Our Team

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Dr Kristina Curtis

PhD, BSc, MSc | Founder & Managing Director

I’m a psychologist specialising in behaviour change and human-centred design, and I’ve spent my career helping organisations create products, services and campaigns that people genuinely want to use. My work focuses on applying behavioural science in practical, accessible ways — particularly through the Behaviour Change Wheel, the COM-B model and Behavioural Design Thinking, which I helped pioneer in the digital space.

Over the past decade, I’ve supported public sector teams, digital health companies and mission-driven organisations to design effective behaviour change solutions and adopt new ways of working. I’m also the founder of Applied Behaviour Change and an Honorary Lecturer and Associate at UCL’s Centre for Behaviour Change, where I teach and supervise PhD students.

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Dr Dorothy Szinay

PhD, MSc, BSc - CPsychol | Director

I’ve always been fascinated by why people behave the way they do, and how small, thoughtful changes can make everyday life easier for individuals and communities. That curiosity led me into health psychology and behavioural science, and I’ve spent the past decade applying this work across public health, digital health and local government.

I help organisations design behaviourally informed programmes, build staff capability and understand what really drives engagement and change. I’ve also taught and supervised postgraduate students, which is one of the parts of my work I enjoy most. At Applied Behaviour Change, I lead on behavioural science integration, including an exciting programme of work at the intersection of AI and behaviour change.

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Chiara Gericke

MSc, BA - MBPsS | Behavioural Science Researcher & Consultant

I’m a behavioural scientist specialising in understanding and influencing human behaviour across health, sustainability and financial wellbeing. My work focuses on designing interventions that are grounded in behavioural theory and evidence, and that translate into meaningful, practical change.

Alongside my role at Applied Behaviour Change, I’m completing a PhD at University College London, where I explore how behavioural frameworks can be applied to real-world challenges. I enjoy working in interdisciplinary teams and often collaborate with policymakers, healthcare partners and government researchers to turn behavioural insights into policies, programmes and digital or physical interventions that support people to make positive changes in their lives.

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Sophia Maguire

MSc, BSc | Behavioural Science Researcher & Consultant

I’m a behavioural scientist specialising in organisational wellbeing, digital health and behaviour change. Alongside my role at Applied Behaviour Change, I’m completing a PhD in Behavioural Science and Healthcare at University College London (UCL), where I focus on social prescribing as a novel mechanism of care.

My background includes work with the United Nations and Ernst & Young LLP (EY), where I led wellbeing and community engagement initiatives for both internal teams and external stakeholders. My academic and applied work spans digital and in-person interventions for Parkinson’s, dementia, multiple sclerosis, COPD and other long-term conditions. I also support postgraduate teaching at UCL in public health and digital health. I enjoy designing and launching behaviourally informed interventions that promote population health and wellbeing.

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Dr Stefanie Williams

PhD, MSc, BSc - CPsychol AFBPsS | Associate Senior Behavioural Scientist

I’m a Chartered Psychologist with a PhD in Health Psychology, specialising in how evidence-based behaviour change interventions can support people to increase physical activity, manage weight and strengthen self-efficacy. Over the past 15 years, my research has focused on identifying which behaviour change techniques reliably influence motivation and help people build lasting habits.

I’m passionate about improving the quality of behavioural science in public health. I work closely with local authorities to design, adapt and evaluate interventions using robust, theory-informed methods. My expertise spans evaluation design, systematic reviews, meta-analysis, fidelity assessment, survey research and randomised controlled trials. I also advise the NIHR Research Design Service, supporting teams to develop high-quality, evidence-based proposals.

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Ella Howes

MSc, BSc | Associate Behavioural Scientist

I’m passionate about making behavioural science clearer, more consistent and easier to apply. After completing my Master’s in Behaviour Change, I joined the Human Behaviour-Change Project (HBCP) at UCL, where I helped develop an ontology — a structured language for describing behaviour change interventions. I also led the project’s outreach and created a 14-episode webinar series to share the work with researchers, practitioners and policymakers.

I’m now undertaking a PhD at the University of Leeds, exploring how complex interventions can be delivered remotely. My work focuses on building methods that strengthen the science behind interventions and help teams design more effective, evidence-based solutions.

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Eldar Agayev

BSc | Technology & AI Lead

I’m a software engineer and AI developer specialising in building secure, scalable and human-centred digital products. I am working on the development of evorAI and other digital behaviour change tools. My expertise includes full-stack engineering, cloud architecture, machine-learning integration and complex API-driven systems. I’m particularly interested in how large language models can be used responsibly to generate insight, improve products and strengthen public-health and behavioural science workflows.

In my work with ABC, I translate behavioural science and research requirements into functional, production-ready technology. I focus on performance, data protection, security and user-centred design - ensuring that everything we build is not only technically sound but also meaningful and usable in real-world settings.

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Professor Andy Pardoe

PhD, MSc, BSc | Senior AI Advisor

I’m an AI strategist and advisor specialising in advanced machine learning, intelligent systems and responsible AI innovation. I work with organisations across industry, government and emerging tech sectors to help them understand, design and deploy AI safely and effectively.

As ABC’s Senior AI Advisor, I support the technical and strategic development of evorAI and other digital behaviour-change tools. I help ensure that our AI approaches are transparent, robust and aligned with best practice in responsible innovation. I’m particularly interested in the intersection of AI, public health and behavioural science, and how advanced models can be applied ethically to generate meaningful insight and improve services. My role is to steer the long-term AI vision, challenge assumptions, and strengthen the scientific and ethical foundations of the products we develop.

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Albert Hewson

BSc, APM, Six Sigma, MBA | Operations & Project Management

I work behind the scenes to make sure our projects run smoothly from start to finish. With a background as an engineer and an APM PMQ-qualified project manager, I’ve spent more than 15 years delivering complex automotive and emerging-technology programmes.

I bring that same structured, solutions-focused approach to Applied Behaviour Change. My role is to create the systems, processes and project oversight that allow the team’s behavioural science expertise to be delivered with clarity, quality and impact.