Please join us in welcoming investigator Dr. Julie Robillard to the Edwin S.H. Leong Centre for Healthy Aging.
Julie Robillard, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Neurology at the University of British Columbia and Scientist in Patient Experience at British Columbia Children’s and Women’s Hospitals. She is a faculty member with Neuroethics Canada, and an affiliated researcher with the Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health, British Columbia Children’s Hospital Research Institute, Women’s Health Research Institute, and Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute. She completed her PhD in Neuroscience at the University of British Columbia, and a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Core for Neuroethics (now Neuroethics Canada).
As the lead of the Neuroscience, Engagement, and Smart Tech (NEST) lab, Dr. Robillard’s research program focuses on the intersection of patient experience, brain health, and technology. Emerging health care technologies, such as mobile apps, artificially intelligent (AI) chatbots, and social robots, have the potential to both benefit and harm brain health. Technically advanced and increasingly AI-powered products are commercially available and claim to be useful to support brain or mental health, but scientific evaluation of these claims is largely lacking and does not focus on the experiences and outcomes that are important to patients and families. Dr. Robillard engages with patient communities to imagine and develop the next generation of smart tools to support brain health and to ensure these technologies are deployed in an ethical and evidence-based manner. She has a particular interest in exploring and modeling how emotions affect technology engagement.
Dr. Robillard’s research interests span the human lifecourse, with projects focused on both older adults and youth. “In the NEST lab, no two days are ever the same, which is one of the best aspects of my work – one day we might explore social robots for pediatric mental health, and the next how to use social media to advance dementia research. But in the end, many of our studies are connected through shared human experiences around technology: regardless of whether we are 9 or 99, we want technology solutions that connect us, that help us, and that make us feel good.” Her work transcends disciplinary boundaries and is deeply collaborative – she combines her expertise in neuroscience and biomedical ethics with collaborators across a range of disciplines and international settings to explore co-creation processes, knowledge co-production, and patient engagement in technology research and development.
Beyond her own research program, Dr. Robillard has held a range of leadership roles, including co-chair of the Ethical, Legal, and Social Implications Committee of the Canadian Consortium on Neurodegeneration in Aging, member of the International Advisory Council of the Alzheimer’s Association International Society to Advance Alzheimer’s Research and Treatment (ISTAART), and member of the Board of Directors of the Medical Device Development Centre of British Columbia, among other involvements.
We are delighted to welcome Dr. Robillard to the Edwin S.H. Leong Centre for Healthy Aging and look forward to her involvement in the Centre.
To read more about Dr. Robillard’s work related to healthy aging, view select publications below:
- “That’s me at my best”: perspectives of older adults on involvement in technology research (2024)
- Ethical Considerations at the Intersection of Social Media and Dementia Prevention Research (2024)
- What Does ChatGPT Know About Dementia? A Comparative Analysis of Information Quality (2024)
- Older adult perspectives on emotion and stigma in social robots (2023)