I am an award winning (British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies) and National Institute for Health Research highly commended Behaviour Change Psychologist and a Chartered Member of the British Psychological Society. I am a published and widely cited researcher in the areas of obesity, weight-loss, motivation, e-health, wellbeing and behaviour change.
I am the primary developer of the highly internationally acclaimed (medical research literature, mainstream print media, TV and radio) motivational coaching intervention Functional Imagery Training (FIT) in the context of weight-management. I co-designed and tested FIT, while completing my PhD in Health Psychology at the University of Plymouth, where I am still a visiting specialist in the Faculty of Health, lending expert advice across projects further testing FIT in a diverse range of health issues, including alcohol dependency and work-related stress, as well as facilitating lectures and workshops in Motivational Interviewing, coaching for health and FIT for psychology and medical students.
“As part of her doctorate she designed, executed and reported a randomised single-blind trial of FIT for weight loss, published in the International Journal of Obesity (DOI: 10.1038/s41366-018-0122-1), which showed that FIT led to a five-fold increase in weight loss compared to Motivational Interviewing (MI)…
NIHR Researcher Awards, 2020, panel member
This research has the potential to transform behaviour change approaches to obesity, implicated in many aspects of health. I am recommending her because of the exemplary way in which this research was conducted and the adoption of Open Science perspective in making the data and analyses available to other researchers as supplementary materials (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41366-018-0122-1#Sec24)”
I also run my own consultancy through which I deliver online training to professionals and practitioners who want to become certified FIT practitioners, provide expert scientific advice for the production of television series on behaviour/lifestyle change and to corporate businesses wishing to design bespoke behaviour change/wellbeing interventions for their clients and/or staff.
I accommodate a limited number of private clients who work with me on tackling issues from weight-loss, binge-eating, yoyo-dieting and/or to improve symptoms of functional disorders, such as CFS/ME and/or Fibromyalgia to alcohol use, anxiety, depression and work-based stress.
I have extensive academic background in the development and testing of behaviour change and wellbeing interventions, as well as developing training and delivering training in behaviour change to professionals, practitioners, and students. I also have a wealth of clinical experience, working for NHS and Public Health service providers such as Livewell Southwest; previously, LWSW tier 2 weight management lead and specialist health improvement practitioner in the Wellbeing team. Currently, I am a Livewell Southwest Academy associate trainer and honorary specialist health consultant.
In my early career, before starting my academic journey in psychology, I trained and worked as a chef in Australia and the UK, as well as studying drama in Berlin, Germany.
