PAU alumna Dr. Sara Nasserzadeh, PhD, is a world-renowned social psychologist, psychosexual and relationship therapist, author, and speaker whose work bridges science and human connection. She earned a master’s degree in Research Methodology and a PhD in Social Psychology from Middlesex University (London), followed by postgraduate studies in Couples Counseling and Psychosexual Therapy at the Relate Institute and University of East London. In 2020, she completed her second master’s degree in Marriage and Family Counseling at Palo Alto University.
“I help people make sense of their relational spaces from the most intimate to the most public because I believe world peace can be created one thriving relationship at a time,” says Dr. Nasserzadeh. “Clinically, I mainly focus on couples, because when there is peace between partners, it ripples outward to their children, families, communities, and workplaces.”
Based between Los Angeles and London, UK, Dr. Nasserzadeh works with clients online from all over the world. For more than two decades, she has worked with hundreds of clients across more than forty countries, helping them cultivate connection, compassion, and intentional love.
Her global practice inspired her to look deeper into why some relationships thrive while others quietly fade. Over ten years, she analyzed clinical notes from 312 couples to understand how cultural narratives shape our definitions and practices of loving relaitonships. After that she teamed up with Dr. Pejman Azarmina to study a sample of 159 US representative couples to validate her findings. She discovered that many couples subscribe to what she calls a submergent model of love, where two people “fall” in love, merge completely, and lose their individuality in the process and. The early intensity can feel exhilarating, but when the dopamine-driven chemistry fades, the absence of deeper alignment often becomes painfully clear. Then in the process of making sense of the situation and regaining themselves, they push each other away in conscious and subconscious ways which create resentment and drifts.
Her research led to the development of the Emergent Love Model, introduced in her award-winning book Love by Design: 6 Ingredients to Build a Lifetime of Love. The model identifies six essential ingredients that enable partners to maintain meaningful, evolving relationships while preserving their individuality: Attraction, Respect, Trust, Compassion, Shared Vision, and Loving Behaviors.
Dr. Nasserzadeh’s work was honored with the Clark Vincent Award by the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists (CAMFT). The award recognizes outstanding literary or research contributions that advance the field of psychotherapy and deepen public understanding of relational dynamics.
In addition to her clinical and research work, Dr. Nasserzadeh is a member of various professional organizations and contributes to the wider community through her social media platforms and training courses. Her educational and consulting projects have taken her from the United Nations to universities, media and professional associations worldwide.
Through her writing, teaching, and direct client work, Dr. Nasserzadeh continues to help people build intentional, resilient, and compassionate relationships, creating ripples of peace that begin, as she says, “one relationship at a time.”