Elizabeth is a Professor in health psychology and passionate about empowering patients and improving care. Her research includes testing interventions to reduce stress, and improve the ways that patients understand and cope with illness. This includes developing AI, robots and embodied conversational agents to increase patient access to helpful interventions.

Elizabeth initially trained as an electrical and electronic engineer at Canterbury University to pursue her interest in robotics. She then worked at Transpower, Électricité de Tahiti, and Robotechnology. After becoming interested in the psychological aspects of robots and in psychoneuroimmunology, she obtained her MSc and PhD in health psychology.

She was a visiting academic at the school of psychology at Harvard University and in the Program in Science, Technology, and Society at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston, USA in 2010. In 2017, she returned to Boston with a Fulbright award to study companion robots.

Elizabeth is known for the development of the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire, drawing assessments, and illness perception interventions. In the technology space, Elizabeth is particularly interested in the emotional connections we form with robots, and how we can build emotional intelligence and empathy skills in robots, to help support patients. This research extends to virtual humans, an advanced form of computer agent with artificial intelligence. She is interested in how technology can be used to empower patients.

Elizabeth's work has been supported by grants from many agencies including the Health Research Council, Marsden Fund, Auckland Medical Research Foundation, Heart Foundation, Oakley Mental Health Research Foundation, Maurice and Phyllis Paykel Trust, the Foundation of Research Science and Technology, and MBIE.

Her research has featured in the New York Times, Scientific American Mind, the Guardian, Time magazine, the BBC World Service, and other media.

Committee/Professional groups/Services: Department postgrad advisor

co-Chair of the International Human-Robot Interaction Conference Steering Committee
Editorial Boards: Technology, Mind & Behavior; Psychology & Health

Areas of Expertise:
Health Psychology
Psychoneuroimmunology
Human Robot Interaction
Digital Humans

Technology and psychology

Media Keywords:
Coping with chronic illness, Human-robot interactions, Patients' drawings of illness, Perceptions of illness, Perceptions of risk, Stress, Healing wounds, Psychoneuroimmunology