About Me.

After retiring from Langara in 2020, I now devote myself full time to my writing and research, bringing together my two passions of horses and psychology. Our show horses have adapted tremendously to the myriad of things we ask them to do in our varied equestrian disciplines. But there are also asks that are simply too great – demands that horses were not evolutionarily designed to handle. In my writing I strive to make these two worlds compatible –how we might improve psychological welfare for sport horses, attain our competitive aspirations, and still make a fair ask of our horses – a fine balance that I believe is achievable.

I currently sit on the Council for the International Society for Equitation Science, an international body of scholars, practitioners, and veterinarians whose mission is to promote evidence-based research and impart that knowledge to the greater horse community to advance equestrian practice and ultimately improve the welfare of horses in their interaction with humans.

I have a strong aesthetic sense and bring innovation and creativity into all my endeavors. I graduated from art school in 1980 and worked successfully as a ceramic sculptor from 1980 to 1990. Though no longer a professional artist, I continue to incorporate the aesthetic into everything that surrounds me. I have a strong sense of style, originality, and a boldness to venture beyond the predictable that has inspired me in both my personal and professional life.

Since 2011 I have been a regular contributor to Horse Sport and Horse Canada writing about the science and psychology of equine behaviour tackling topics such as what do we mean by the “happy equine athlete”, how do we understand and apply scientific learning principles to equine training to create a more equitable learning environment for horses, or how do meet the needs of both horses and owners and trainers in our housing of elite equine athletes. I have published extensively in academic journals, books, and book chapters, but my current writing focuses on casting a wider net by publishing for the general horse public, distilling the science, and bringing it back to the stable. Most of my current writing can be accessed at HorseSport under “Articles” and then “Behaviour” and also “Welfare.”

I have continued to be an active equestrian. I head to the stable every day and ride and compete my 9-year-old Hanoverian dressage mare, “Farah”. I live in Fort Langley, BC with my amazing husband Frank, and my Rhodesian Ridgeback, “Leon”.

My Background.

I have always maintained that graduate school teaches you the verbs so that eventually you can replace the nouns with almost anything; learn the process of research and the content can change continually. This has certainly been born out in the diverse projects that I have taken on since graduating with a Ph.D. in Social and Personality Psychology in 1998. I have worked as a Research Psychologist and a professor of psychology throughout my career with a specialty in Attachment, Human/Animal Relationships, and the Psychology of Equine Behaviour. However, my research projects have bridged academic, health, and corporate sectors included assessing attachment relationships in young sex offenders, looking at attachment in women with breast cancer, exploring how people with vision impairments form bonds with their service dogs, and assessing the value of using animals to build empathy skills in children, to name but a few.

A key research focus after graduation was working for the British Columbia Transplant Society codirected a large-scale multi-disciplinary research project looking at the practical and ethical implications of Living Anonymous Kidney Donation – the possibility of donating a kidney while alive to a stranger. Thanks to this study, Canada implemented the first Living Anonymous Kidney Donation in 2002 and continues to use and build upon this donor source today.

I have worked with the Animals and Society Institute (ASI), an independent human-animal relationship think tank dedicated to improving the lives of animals and people through research and analysis. With the ASI, I headed a number of research projects on animal abuse and evaluation studies looking at the effectiveness of treatment models for animal abusers.

My teaching assignments have been equally varied; I don’t think there are many Psychology courses I haven’t tackled at least once. Until September 2020, when I retired from teaching, I was a professor at Langara College in Vancouver, BC primarily teaching Introductory Psychology, Developmental, Psychological Disorders, and the Psychology of Human/Animal Relationships. I have also taught courses to teachers on development and design of online courses, to counsellors and researchers on Attachment Theory, and for the ASI as Certified Anicare Trainer teaching health care professionals about how to identify, assess, and treat adults and children who abuse animals.

I also have a practical background in the equine industry. I worked at several hunter/jumper facilities in Southwestern Ontario, grooming, teaching, riding, and managing. I have owned, bred, imported, and successfully competed my own horses in the hunter/jumper, and dressage, disciplines.

Writer.

I have an extensive publication record in academic journals, popular magazines, media articles, and community newsletters. I have learned how to write for other scientists, but also how to distill this science-speak into something that is engaging and useful for non-academics. Over the past 11 years, I have published over 70 articles in popular horse magazines including HorseSport and Horse Canada about the psychology of equine behaviour and how this impacts our equine interactions, training, and management.

Researcher.

I have worked full time as a Research Psychologist since obtaining my Ph.D. in 1998. I have a proven ability to take a project from its conception, through implementation, dissemination of findings, and to policy formulation that effects meaningful change in the real world. From 2000 to 2005 I codirected a $500,000 research project at the British Columbia Transplant Society investigating the ethical and practical implications of using living anonymous donors (LADs: those who would be willing to donate a kidney while alive to a stranger). As Research Director, I brought together a coalition of 35 key players into a cohesive whole that fused academic, medical, communications, and community disciplines. Based on the strength of our findings, the BC transplant society is now performing living anonymous donor transplants, and was the first centre in Canada to do so.

I have also designed and directed several research projects evaluating treatment models for animal abusers. My current research focuses on Learning Theory as it applies to horses, equine environmental design, and training, to foster psychological well-being in show horses.

Speaker.

I am a strong communicator. As a psychology professor I have had a wealth of experience in public speaking to student audiences. I am also well-versed in speaking to my peers (a much more daunting task because, unlike students, they know what you don’t know) at conferences, workshops, and educational webinars. During my work for the Transplant Society, we were engaged in a revolutionary and newsworthy project – bringing Living Anonymous Kidney Donation to Canada for the first time – and I had many opportunities to speak to the media for television and radio. I have been told I am an engaging speaker, bring humour to dry topics, and am skilled at translating scientific research into accessible language for non-academic audiences.

Educator.

For most of my adult life I have been teaching: Teaching Pony Club in my teens, at an Ontario Riding School in my 20s, Art and Ceramic Sculpture in my 30s, and Psychology throughout my academic career. I encourage students to learn how to learn, to advance novel ideas, to work collaboratively, and remove boundaries across disciplines so as to understand our impact upon the world beyond the scope of the subject I am teaching. I have been consistently reviewed as a provocative and connected instructor whose courses are relevant beyond the classroom. I have taught teachers on how to become better teachers, counsellors on how to treat animal abusers, researchers on assessment of Attachment relationships, and professors on how to become effective online instructors. I love to teach, I am good at it, and I believe it will always be a part of my life.