In ackowledgement of Prof. Eli Somer’s retirement from active teaching at the University of Haifa, the School of Social Work Council dedicated on January 17th a special meeting to maladaptive daydreaming (MD). The keynote speaker was Dr. Nirit Soffer-Dudek from the Department of Psychology at the Ben Gurion University of the Negev. Dr. Soffer-Dudek reviewed the latest developments in MD research. The group photo below features Dr. Soffer-Dudek with Prof. Somer and 6 University of Haifa students who focus their research on MD. In response to a question, Prof. Somer said: “Maladaptive daydreaming research is gaining momentum. Seven parallel studies in the field are currently being conducted by young Israeli researchers, while global involvement in MD research is growing rapidly. For example, a symposium on MD with participation of researchers from Hungary, Italy, Israel, Poland and the USA will be presented at the 2019 conference of the European Society for Trauma and Dissociation (ESTD) in Rome, Italy, this year” (Photos by Galit Rosen).
