Kristen Kraemer, PhD, is a clinical health psychologist and affiliated faculty member at the Osher Center at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.  

She is in the final year of a NIH K23 Career Development Award aimed at better understanding the mind-body benefits of exercise for promoting long-term physical activity engagement. The experimental study uses a factorial design to measure four interventions: mindful walking, walking only, mindfulness only, and no intervention. “I am interested in how positive experiences during exercise may lead to sustained physical activity long-term,” said Dr. Kraemer.  

Involved with sports from an early age, Dr. Kraemer has always been interested in what drives or inhibits people to engage in healthy behaviors. In 2017, she earned her PhD in Clinical Psychology at the University of Cincinnati, where she worked with Sian Cotton, PhD, before the site was established as an Osher Center in 2021. As a trainee, Dr. Kraemer developed an interest in mind-body interventions and learned about the bio-psycho-social factors that can inhibit health behavior changes. She chose to dedicate her career to optimizing interventions to better target these barriers and help individuals achieve and sustain healthy behaviors.  

Dr. Kraemer is grateful to be a part of the Osher Collaborative, especially in the wake of current events that have impacted the research landscape. “It’s been helpful to have a community of shared interests and support,” said Dr. Kraemer. “We are not in this alone. We are still—individually and together—producing work that is pushing the field forward.”