Liza Berdychevsky, Ph.D.

Dr. Berdychevsky’s research revolves at the nexus of health and well being in leisure and tourism contexts, adopting a gender-sensitive and a life course-grounded approach. In her work, she focuses on risky behaviors and vulnerable populations, exploring the impacts of risk taking on health and well being. Specifically, Dr. Berdychevsky examines two interrelated aspects of health and risk behaviors that have gained little attention in both leisure and tourism literature. First, she investigates sexual behavior and risk taking among young and senior adults in various leisure and tourism contexts. Her research indicates that sexual risk taking is a multidimensional and complex phenomenon and provides recommendations for tailoring gender-sensitive, age-appropriate, and context-specific sexual health education messages. Second, Dr. Berdychevsky studies people’s experiences of violence-related behaviors and other delinquent leisure practices. She investigates the impacts of these behaviors on health and well being and examines various risk and protective factors instrumental for developing prevention and intervention programs.