Dr Chris Macdonald is a behavioural scientist, founder, and author. At Lucy Cavendish College, Chris is Lab Director, Communications Director, Sustainability Engagement Lead, and a Fellow. Chris is also a Fellow at the Institute of Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability, a Public Engagement Fellow at Cambridge Zero, and a Supervisor at the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL).
Chris has a PhD in Behavioural Economics. His interdisciplinary research led him to take a wide range of additional courses including advanced programming, environmental management, global energy, behavioural therapy, and health policy. Chris also has a diverse portfolio of professional experience including working as a consultant, technical director, and manager for media and tech companies in North America.
Chris has established two labs to conduct his post-doctoral research: The Meta Lab to use emerging technologies to create transformational educational and therapeutical experiences; and The Living Lab to conduct experiments in real-world settings to develop data-guided behavioural interventions.
Chris is the founder of a virtual reality public speaking platform where users transform into confident and skilled public speakers with the help of virtual reality exposure therapy. On the free platform, users build resilience through a self-paced gamified journey where the virtual audiences increase as tasks are completed. Chris has also created a free online data science and programming course for those getting started with academic research, and he is the author of Operation Sustainable Human which explores data-driven climate action.
Chris was a finalist for the World Sustainability Awards and the Global Good Awards. His research has received two awards from the University of Cambridge: The Excellence Award for research at The Living Lab exploring the efficacy of ‘green nudges’, and the Innovation for Engagement Award for a project at The Meta Lab where Chris used artificial intelligence and metaverse environments to better translate and visualise emissions data. The latter project was subsequently shortlisted for a national innovation award, which it won.
