Marilyn R. Davillier LCSW, MSSA

Marilyn R. Davillier is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker who has worked with infants, toddlers, children, and their families, in a teaching, research, or clinical capacity for over 35 years. What began as a career in the Montessori method of preschool education led to extensive research experience in Behavioral Pediatrics. In this capacity, she worked extensively with the psychological tools and measures relevant to infant and child development and co-authored several papers on the long-range developmental outcomes of preterm and drug-exposed infants. Additional post-licensure training includes The Brazelton Touchpoints Model of Child Development, The Napa Infant-Parent Mental Health Post-Graduate Fellowship, Perry’s Neurosequential Model of Therapeutics, Ogden’s Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, Downing’s Video Intervention Therapy (VIT), Sandplay Therapy, and Mindfulness Meditation Training.

Ms. Davillier is the Co-Director and Curriculum Coordinator for the University of Massachusetts, Boston, Infant-Parent Mental Health Fellowship Program, a nationally acclaimed two-year intensive interdisciplinary fellowship for licensed professionals whose mandate is to treat the social, emotional, and relational derailments that can arise in families with children ages birth to five years. This fellowship is developmental in orientation, multi-disciplinary in focus, and developed as a primary public health preventive intervention aimed to increase awareness and understanding of the critical role of early relationship support in child development and family well-being.

Ms. Davillier maintains a private practice in Boston that specializes in the parent-child dyadic model of treatment for families with young children under the age of six years of age who are dealing with disorders of behavior, regulation, communication, mood, adoption, and trauma. Related therapeutic services also include Parent Consultation, Family Therapy, Play/Art/Sandtray therapy for elementary and middle-school-aged children, Adolescent Psychotherapy, and Couples Therapy. Ms. Davillier lectures both nationally and internationally on meaning-making in the clinical treatment of young children, the importance of limit setting, family narratives, and the use of literature to promote resilience in the private life of the child. She is currently writing a fairy tale.