Better Thinking

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Dr Donel Martin about new and innovative approaches to improving cognition, with a focus on brain stimulation technologies.

Dr Donel Martin is a clinical academic researcher based at the Black Dog Institute and University of New South Wales and practicing Senior Clinical Neuropsychologist. He has a Ph.D in psychology and a Masters in Clinical Neuropsychology.

He is the Head of the Neurocognition team at the Black Dog Institute, which investigates the cognitive and emotional effects of interventional treatments for psychiatric disorders, including ketamine, psilocybin, non-invasive brain stimulation (e.g., transcranial direct current stimulation: tDCS; repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation: rTMS) and ECT. He has been a researcher for over 18 years and published >150 peer reviewed papers and 13 book chapters, and has been cited over 5000 times.

Dr Martin has won two internationally competitive early career researcher awards and attracted over $9.2Mil in competitive research funding as a Chief Investigator. In the field of Psychiatry/Psychology he is in the top 1% of highly cited authors. 

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Dr. Jerry Rosenbaum anxiety disorders, depression, and how psychedelics change the brain — and what this could mean for the future of psychiatry.

Dr. Jerry Rosenbaum is the Stanley Cobb Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and former Chair of the Massachusetts General Hospital Psychiatry Department, where he led one of the nation’s largest and most influential psychiatric programs for two decades.

Dr. Rosenbaum has authored more than 400 scientific papers, edited 20 books, and has been recognized with numerous awards—including the C. Charles Burlingame Award for lifetime achievement in psychiatric research and the Ellis Island Medal of Honor. His career spans pioneering longitudinal studies on anxiety and depression, major leadership roles across national mental health organisations, and groundbreaking work in neuroscience and psychopharmacology.

He now directs the Center for Neuroscience of Psychedelics, where his research focuses on how psychedelics change the brain and what this could mean for future treatments of psychiatric disorders.

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Robert Whitaker about how the disease model of mental illness emerged, what evidence it was built on, and why it may not be as scientifically grounded as many believe.

Robert Whitaker is an American journalist and author who has won numerous awards as a journalist covering medicine and science, including the George Polk Award for Medical Writing and a National Association for Science Writers’ Award for best magazine article.

In 1998, he co-wrote a series on psychiatric research for the Boston Globe that was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. His first book, Mad in America, was named by Discover magazine as one of the best science books of 2002. Anatomy of an Epidemic won the 2010 Investigative Reporters and Editors book award for best investigative journalism.

He is the publisher of madinamerica.com. He is a Clinical Assistant Professor (Adjunct) in the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science.

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Professor Dianna Kenny about understanding gender dysphoria in young people and the complexities surrounding their care and wellbeing.

Dr Dianna T. Kenny is an experienced psychologist in Sydney who offers a range of services including individual adult psychotherapy, child, adolescent, couple, and family therapy, mediation and family dispute resolution, and medico-legal consultancy.

A former professor of psychology at The University of Sydney, Dianna is now a consulting, developmental and educational psychologist and psychotherapist who provides a range of psychological services to adults, children, adolescents, couples and families, including psychological assessment, psychotherapy, specialist treatment for music performance anxiety, mediation, family dispute resolution, and medico-legal consultancy. She is also an expert court report writer, researcher, and author. She has authored bestselling books on child development, child sexual abuse, psychotherapy, gender dysphoria, and music performance anxiety. She has consulting rooms in Concord (Inner West), and Glebe (near Camperdown, Newtown, Ultimo, Darlington, and Annandale).

Dr Kenny provides a range of services covering psychological assessment and therapy, parent management training, mediation, family dispute resolution, and medico-legal consultancy.

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Arthur Thomas Ware about fostering long, happy, and purposeful years in retirement, and how psychology can help us create meaning beyond work.

Arthur Thomas Ware (He prefers to be called, Tom) will be turning ninety in April next year. He was born in the U.K. and came to Australia as a “Ten Pound Pom” in 1951. From that year he had a variety of jobs: Post Office, Navy, Aviation, Electrical Power, Truck Driver, Foundry Laborer, Lab Assistant, NSW Police and even a year as an Antarctic Expeditioner. His final work was the usual 9 to 5 in a government office job. He worked for 44 years and took voluntary redundancy in 1995.

Since that time, Tom has been engaged in a dozen or so different types of volunteer work. Mostly, though, he has stuck to his three main passions: Creative Writing, Speaking to Audiences, and pursuing Self-knowledge and greater Self-understanding. Thirty years retired, Tom’s current focus is on enabling upcoming retirees to find their “Why” so that they, too, can live long, happy, and meaningful retirements.

Tom has been married to the same little lady for 65 years. He and his wife, Rita, are parents, grandparents and great-grandparents. They live in Sydney.

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Paul Rhodes about moving beyond individual psychology to explore systemic thinking, family therapy, eco-psychology, and affect theory.

Professor Paul Rhodes is a clinical psychology academic and at The University of Sydney where he teaches family therapy, community-based approaches to mental health and a new lived experience co-designed course exploring insider knowledge of recovery. His current research is diverse including eco-psychology, liberation psychology, the decolonisation of the field and innovations in qualitative methods. He is currently writing a book from Thames and Hudson called Liberating Psychology: Anti-Fascism in a Post-Human World. He also works as a clinician at Mind Plasticity in Ultimo, Sydney.

In his private time on weekends he is a fine artist at Lennox St Studios in Newtown and currently has an exhibition at The Dax Centre called Troubled/&beyond about the life of the therapist. Last month he released a travel book about Italy called A Psychogeography of Florence, blending psychology with poetry, art and history.

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Professor Zoltán Sarnyai about his recent randomized controlled trial on ketogenic metabolic therapy for serious mental illness and the broader implications of this emerging field for the future of psychiatric treatment.Professor Zoltán Sarnyai, Director of the Margaret Roderick Centre for Mental health Research at James Cook University, is a medically trained neuroscientist with an internationally recognised expertise in the neurobiology of stress and mental health disorders. Before moving to Australia, he was University Lecturer in the Department of Pharmacology, University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Pembroke College, where he was Director of Studies for Medicine. He trained at McLean Hospital at Harvard Medical School and at The Rockefeller University, supported by the DuPont-Warren Award and a NARSAD Young Investigator Award, respectively. His group described the role of stress neuropeptides oxytocin and corticotropin-releasing factor in addiction, for which he was awarded the Richter Prize by the International Society of Psychoneuroendocrinology. More recently, he discovered the efficacy of ketogenic metabolic therapy in preclinical models of schizophrenia and is currently conducting the world’s first randomised controlled clinical trial to investigate this in clinical populations. Zoltán was appointed Lady Davis Visiting Professor at Technion-Israel Institute of Technology to study the neuro- metabolic aspects of schizophrenia. Zoltan has published over 150 original research papers, reviews and book chapters, his works have been cited over 10,000 time, with an H index of 50. He is Associate Editor for Nutritional Neuroscience and Frontiers in Neuroscience, and editorial board member of Nutritional Psychiatry and Stress.

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Lucy Johnstone about the Power Threat Meaning Framework and how it offers an alternative to traditional psychiatric diagnoses by focusing on power, threat, and meaning in people’s lives.

Dr Lucy Johnstone is a consultant clinical psychologist, author of 'Users and abusers of psychiatry' (3rd edition Routledge 2021) and ‘A straight-talking guide to psychiatric diagnosis’ (PCCS Books, 2nd edition 2022); co-editor of 'Formulation in psychology and psychotherapy: making sense of people's problems' (Routledge, 2nd edition 2013); and co-author of ‘A straight talking introduction to the Power Threat Meaning Framework’, 2020, PCCS Books) along with a number of other chapters and articles taking a critical perspective on mental health theory and practice.

She is the former Director of the Bristol Clinical Psychology Doctorate in the UK and has worked in Adult Mental Health settings for many years, most recently in a service in South Wales. She is Visiting Professor at London South Bank University, an Honorary Fellow of the BPS, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Lucy was lead author, along with Professor Mary Boyle, for the ‘Power Threat Meaning Framework’ (2018), a British Psychological Society publication co-produced with service users, which outlines a conceptual alternative to psychiatric diagnosis and has attracted national and international attention. Lucy is an experienced conference speaker and lecturer, and currently works as an independent trainer. She lives in Bristol, UK.  

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Professor Gordon Parker AO about the gut–brain connection and how it could transform our understanding and treatment of mood disorders such as depression and bipolar disorder.

Professor Gordon Parker AO is Scientia Professor of Psychiatry, UNSW, was Founder of the Black Dog Institute, Head of the UNSW School of Psychiatry, Director of the Division of Psychiatry at Prince of Wales Hospital and Area Director of Psychiatry in the South- Eastern area. His positions with the Royal Australian & New Zealand College of Psychiatrists include having been Editor of its Journal and initiating its Quality Assurance Committee.

In 2018 he was a finalist for the NSW Senior Australian of the Year and in 2020 was recipient of the Australian Mental Health Prize. His research and clinical practice have focussed on the mood disorders. His 25 th book on a radical new therapy for bipolar disorder (faecal microbiota transplantation) was published in March 2025 – “A Gut Brain Solution” and published by Allen and Unwin.

His first novel was published in 1966 and his second in 2017. In the 60’s, he wrote for The Mavis Bramston Show and OZ Magazine, was an ABC Science broadcaster in Sydney and London, and in 2004 he had a play (“Personality Games”) produced by La Mama in Melbourne.

In this episode of Better Thinking, Nesh Nikolic speaks with Dr Matt Bernstein about the emerging field of metabolic psychiatry and how metabolism, nutrition, and lifestyle factors influence mental health.

Dr. Matt Bernstein is a respected clinical psychiatrist for more than 20 years. He is also Accord’s chief executive officer and one of the leading voices in the emerging field of metabolic psychiatry. After graduating summa cum laude from Columbia University in New York, N.Y., with a bachelor’s degree in English literature, he received his medical degree from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA.

Dr. Bernstein then trained at the MGH McLean Psychiatry Residency Program in Belmont, Mass., where he served as chief resident. He remained at McLean Hospital after residency as a psychiatrist-in-charge and later served as assistant medical director of its schizophrenia and bipolar inpatient program. Dr. Bernstein has developed his passion for community-based care as the chief medical officer at Ellenhorn, a sister program of Accord, where he has pursued alternative ways (such as a focus on metabolism, nutrition, circadian-rhythm biology and exercise) to help individuals achieve their best levels of functioning without relying solely on traditional psychiatric approaches. In addition to serving on the clinical advisory board at Metabolic Mind, Dr. Bernstein is known for organizing the first-ever public conference on metabolic psychiatry in 2023.