From urban planning to modern ageing, GCMA Psychologist AND User Researcher Amelia McCabe has a passion for human centred design.
A skilled business researcher and registered psychologist, Amelia McCabe, understands the importance of first-hand experience when tackling the challenges of product, services, and physical design for ageing populations.
Amelia does not fit into the stereotype of a researcher. There is no white lab coat or petri dish to be found, instead a warm and genuine smile paired with a keen intellect.
Amelia specialises in integrating empirical research and user-experience.
She has been instrumental in the company’s successful accreditation to the European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL).
Amelia holds a Bachelor of Psychology (Honours) and a Master of Psychology (organisational and human factors).
This unique combination makes her the perfect fit to lead many of the GCMA’s interactive LifeLab sessions and aids the company in their delivery of commercial insights and enterprise-based research reports to clients.
Throughout her career, Amelia has focussed on projects that empower and address the needs of older people in Australian communities. Her experiences range from gamification focussed on urban planning and co-living to immersive research designed to understand first-hand the challenges of product, services, and physical design for ageing populations.
When asked why she joined the Global Centre for Modern Ageing, Amelia said it was the company’s ability to help older people be independent and retain their sense of self in their environment, not only on an individual level, but on a global scale.
Amelia’s drive for putting people first is embodied in a personal connection she made with aged care resident Leslie when the pair were writing her life story a few years ago. During these candid moments, Amelia became aware that the necessary compromises to self that occur when transitioning to care facilities, have a profound impact on the individual.
“There's something special about people's lived experience. There is so much to learn from people who have done it before and lived to share their insight.”
The enjoyment of a morning coffee for Leslie became a disempowering experience as she was unable to follow the coffee machine’s instruction to ‘pull the lever’ as she didn’t know where the lever was. For someone who had always been independent she now found herself forced to continually ask for help for something as simple as a cup of coffee.
At that moment, Amelia decided she wanted to help make sure that a ‘pull the lever’ sign wasn't needed because products themselves were intuitive and user friendly and that care environments become more home like; haven like even.
This questioning nature and her commitment to improving lives, brought her to the GCMA and to a place where turning a house into a haven can be realised.
