotion in Psychotherapy , July 2025
Lausanne, Switzerland
 

On July 7–10 2025, the Change in Emotion in Psychotherapy event took place at the University Institute of Psychotherapy. The three-day program explored approaches to understanding and fostering emotional change in therapy.  

Bridging Hearts: The Role of Affective Processes in Transforming Relationships , 2025
 

On May 29th, Prof. Eran Bar-Kalifa delivered a lecture at the - Clinical Applications of Attachment Theory and Research conference, held at the Hebrew University and organized by ICAMH.

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EFT conference in Israel, 2025

On February 19th, our very own Prof. Eran Bar-Kalifa and Ph.D. student Ofra Kula delivered presentations at the Israel EFT Conference, sharing insights from our research on couples therapy using Emotion-Focused Therapy (EFT), including preliminary findings on the role of emotional processes in the transformation of relationships.

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Smile Synchrony in Couples: A Subtle but Powerful Sign of Relationship Quality, 2025

We’re excited to share that our very own PhD student, Reut Machluf-Ruttner, has been featured in a recent article discussing her innovative research on smile synchrony in couples therapy. Her study explores how the subtle coordination of smiles between partners can serve as a key indicator of emotional connection and relationship quality.

In the interview, Reut delves into the science behind smile synchrony, explaining how this small but powerful nonverbal cue reflects deeper emotional attunement between partners. Her findings provide valuable insights for therapists and researchers, offering a novel way to assess progress in Emotion-Focused Couple Therapy (EFT) and enhance therapeutic interventions.


Click here to read the article

Maternal Physical Activity as a Buffer for Children’s Declining Activity Levels
December, 2024

Our lab is thrilled to announce a new publication highlighting the critical role of maternal physical activity in mitigating the typical age-related decline in children’s activity levels. This research draws on data from six waves of ecological momentary assessments with mother-child dyads and reveals how mothers’ physical activity, as well as their physical activity in the presence of their children, influence their children’s physical activity habits over time. The findings emphasize the potential for targeted family-oriented interventions to promote healthy behaviors during childhood.

This work, authored by Ophir Katzenelenbogen and Prof. Eran Bar-Kalifa from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, in collaboration with Prof. Genevieve Fridlund Dunton from the University of Southern California, underscores the importance of maternal modeling behaviors in fostering children’s long-term physical health.
Click here to read the paper

Emotional Expression and Empathy in an Online Peer Support Platform
August, 2023

Our lab is pleased to share a new publication examining the profound role of empathy and emotional expression on online peer support platforms, specifically focusing on the Emotional First Aid platform. This work delves into how the empathetic engagement of supporters positively influences the emotional well-being of those seeking help. It emphasizes the importance of empathetic communication in aiding emotional regulation and improving the efficacy of online mental health support. Conducted by Ori Weisberg, under the mentorship of Prof. Eran Bar-Kalifa, in collaboration with Shiri Daniels from the ERAN Israeli Association for Emotional First Aid, this publication offers valuable insights for furthering the impact of online mental health interventions. 
Click here to read the article

Dynamics of Synchrony Between Therapists and Patients

August, 2023

The subtle interplay of non-verbal communication between therapists and patients enriches the effectiveness of therapy, as demonstrated in recent research. Examining synchronized movements and physiological responses, the study reveals how these quiet interactions help build stronger connections, making therapy sessions more meaningful. In collaboration with Prof. Dana Atzil-Slonim and Dr. Adi Paz, the article emphasizes the importance of non-verbal synchrony in psychotherapy and offers strategies for practitioners to enhance therapeutic practices for better patient outcomes.
Click here to read the article

Daily Dyadic Coping During COVID-19 Among Israeli Couples
September, 2021
 

COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic in March 2020 and since then our lives quite literally have not been the same. The effects of the pandemic are far reaching and for the most part yet still to be uncovered. What we can be certain about is that the pandemic has added an additional external stress, perpetuating greater symptoms of depression and anxiety. However, how this stress plays out within people’s romantic relationships is still for the most part unexamined.  In collaboration with Dr. Ashley K. Randall from Arizona State University we set out to examine this question and highlighted ways in which couples can cope with this new stressogenic event within a dyadic context.
Click here to read the article

Taking part at the Shared Reality symposium at the International Association for Relationship Research (IARR) main conference
August, 2021

 

How do experiences like finishing each other’s sentences or sharing the same emotion influence interpersonal relationship processes? Further, how do these experiences shape how people interpret events in their lives? This symposium examined the role of shared reality in interpersonal relationships. Yael Bar-Shachar, a PhD student at our lab, and Dr. Maya Rossignac-Milon from Columbia University organized this symposium, which included four talks and a discussion, led by Dr. Eran Bar-Kalifa.  In her talk, Yael presented the new article  ‘Responsiveness processes and daily experiences of shared reality among romantic couples’ which was recently published at JSPR.

New findings

December, 2020

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In recent work with his colleagues, Dr. Eran Bar-Kalifa examined partners’ respiratory sinus
arrhythmia (RSA) during affiliative dyadic interactions. It was found that this biological marker, indexing partners’ regulatory effort, can serve as a protective dyadic factor for partners in the transition to parenthood, a challenging period for most couples. For example, new fathers’ RSA predicted their (female) partners’ lower negative affect and stress-reactivity. 
Click here to read the article.

Video abstract for recently published paper “Accuracy and Bias in Vulnerability Perceptions of Partners Undergoing Emotion-Focused Therapy for Couples"

August, 2020

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This paper by Ido Wiesel (a former MA student) was published in the August 2020 issue of the Family Process Journal. It focuses on the importance of accessing and expressing vulnerability as a mechanism of change in emotion-focused couples therapy, and specifically the role of accurate perceptions of the other’s experience of vulnerability during therapy sessions.

Read about us

June, 2020

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In its June 2020 issue, The Relationship Research News Journal published a spotlight article on Dr. Eran Bar-Kalifa’s current work. Click here to read the article.

The Common Factors approach in psychotherapy.

May, 2020

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On May 7th 2020, the clinical division of the Israel Psychological Association held an online conference entitled “From Research to Clinic and back.” The sessions included lectures on evidence-based psychotherapy and the relationship between research and clinical practice. As part of the introductory panel, Dr. Eran Bar-Kalifa gave a short presentation on the Common Factors approach in psychotherapy, which posits that different treatment approaches have a set of components in common, and that these, more than any other specific component, drive the therapeutic effect. He also presented the contextual model for psychotherapy, and highlighted the importance of incorporating deliberate practice into basic therapeutic skills (e.g., empathy) in Israeli training programs.

*The conference was given in hebrew

New Grant: ISF Funding for our 2019-2024 Capitalization Enhancement Project

July, 2019

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We are pleased to share that our lab has received funding from the Israeli Science Foundation (ISF) to continue developing our capitalization enhancement intervention. Building on two decades of extant research documenting the salubrious effects of sharing and celebrating good news with one’s partners, over the last two years we have been working on developing and piloting a brief intervention to promote partners’ capitalization skills. With the generous support of the ISF, we will be able to expand these efforts (e.g., running RCT) as well as to broaden our theoretical understanding of capitalization processes (e.g., delineating the specific motivations and needs driving romantic partners’ capitalization behaviors).

For further information on this project click here.

New Grant: BSF funding for our 2019-2023 study on change in emotional interpersonal dynamics among couples receiving EFT-C

June, 2019

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We are delighted to announce that we have just learned that we received funding from the U.S.-Israel Binational Science Foundation. This project, submitted with our dear colleagues Emily Butler, David Sbarra, and Ben Shahar, will allow us to examine change in couples’ emotional interpersonal dynamics as the couples undergo emotion-focused therapy.

For further information on this project click here.

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Building #97

Ben-Gurion University, Beer-Sheva, Israel

Email us: rplab@post.bgu.ac.il

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