Laurence Irwin Sugarman is Research Professor and Director of the Center for Applied Psychophysiology and Self-regulation in the College of Health Sciences and Technology at the Rochester Institute of Technology; a developmental and behavioral pediatrician at the Easter Seals Diagnostic and Treatment Center in Rochester, New York; and Clinical Professor in Pediatrics at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry. He received his MD magna cum laude from the University of Missouri School of Medicine and completed residency and Senior Chief Residency in pediatrics at the University of Rochester.

For his two decades after residency, Dr. Sugarman ran a solo, community-based primary care practice. During this time he developed an interest in clinical strategies that effectively increase resilience and coping skills including biofeedback and hypnosis. Through his training, practice, teaching and writing he has emerged as an international leader in the clinical integration of self-regulation strategies with children. He is an Approved Consultant and Fellow in the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis (ASCH), for which he has served as Vice President and Co-Director of Education. He is immediate Past President and current Vice-President of the American Board of Medical Hypnosis, the credentialing body for competency in clinical hypnosis for US physicians. He was on the teaching faculty for the SDBP Clinical Hypnosis Workshops from 1997-2009 and the National Pediatric Hypnosis Training Institute since inception in 2010. He lectures and trains professionals in pediatric hypnosis, biofeedback and self-regulation internationally. He was also an Executive Committee member of the Section on Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Dr. Sugarman has authored numerous papers, audio-recordings, book chapters and produced an internationally acclaimed video-documentary, Hypnosis in Pediatric Practice: Imaginative Medicine in Action. With Dr. William Wester, Dr. Sugarman has co-authored and co-edited the text, Therapeutic Hypnosis with Children and Adolescents now in its second edition. At RIT his work has focused on how best to evoke the abilities of young people with autism spectrum disorder to control their own stress with a combination computerized biofeedback and hypnotic techniques as well as developing pedagogy for continuing professional development in psychophysiological care. He has received numerous awards and citations for his efforts in this field, the essence of which, he writes, “is exploring and investing in the therapeutic potential of each child’s imagination.”