Nisha Gupta, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Psychology
School of Social Sciences College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences

678-839-0698
ngupta@westga.edDoEpKFPOiS7uai6Guu

Melson Hall - Room 205
Office Hours
By appointment

Nisha Gupta, Ph.D.

DR. NISHA GUPTA is an associate professor of psychology at the University of West Georgia, an arts-based phenomenological researcher, a psychotherapist, and creativity scholar. Her work as a researcher, artist, therapist, and educator seeks to embrace the creative process as a vehicle for evoking empathic understanding, fostering joy and well-being, and building beloved community. Nisha advocates for "arts-based phenomenological research" as an innovative and interdisciplinary methodology for psychology, which treads the line between psychology as a human science and the psychological humanities. She runs a research lab at UWG called the "Phenomenological Art Collective" through which she teaches students to conduct phenomenological research about people's psychological and sociocultural experiences, and then disseminate the research findings to the public as art (filmmaking, painting, poetry, music) for psychoeducation and community healing.  She also facilitates art therapy workshops for community organizations using arts-based phenomenological methodologies.

Trained as a clinical psychologist, Nisha is also a private practice psychotherapist. She offers individual and couples counseling for clients of diverse backgrounds and identities. She integrates psychodynamic, internal family systems, Jungian, mindfulness, and liberation psychotherapy approaches to provide culturally-sensitive, insight-oriented, trauma-informed therapy for clients. Nisha received her education at New York University (M.A.) and Duquesne University (Ph.D.), and has a background in the advertising industry prior to her career in psychology. 

  • B.S., Psychology and Communications, New York University, 2006
  • MA, Counseling for Mental Health and Wellness, New York University, 2012
  • Ph.D., Clinical Psychology, Duquesne University, 2018

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Fall 2020 Sections

Gupta, N. and Zieske, C. (2024): Arts based phenomenological research: Theory and praxis. Qualitative Psychology.

Head, JC; Gupta, N; Korobov, N. (2023). Reflecting back and imagining forward: Qualitative inquiry in psychology at the dawn of a new era. Qualitative Psychology.

Gupta, N. (2020). Teaching phenomenological research as a method of therapeutic art-making: A Covid-19 case study. Qualitative Methods in Psychology Bulletin: Special issue on creative and multimodal approaches to Qualitative Research, Issue 30 Autumn 2020

Gupta, N. (2020). Singing away the social distancing blues: Art therapy in a time of coronavirus. The Journal of Humanistic Psychology; Special issue on COVID-19. Onlinefirst.

Gupta, N. (2018). Stories of faith, stories of humanity: Fusing phenomenological research with digital storytelling to facilitate interfaith empathy. Qualitative Research in Psychology. DOI: 10.1080/14780887.2018.1442705

Gupta, N. (2017). Exploring the schizoid defense of the closet through the existential-phenomenology of R.D. Laing. The Journal of Humanistic Psychology. 5(2), 170-189.

Gupta, N. (2015). The cinematic chiasm: Evoking societal empathy through the phenomenological language of film. Janus Head: Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature, Continental Philosophy, Phenomenological Psychology, and the Arts, 14(2), 35-48.