Shannon Bredin
Physical activity; Skill acquisition; Human motor performance; Telehealth; Physical activity screening; Long-term athlete development; Systematic reviews; Knowledge translation.
Dr. Bredin is a leader in community-based initiatives in physical activity and health. She is a project lead for the innovative Physical Activity Line, a free telehealth resource for evidence-based physical activity information in BC. Her research examines factors that facilitate physical activity, and physical activity in relation to skill acquisition and human performance in childhood, early parenthood, in developing and elite athletes, and in persons living with chronic medical conditions.
Michael Koehle
Environmental physiology; Exercise physiology; Sport medicine; Exercise medicine.
Dr. Koehle studies the impact of interaction between the environment (pollution, altitude, submersion, etc.) and exercise on human physiology, and health.
Donald McKenzie
Sports medicine; Kinesiology; Exercise and breast cancer.
His research centres on exercise and breast cancer. Dr. McKenzie has a ‘cancer gym’ near the BC Cancer Agency that has been very productive in multi-centre trials looking at the integration of exercise with this disease.
Mark Beauchamp
Sport and exercise psychology; Behavioral medicine; Health psychology; Leadership; Group processes; Physical activity; Role perceptions and coach-athlete relationships.
Dr. Beauchamp’s research focuses on the psychology of group processes in exercise, sport, and physical activity contexts. Specifically, drawing from diverse disciplines (that include behavioural medicine, organizational psychology, and education), his research program is concerned with (a) understanding both barriers to, and facilitators of, physical activity behaviour across the age spectrum, and (b) developing conceptually-sound evidence-based interventions that are cost-effective and sustainable.
Romeo Chua
Human perceptual-motor control; Sensorimotor control.
His research is directed toward the study of the sensorimotor adaptation of reaching movements and is guided by issues pertaining to factors that can influence our ability to adapt to errors in the preparation and execution of target-directed reaching movements. Dr. Chua studies the type of error signals that are used to drive motor updating and the influence conscious awareness of the error signals has on adaptation.
Patricia Vertinsky
History of physical culture; Physical education; Gender studies.
Dr. Vertinsky is a social and cultural historian working across the fields of women’s and gender history with a special interest on physical culture, physical education and modern dance. Her work focuses on the study of normalizing disciplinary regimes in kinesiology and sport science and the social, political, and scientific context in which they have been conceived and promoted. Her currently funded projects focus upon a new history of female physical education, expressive movement, and modern dance.
William Sheel
Exercise; Physiology; Pulmonary; Hypoxia; Lung; Cardiorespiratory; Sex-differences.
The long-term goal of Dr. Sheel’s research program is to understand how the respiratory and cardiovascular systems interact, respond and adapt to physiological stress and how biological sex affects these relationships. The heart, circulation, lungs, and chest wall all act together in a highly coordinated fashion. Studying each system in isolation can provide valuable information but examining how these systems act together provides a more comprehensive understanding of basic human physiology.
Ian Franks
Motor control; Startle reflex; Reaction time; Response preparation; Motor program.
Dr. Franks’ research examines how people prepare and control their actions. One method of probing these preparation processes is to deliver a startling stimulus along with the “go” command. A brief loud sound causes a startle reflex but also triggers the release of a voluntary movement that is planned and ready to go. Because we have an understanding of the pathways responsible for the startle reflex it is possible to map movement preparation as it interacts with this reflex.
Nicola Hodges
Practice; Motor learning; Skill acquisition; Expertise; Motor control; Motor behavior; Instructions; Observational practice.
Her research is guided primarily by the desire to understand the principles which guide motor learning/skill acquisition and to apply this knowledge to the design of effective practice. This includes the study of action-observation, instruction, practice organization and feedback. Dr. Hodges’ research has had significant impact internationally on motor learning theory and application, particularly the delivery of sport science support.
Jean-Sébastien Blouin
Standing balance; Sensorimotor physiology; Whiplash injuries; Vestibular; Neck muscles; Robotics, Virtual reality.
Dr. Blouin’s research investigates human physiology from an integrative perspective. Specific research interests include i) physiological processes underlying human balance, ii) physiological responses evoked by whole-body (simulating whiplash motion) or localized perturbations, iii) neural control of the deep and superficial neck muscles and iv) research applied to injury prevention or patient populations to determine the neuromechanical effects of known injuries/pathologies on the sensorimotor system.