ONLINE SUMMIT: TRAILBLAZERS IN CNM RESEARCH & EDUCATION

May 21-22, 2022

This conference is 100% ONLINE.

Attendee & Registration Information

*Cant attend live? No problem! This event will be recorded and made available within 7-10 business days. Make sure to purchase a ticket prior to the workshop as it will not be available to purchase after the workshop ends. Please note: If you purchased CEs, you will receive asynchronous credit.

Summit Topics Covered:

• A broad introduction to CNM relationships

  • Under the umbrella: What are swinging, open, and polyamorous relationships?

  • The prevalence of CNM relationships

  • The demographics of individuals in CNM and monogamous relationships

  • How sexual attitudes and beliefs differ across people in CNM relationships

• Navigating relationships with multiple partners

  • Sexual and relational ethics

  • Relationship agreements and communication

  • Examining relationship quality in diverse relationships

  • Diversifying need fulfillment across partners

• Overcoming jealousy and fostering compersion

  • Managing jealousy in CNM relationships

  • Fostering compersion in relationships

  • Who is most likely to experience jealousy and compersion?

• Coping with stigma

  • The impact of stigma and internalized CNM negativity on relationships

  • How relational secrecy and acceptance can shape sexual experiences

  • Overcoming stigma and thriving in relationships beyond the dyad

  • The perpetuation of stigma towards CNM in clinical settings

  • Positive approaches to working with CNM clients and their partners

NEED A SCHOLARSHIP FOR THIS WEEKEND CONFERENCE?

In collaboration with the BIPOC Collective, SHA donates two full weekend scholarship spots to every conference for BIPOC-identifying individuals.

*The BIPOC Collective's mission is to support the diverse community of BIPOC adult performers and sex-workers within the adult industry through mutual aid and advocacy with dignity and respect.

STUDENT DISCOUNTS

Are you a current college or graduate student? Email shacertifications@gmail.com with a copy of your student ID and current or next term’s course schedule to get this conference at student rate.

*Please note, this discount does not include CEs.

WANT TO BECOME SHA CERTIFIED?:

Want to stop paying for conferences one by one and gain hours towards AASECT Certification too? This program can also be registered for and included as part of SHA’s full Sexuality Educator/Counselor/Sex Therapy Certification & Sexuality Consultant Program. Apply HERE to become SHA Certified and to gain all the CEs you need to apply towards AASECT Certification. Take your sexuality education even further and become sexceptional.

ABOUT THE PRESENTERS:

Additional Speakers

Maria Pallotta-Chiarolli

For over 30 years, Maria has been an academic, author, activist and ally in the issues and intersections of cultural diversity, gender and sexual diversity, relationship and family diversity. She is considered to be the first Australian person to research and publish about polyamory, consensual non-monogamy and bisexuality, beginning in 1992. 

An Honorary Fellow in Gender and Sexuality Studies, Deakin University and with her consultancy, GSE Tapestry Consulting, Maria espouses decolonising research and writing projects, training and advocacy that are empowering and capacity-building for the communities and organisations she works for and with, and creating respectful and dynamic collaborative approaches. Maria’s current research is with First Peoples of Australia with Southern European heritage, exploring the contestations and connections between colonialism, racism and multiculturalism.  

Apart from journal articles, her publications include research and narrative on Non-Monogamies and Contemporary Intimacies: Love You Two (2008 Lambda Literary Award); Border Sexualities, Border Families in Schools (2011 Lambda Literary Award); Bisexuality in Education: Erasure, Exclusion by Inclusion and the Absence of Intersectionality (2016 USA Bisexual Book Award); and Women in Relationships With Bisexual Men: Bi Men By Women (2017 shortlisted for Lambda Literary Award).

Dr. David L. Rodrigues

Dr. David L. Rodrigues is an Assistant Researcher at Iscte-Instituto Universitário de Lisboa. Dr. Rodrigues is a social psychologist studying diverse topics in interpersonal relationships, that includes interpersonal communication using digital technologies, the functioning of people from sexual (e.g., asexual individuals) and relationship (e.g., non-monogamous individuals) minorities, and the implications of sexual activity to sexual health and well-being. More recently, Dr. Rodrigues has been examining how being able to pursue one’s needs and expectations in sex can help individuals have satisfying and pleasurable sexual activities.

Dr. Elisabeth “Eli” Sheff

Dr. Elisabeth “Eli” Sheff is a researcher, expert witness, coach, speaker, and educational consultant. With a PhD in Sociology and certification as a Sexuality Educator from AASECT, Dr. Eli specializes in gender and sexual minority families, consensual non-monogamy, and kink/BDSM. Sheff is the foremost academic expert on polyamorous families with children, and her 25+ year Polyamorous Family Study is the only longitudinal study of poly families with children to date. Currently teaching at the University of Tennessee in Chattanooga, Dr. Eli has also taught at the University of Colorado, University of Montana, Georgia State University, Oglethorpe, Emory, and the University of Zurich. Sheff co-chairs the Consensual NonMonogamies Legal Issues Team for the American Psychological Association, Division 44. Dr. Eli has published four books and over 25 journal articles and chapters, and is currently editing a series of books on diverse sexualities, genders, and relationships with Dr. Richard Sprott and the publishers Rowman & Littlefield. In collaboration with three colleagues, Dr. Eli developed The Bonding Project, a test people can take to explore their preferred bonding styles.

Dr. Justin K. Mogilski

Dr. Justin K. Mogilski earned his Ph.D. in evolutionary psychology in 2017 from Oakland University. He is an Assistant Professor at the University of South Carolina, Salkehatchie. He researches how evolution has shaped brain computation to adaptively guide the decisions that people make to initiate, maintain, and dissolve intimate relationships. He has published in evolutionary, social, personality, and sexual psychology journals on topics spanning mate poaching, infidelity, cross-gender friendship, consensual non-monogamy, intimate partner conflict, moral decision-making, morphometric cues of partner attractiveness, and multivariate statistical analyses of human mate preference.

Dr. Marie Thouin

Dr. Marie Thouin is the Founder of Love InSight, a mindful dating & relationship coaching practice where she supports people of all ages, genders, sexual and relationship orientations in navigating the path of intimate love. Marie is passionate about intentional and non-traditional relationship structures and the intersection of love, sexuality, and personal freedom. She completed her PhD research on the experience of compersion in consensually non-monogamous relationships at the California Institute of Integral Studies, which she discusses at www.WhatIsCompersion.com. She also serves as Editor at the International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, a leading peer-reviewed publication in the field of whole-person psychologies.

Dr. Michelle D. Vaughan

Michelle D. Vaughan, Ph.D. (she/her) is pansexual polyamorous psychologist and an Associate

Professor in the School of Professional Psychology at Wright State University. She trains health

providers in sex, gender, and relationship-affirming practices and conducts strengths-based

scholarship on LGBTQ+ and Consensual Non-Monogamy (CNM) in addition to serving on

committees and organizations focused on CNM. She is the co-editor and co-author of The

Handbook of CNM Affirming Mental Health Practice which will be published this summer by Rowman & Littlefield.

Cara Herbitter, PhD, MPH

Cara Herbitter, PhD, MPH, is currently an Interprofessional Advanced Addiction Fellow within the VA Boston Healthcare System. Dr. Herbitter completed their BA with Honors in Women’s Studies at Wesleyan University, Master of Public Health in the Sexuality and Health track at Columbia University, and doctorate in Clinical Psychology at the University of Massachusetts Boston. They completed a predoctoral internship at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University in the Behavioral Medicine track. Dr. Herbitter’s program of research is focused on minority stress and health disparities impacting sexual and gender minority (SGM) communities, along with groups that are similarly marginalized, such as those who are consensually non-monogamous. They are particularly interested in the intersection of SGM stress, traumatic stress, and substance use, and committed to efforts to reduce identity-related stigma in healthcare and develop affirmative interventions. As a clinician, they seek to integrate cognitive behavioral therapy, feminist-multicultural approaches, trauma-informed approaches, and client-centered therapy. They serve on the editorial advisory board of Behavioral Medicine, as co-chair of the Non-Binary Sexual and Gender Diversity Caucus of the Association for Women in Psychology, and as a member of the Committee on Consensual Non-monogamy within the American Psychological Association’s Division 44.