Researcher and writer dedicated to exploring human behavior, technology, design, and the environments that shape us.
Jessica Housand, PhD, MPH, MFA, is a multidisciplinary researcher and creative writer. Her research examines human interaction with emerging technologies, immersive environments, mental health, and complex systems. Her fiction, poetry, memoir, and screenwriting explore power, trauma, identity, moral choice, and resilience. She has also gone by Jessica Housand-Weaver.
Featured Writing
Blood Gilt
The empire profits. Blood pays.
Sent back to El Salvador by his smuggler father, Alejandro enters a family war in which criminal succession, revolutionary power, obsessive love, and shifting loyalties will decide what he inherits—and what he becomes.
A dark literary crime saga of inherited violence, political ambition, and weaponized family bonds.
Research Focus
Immersive Technology and Mental Health
Research examining how virtual and immersive environments affect mood, perception, behavior, and psychological wellbeing.
Human Factors and Intelligent Systems
Research on trust, usability, safety, and human performance within autonomous, AI-enabled, and technologically complex systems.
Environment, Perception, and Behavior
Interdisciplinary work investigating how physical and mediated environments influence judgment, emotion, and human experience.
View Research and Publications
Background
PhD in Psychology · Master of Public Health · MFA in Creative Writing · Former U.S. Navy Civilian Scientist