Dr. Alison Phillips

Professor

Contact

Dept:Psychology
Email:alisonp@iastate.edu
Office:0020 Office And Lab
2401 Osborn Dr.
Ames IA
50011-2401
Phone:515-294-3393
Website:https://faculty.sites.iastate.edu/alisonp/

Topics of interest: Social and health psychology

Laboratory: The Healthy Habits Lab

Bio

Publications and External Links:

Education:

Ph.D., Social/Health Psychology
Rutgers University, New Jersey, 2011

M.A., Social Psychology
Rutgers University, New Jersey, 2008

B.A., Psychology & Mathematics
Grinnell College, Iowa, 2003

Research Interests:

I study the processes by which individuals develop and maintain health-related habits, particularly medication adherence and regular physical activity. These processes include belief/attitude formation, experience that a behavior has expected results, intrinsic motivation and self-identitification with the behavior, and stable context cues for the behavior.

I study mainly populations with chronic illness but also young adults, for whom prevention of chronic illness is key. I also study provider communication strategies for promoting optimal adherence to medical advice, primarily focusing on eliciting and addressing patients' beliefs about their treatment(s) and their treatment-related habits.

In the future, I will develop "mobile health" technology applications to promote effective patient-provider communication and habit development