Louisa Pavey

Louisa Pavey is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology within the Faculty of Business and Social Sciences at Kingston University. She serves as Co-Course Director for the BSc Psychology, BSc Psychology with Criminology, BSc Psychology with Sociology, and BSc Business Psychology courses. Her academic expertise spans health psychology, social psychology, and behavioral science with a focus on communication and persuasion.

Education

• DPhil Psychology (ESRC +3 competition funded), University of Sussex, 2008
• MRes Psychological Methods (Distinction), University of Sussex, 2005
• BA (Hons) Social Psychology (First Class), University of Sussex, 2003
• PGCLTE Higher Education Teaching and Learning, Kingston University London, 2009

Research Interests

Dr. Pavey's research focuses on health behavior change, message framing, and motivational responses to health risk information. Her work particularly examines implicit cognitive processes, choice and autonomy, reactance, planning and impulsivity, with interventions targeting behavior change in areas such as diet, alcohol consumption, and exercise. She applies theoretical frameworks like Self-determination Theory to understand how autonomy-supportive communication can facilitate more effective health promotion. Her research has important implications for designing public health campaigns that minimize psychological reactance and maximize engagement with health recommendations.

As a member of the Clinical and Applied Behavioural Research Group in the Department of Psychology, she has published extensively on topics including the effects of proscriptive versus prescriptive messaging, temporal framing of health information, and the role of autonomy in health behavior change. Her recent work has addressed important public health challenges including vaccine hesitancy and pandemic response behaviors, examining how message framing affects compliance with health guidelines during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Teaching and Supervision

Dr. Pavey teaches across multiple undergraduate and postgraduate programs, including Behavioural Science, Business Psychology, Health Psychology, Positive Psychology, Research Methods, and Social Psychology. She supervises PhD students in areas related to health psychology and behavioral science. As Co-Course Director for multiple psychology programs, she plays a key role in shaping the educational experience for psychology students at Kingston University.

Professional Affiliations

• British Psychological Association
• European Health Psychology Society
• European Association of Social Psychology
• Behavioural Science and Public Health Network