Recovering From a Once-in-a-Century Pandemic: Can We Recover Our Motivation and Happiness?

Covid-19 has upended our lives - work and family life has been altered and our social and recreational activities have been restricted. The dramatic alteration of our everyday lives has impacted many of our personal, social, and career-related goals. In this talk, we will discuss what motivational science suggests about how to cope with the uncertainty and stress of the remaining months of the pandemic, as well as how to begin to make goals and plans for our post-pandemic lives. Has the last year made you reconsider some long-held personal or work goals? Are there adaptations you have made in your life that you would like to carry forward into the future? We seek to present a realistic, yet hopeful, view of what we can expect of ourselves as we emerge from the mostly harrowing experience of living through the worst pandemic in a century.  

Speakers:

Dr. Richard Koestner is a professor of Psychology at McGill University. He did his PhD at the University of Rochester, and a post-doctoral fellowship at Harvard. He has dedicated more than 30 years of research to studying personality and human motivation. He is the Founder and Director of the McGill Human Motivation Lab, and he has published over 200 scientific articles. In 2007, Dr. Koestner received the Canadian Psychological Association Award for excellence in teaching and, in 2008, he won the Principal's Prize for Excellence in teaching at McGill. Dr. Koestner's recent work focuses on how to effectively set and pursue personal goals. 

Dr. Anne Holding is a clinical psychologist and post-doctoral research fellow specializing in human motivation and goal pursuit. Her particular focus of interest is why certain goals don't work out in the ways we expect them to and how to let go of the goals that become unattainable. She completed her PhD in Clinical Psychology at McGill University. She is currently researching with Prof. Richard Koestner to understand the emotional and motivation impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on mental health and adjustment. 

Moderator: Lisa Carroll, Director, Policy and Research, CPA