Tara Peris, Ph.D.

Board Member

Assistant Professor, UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior

Dr. Tara Peris is Professor and Vice Chair for Research at the Jane and Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA.  She is also Associate Director of the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Co-Director of the UCLA Child OCD, Anxiety, and Tic Disorders Program. Her research has been funded by NIMH, PCORI, NARSAD, the American Psychological Foundation, CISCO, and several other private foundations. Dr. Peris serves on the editorial board of several journals and is Associate Editor of Behavior Therapy. She is also the 2016 recipient of the Richard Abidin Early Career Award from the Society of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology.

Her clinical specialty is in evidence-based assessment and treatment of child and adolescent OCD, anxiety, and related disorders. Her research interests center on (1) understanding basic processes underlying youth anxiety, OCD, and related conditions; and (2) treatment development for youth with refractory cases of these conditions.  In the field of BFRBs, she has published on developmental, family environmental, and biological correlates of illness as well as on treatment outcome. In collaboration with study PIs, she served as Project Director for TLC’s BPMI Initiative.