Rika Higashikaze is a counsellor and clinical psychologist who has worked with children with autism, adolescents and adults in hospital and private settings in Japan and England for 20 years.

She has studied cognitive behavioural therapy, transactional analysis, hypnotherapy and psychoanalysis (at the Tavistock Centre), psychosynthesis and psychotherapy (PET).

She also works for an overseas students' bureau in London, where she brings an Eastern awareness to communication and the exchange of energies between therapist and client.