Serena Petrocchi

Dr Serena Petrocchi is Lecturer and Researcher (Maître d’Enseignement et de Recherche) at the Faculty of Biomedical Sciences, Università della Svizzera italiana, where she is affiliated with the Institute of Family Medicine and coordinates the MSc in Cognitive Psychology in Health Communication.

She holds a PhD in Psychology from Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (Milan), she is a licensed psychologist in Italy, and she obtained the Italian National Scientific Qualification as Associate Professor in 2020. Her academic career includes postdoctoral appointments at Keele University, UK (under a Marie Curie Fellowship) and Università del Salento, Italy, where she developed independent research lines on medical decision-making and trust in healthcare. She subsequently held a senior research position at the European Institute of Oncology in Milan, contributing to a large-scale EU-funded project on patient preferences and treatment decision-making in oncology (PREFER).

She has secured competitive national and international research funding, serving as Principal Investigator on prostate cancer decision-making funded by Fond’Action contre le cancer (2026) and a Horizon Europe MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowship project (she received a Seal of Excellence; 2026). She has also been Co-Principal Investigator on projects funded by the European Society for Sexual Medicine (2023) and the Swiss National Science Foundation (Digital Lives, 2018). She has participated in additional funded projects, including COVID-19-related research supported by institutional funds (AFRI-EOC). Earlier in her career, she was awarded a Marie Curie Fellowship under the EU FP7 programme (2010).

She is actively involved in national and international scientific networks and governance, serving on advisory and scientific committees in primary care and health innovation, including the Social Prescription Project (promoted by the Institute of Family Medicine) and the GIOCO Project. She is a member of key academic bodies, including the APA, the International Communication Association (ICA), and the Swiss KPSYCH committee, and serves on the board of the Institute of Family Medicine. She is also affiliated with the Laboratory of Applied Psychology and Intervention at the University of Salento.

She supervises postdoctoral researchers, PhD candidates, and visiting doctoral students across international institutions, with projects spanning medical decision-making, patient–clinician communication, and health-related behaviours. Her supervision includes collaborations with leading universities (e.g., University of British Columbia, University of Konstanz; University of Wuerzburg).

Her research lies at the intersection of health psychology and consumer behavior, with a focus on how individuals understand, evaluate, and make decisions about their health. She investigates decision-making processes, doctor–patient communication, and interpersonal trust, examining how these shape patient behaviors, adherence, and health outcomes. Her work also addresses decision fatigue in clinicians, psychosocial determinants of health behaviors across the lifespan, and the moralisation of health, integrating behavioural, relational, and physiological approaches. She is the author of more than 70 peer-reviewed articles in the field of health psychology and mental health.