Ruth Perednik (née Kestenbaum, Hebrew: רות פרדניק; born 24 October 1959) is an English-born Israeli psychologist, pioneer in the field of selective mutism.
Her thesis in England was on The Relation Between Mothers’ Attentiveness to Toddlers and Child’s Attachment to Mother and in Israel she completed her thesis on Selective Mutism in Immigrant Families, under the supervision of Prof. Yoel Elizur, with a grant from the Martin and Vivian Levin Center for the Development of the Child and Adolescent.
Ruth Perednik taught at the Lincoln School, and at the Yehuda Halevi Teacher’s Training College, Argentina (1986–1987), where she lectured on Educational Psychology.
The innovative element of Perednik’s treatment method is treating the child or teen in his natural environment [3] (home and school sessions), and not in a clinic setting, since this is where the symptoms of the selective mutism hit hard and must be alleviated.
Perednik advocates for accountability of therapists when treating children, so that evidence-based interventions are the treatments of choice, facilitating effective therapy.