Role
Dr Vivienne Wenchong Du (DU Wen-Chong) is an Associate Professor of Psychology. She teaches on several modules in Child Psychology and Lifespan Psychology.
Career overview
Vivienne obtained her BSc. in Applied Psychology from Beijing Normal University and an MPhil in Educational Research (Neuroscience in Education) from the University of Cambridge (funded by Cambridge Overseas Trust). After several years working in consultancy, she then completed a PhD in Psychology at the University of Strathclyde (funded by Scottish Overseas Research Students Award Scheme, SORSAS).
Research areas
Dr Vivienne Du’s research focuses on child health and the development of sustainable health behaviours across the lifespan. She has been involved in a range of funded projects, with a combined value of over £1.6 million. Her research uses advanced quantitative methods and data linkage to understand neurodevelopmental conditions in children, alongside wider outcomes such as obesity, sleep, and mental health, particularly in relation to urban environments and family sociodemographic contexts.
She has played leading roles in several community-based intervention programmes and is actively developing technology-enhanced approaches to assessment and intervention, including the use of VR/XR and AI for children with neurodevelopmental conditions.
Dr. Du also has a growing interest in AI psychology from a developmental perspective, investigating how artificial intelligence systems learn about and represent human cognitive and social processes, and how developmental frameworks can inform the design and evaluation of AI models so that they are fair, realistic, and appropriate for diverse groups.
She welcomes enquiries from prospective PhD students interested in environmental influences on health, neurodevelopmental conditions and intervention, technology-enhanced assessment, and developmental approaches to AI and human cognition.
External activity
Vivienne collaborates with national and international leading academics in child impairments and child health, and she is the founding member and China representative at the International Society for Research in DCD (ISR-DCD).