John Day

John is a Consultant Counselling Psychologist and a member of The Cognitive Collective’s autism assessment team. He carries out ADOS-2 and ADI-R assessments as part of our multidisciplinary autism assessment pathway, working with both children and adults.

John trained as a psychologist in South Africa, having lived, studied and worked in Cape Town before returning to the UK. He holds an MA in Counselling Psychology from Rhodes University and is registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC). His wider professional experience includes working within Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) and specialist autism assessment services.

He has considerable experience working with neurodivergent people and has both delivered and led autism assessments within the private sector. John is trained in the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule, Second Edition (ADOS-2) and Autism Diagnostic Interview-Revised (ADI-R), two of the specialist clinical tools used within a comprehensive autism assessment.

John understands that an autism assessment is about much more than completing a series of clinical tasks or reaching a diagnostic outcome. For many people, assessment can be an important part of developing a clearer understanding of themselves, their experiences and the way they interact with the world around them. He approaches the assessment process with curiosity and compassion, creating space for each individual’s experiences to be properly heard and understood.

His background as a counselling psychologist strongly influences the way he approaches assessment. John originally trained within Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) and also works from existential and humanistic perspectives, giving him an integrative understanding of mental health, development and individual experience. While John does not currently provide ongoing psychological therapy through The Cognitive Collective, this therapeutic experience informs the warm, person-centred way in which he conducts assessments.

John is particularly mindful that autism does not look the same in every person. His approach considers the individual as a whole, recognising their strengths, difficulties, developmental experiences and the different ways neurodivergence may present across people and throughout their lives.

As part of The Cognitive Collective’s multidisciplinary team, John contributes his specialist psychological and autism assessment expertise to help us reach careful, considered and evidence-based clinical decisions. Above all, he aims for the assessment process itself to feel respectful and collaborative — helping people leave with greater understanding of themselves, regardless of the eventual diagnostic outcome.