Kristin Samuelson, PhD

Dr. Kristin Samuelson received her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Virginia in 1998. She completed her internship at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford University/Children’s Health Council  and post-doctoral fellowship with the Stanford University Department of Psychiatry. She obtained additional post-doctoral training in forensic psychology at the University of South Carolina Abuse Recovery Center. She has been licensed as a psychologist since 2001. She was previously licensed in California (2001 – 2018) and is currently licensed in Louisiana and Colorado. She additionally holds temporary licenses to practice psychology in multiple states.

Dr. Samuelson’s forensic practice specializes in trauma. She is a former professor who brings over 25 years of experience as an expert witness and forensic evaluator in litigation related to traumatic stress. Her research has specialized in the field of trauma psychology since 2001, with much of her work surrounding neuropsychological functioning in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).  She continues to serve as a research consultant on federal grants related to PTSD. She has published over 45 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters on trauma, PTSD, and traumatic brain injury (TBI).

Dr. Samuelson has been involved in hundreds of civil and criminal matters, involving personal injury, emotional distress, PTSD, TBI, pain, neuropsychological functioning, child maltreatment, sexual assault, domestic violence, sexual harassment, malingering, and trauma-related criminal mitigation, among others. Dr. Samuelson is regularly sought out as an expert in civil rights and human rights litigation, including cases involving excessive use of force, unlawful arrests, racial discrimination, and family separation of immigrant detainees. In addition, she is well-versed in cross-cultural assessment and has worked with culturally diverse trauma survivors all over the world.

Dr. Samuelson’s training, research, and clinical experience involved both children and adults, which is somewhat unique in the fields of psychology and psychiatry, where typically professionals specialize in one or the other. Her forensic practice involves both child and adult survivors of trauma.

Dr. Samuelson has been retained by attorneys in 16 states across the country. Her work is equally split between plaintiff and defense cases, and she has been qualified as an expert witness in trauma, child abuse, sexual assault, domestic violence, neurobiology of trauma, and clinical psychology in district courts in six states as well as federal court. With over 25 years of experience as a research scientist specializing in trauma psychology, Dr. Samuelson is able to provide scientifically informed, firsthand knowledge of the relevant research as an expert witness.

Dr. Samuelson is proud to have trained, mentored, and taught hundreds of clinical psychologists during their graduate training during her tenure as a professor from 2005 until 2021. At the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs (2015-2021), she and her colleagues started a doctoral clinical psychology program specializing in trauma psychology. Dr. Samuelson served as its Director. She mentored doctoral student  dissertation research and taught graduate-level trauma psychology, psychodiagnostic assessment, and trauma assessment and supervised student therapy and neuropsychological assessment

Dr. Samuelson is a member of multiple professional associations, including the American Psychological Association and the American Psychology-Law Society. She is regularly invited to serve on grant review panels for the Department of Defense, serves as a Contributing Editor for the journal, Psychological Injury and the Law, and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Clinical Psychology and Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy.

Dr. Samuelson began working as an independent contractor for fpamed in 2026.

References available upon request.