Postcard from the Health Psychology Group #1
European Health Psychology Conference 2026 in Pafos, Cyprus
The annual conference of the European Health Psychology Society is a highlight of the academic year. Each year, several hundred health psychologists from all over Europe and beyond meet to discuss their research and network. This year’s conference took place from 1 to 4 September in Pafos, Cyprus. Our team was represented by Professor Laura König.
Since Laura is the society’s secretary, she arrived a day early for the annual meeting of the executive committee. They used the time to update each other regarding ongoing administrative tasks to keep the society going, make plans for the year ahead, said good-bye to outgoing members and welcomed new ones. Being part of the leadership team of an academic society is a great opportunity to learn about its inner workings and to actively shape it.
Laura also had the opportunity to share first results from an ongoing project on self-monitoring that she is working on with Professor Becca Krukowski (University of Virginia, United States) and Dr. Max Western (University of Bath, United Kingdom). The conference was especially exciting because both collaborators also attended, so there was time for formal and informal catch-ups. The conference was so exciting and busy that they even forgot to take a group photo!
Finally, Laura contributed to a roundtable on her second big passion – science communication. She left the session inspired by the input of her colleagues Professor Alia Crum, Dr. Lauren Heathcote and science communicator Kari Leibowitz who were on stage with her, and will feed the insights back both into our ongoing discussions within HPG and within the EHPS EC.
The next EHPS conference will take place in Bern, Switzerland, in August 2027. We are already very much looking forward to seeing our international health psychology family there again and to introducing several new HPG members to the community.
