Canada Research Chair
Canada Research Chair (Tier II) in Learner Agency, 2025-2030
About the Chair
As the Canada Research Chair in Learner Agency at the University of British Columbia, my research examines how people develop and exercise agency in hybrid, digitally mediated, and AI-influenced environments. I study how learners and patients make decisions, navigate algorithmic systems, and adapt across physical and digital spaces. Through the development of Postdigital Learner Agency (PLĀ), my work investigates the social, technological, and systemic conditions that shape autonomy, participation, and decision-making in education and healthcare. This research brings together learning sciences, digital pedagogy, immersive technologies, and patient-oriented research to support more ethical, human-centered approaches to learning and engagement in postdigital contexts.
Areas of Focus
Postdigital Learner Agency
This research explores how learner agency can be preserved, understood, and supported in an age of AI, algorithmic systems, and immersive digital environments.
- This pillar advances the theoretical foundation of learner agency in hybrid and algorithmically mediated environments. My research examines how learners navigate digital infrastructures, AI systems, and interconnected learning spaces while maintaining autonomy, critical judgment, and meaningful participation. This work develops the PLĀ framework to better understand agency across physical, digital, and social contexts.
Patient Agency
This research explores how patients develop, exercise, and sustain agency across cardiovascular care, advancing new approaches to patient engagement, self-management, and participation in research and everyday health decision-making.
- This pillar extends agency research into healthcare and patient-oriented research contexts. My work explores how patients navigate digital health systems, participate in research, and engage in informed decision-making within increasingly mediated healthcare environments. Through participatory and co-designed approaches, this research supports more equitable, accessible, and patient-centered models of healthcare education and engagement.
Inquiry in Digital Education and AI
This research examines how learners and educators navigate AI mediated, immersive, and hybrid educational environments, with a focus on inquiry, critical engagement, and the design of learning experiences that support human agency in digital contexts.
- This pillar investigates how immersive technologies, game-based learning, and AI-mediated systems shape learner decision-making, engagement, and self-regulation. Through projects such as ALIVE and NARRATE, I study how learners interact with virtual environments, algorithms, and digital assessments to better understand the conditions that support adaptive, ethical, and agency-centered learning.
Active Projects
Agency in Learning in Immersive and Virtual Environments
SSHRC Insight Grant · $399,003 · 2022–2027
The ALIVE Research Lab investigates how learners exercise agency in immersive and virtual environments. Based at UBC, the lab brings together graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and community partners.
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learNer Agency emeRgence thRough Algorithmic liTEracy
SSHRC Insight Development Grant · $74,994 · 2023–2025
A systematic exploration of learner agency in the human–algorithm relationship — how algorithmic literacy shapes the conditions for agency in postdigital learning environments.
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Promoting Agency Through Innovative Education & Networked Teams
CFREF Brain-Heart Interconnectome · $25,000 · 2025–2026
Facilitating outcomes and collaboration for understanding the brain–heart system. A partnership between researchers, clinicians, and patients to promote agency in heart failure care.
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Patient Agency in Cardiovascular Education
CIHR CHF Alliance · $25,000 · 2023–2025
A pilot study promoting agency through innovative education and networked teams — developing patient-centred approaches to heart failure self-management and advocacy.
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Brain & Heart Failure Priority Setting Partnership
CFREF Brain-Heart Interconnectome · $100,000 · 2025–2026
A priority setting partnership to identify the most important unanswered questions about the brain–heart connection in heart failure, centering patient and caregiver voices.
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