Christian Ryan is a Senior Lecturer in clinical psychology in the School of Applied Psychology, University College Cork (UCC). He maintains his clinical practice as a chartered clinical psychologist, working primarily with children and adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). He has published a range of peer-reviewed articles in the area of disabilities, adult mental health and psychometrics. The current focus of his research is on the interaction between alexithymia and autism, with a view to improving emotion recognition and regulation interventions.
Christian is the placement coordinator for the doctoral programme in clinical psychology at UCC, and is involved in all aspects of the course, including selection, teaching, research supervision, curriculum development and placement evaluation. He is also the Academic Director of the ASD Studies courses at UCC. He joined the university in 2017 after many years working in front-line services, both as a psychologist and psychology manager.
Christian served as an elected Council Member of the Psychological Society of Ireland (2014-2017); he is a full member of the Division of Clinical Psychology and a former member of Heads of Psychology Services Ireland (HPSI).