In House 11, Erik Wästlund is just finishing a Zoom meeting on research funding. He is new as professor of psychology, but a familiar face in the university corridors.
– I started studying psychology here in 1996, he says.
– Back in those days it was mostly because I wanted to do something more besides my job working in a bar. But pretty soon my studies became more important than my work. Psychology was not a given choice. I was actually also thinking about applying to the preparatory year, technical and natural science subjects. But I chose psychology and over the years I’ve managed to combine that with my interest in technology, says Erik Wästlund, who was promoted to professor in February and will be formally inaugurated at the Academic Celebration in the autumn.
The combination of psychology and technology began to develop quite early on in his academic career.
– After my master’s degree here, I was admitted to a PhD programme in Gothenburg. I completed my doctoral thesis in 2007 on the interaction between humans and computers, and the same year I started working at CTF and Computer Science, which were strong research environments here at Kau already back then.
– I was probably a bit of a rare bird at the time, combining research in humanities and social sciences with natural sciences and technology, but it has helped me develop a lot and it’s also the reason why I’m responsible for digital health innovation in the Academy for Smart Specialisation today. It’s the common thread in everything that I've been working with over the years, Erik says smiling.
The Academy for Smart Specialisation is a partnership between Karlstad University and Region Värmland centred around research, innovation and education that lead to smart specialisation and renewal in the local industry and public sector.
– We are about 20 researchers doing interdisciplinary research on digital health innovation. There are researchers from psychology, information systems and business administration here at CTF, as well as researchers from nursing, gender studies, FoU Välfärd Värmland, computer science and CBU.
The latter stands for the Centre for Research on the Mental Health and Life Circumstances of Children and Youth, and research in digital health innovation, DHINO, currently revolves around three themes:
- Internet of Things, IoT
- Health, elder care/comorbidity and the co-creation of health
- Data-driven innovation
– Even though I was a bit of a rare bird in the beginning, this interdisciplinary approach is my main strength today. My research is based on three major themes or areas, says Erik Wästlund.
– The first theme is about how we make decisions, and by that I mean quick, automatic decisions in our everyday lives. For example, whether or not we want to share personal data to create an account somewhere.
The second theme is consumer psychology and consumer behaviour.
– It’s about what affects what we buy or don’t buy. For example, if we prefer to always buy new things or if we choose second hand.
The third theme is health psychology.
– Behaviour and behaviour change are central to this theme. In other words, which strategies people choose and how they can get help to succeed in changing a behaviour, for example.
Erik Wästlund’s academic career has run parallel to the digital development and he notes that a lot has happened during these decades.
– When I was working on my doctoral thesis, I studied, among other things, whether people prefer to read on paper or on a screen. This was a hot topic back then, but it’s not quite as hot today, although screen time has been discussed a fair bit in recent years.
– Another example from the early days of my research here at Kau is that we used a large stationary computer to measure people’s eye movements. Over time, this changed and we got portable eye movement monitors that we could bring with us into a store to study customer behaviour. And these days there are watches and devices that measure a wide variety of things about people’s behaviour.
That he has been promoted to professor is, of course, a good feeling.
– But there really isn’t that much of a difference. I continue applying for funding and leading research programmes.
He still finds it exciting to investigate how technology affects and interacts with our behaviour.
– For example, that a step counter can become an important motivational factor for many when going for walks is the actual goal. It’s interesting to study how we can use technology to support individuals to achieve their goals.
