Elizabeth Bayardelle, PhD
Behavioral Scientist
Trauma · Coping · Recovery
I study what happens after painful experiences are over and what helps people recover.
Specifically, I study how the psychological characteristics of traumatic experiences interact to shape functional brain network organization, how the resulting neural changes influence cognition, emotion, self-perception, and behavior, and how targeted interventions can promote adaptive neural and psychological recovery.
My training runs from health threat messaging, through offender and victim behavior at John Jay, to a dissertation on how people respond to failure. The thread through all of it is individual differences in response to adversity: why comparable harm leaves some people intact and others not.
Most recently I have applied that question to AI-supported care, as one setting for it rather than the destination. Human memory consolidates, fades, and revises painful experience. Artificial memory does none of that. I study what the difference means for recovery, using data from GetBackUp, an application I built that offers social support through conversation with AI personas rather than with other people, and from a user population I am accountable to.
Current work
Memory architecture and psychological outcomes
What human and artificial memory are each actually for, and why the difference matters more than the resemblance. Poster accepted for CPA 2026, with Jennifer Thompson.
Human-AI interaction as a third relational mode
Whether relating to an AI is its own category, distinct from both human relationships and parasocial attachment. In preparation with Jeremy Nicholson.
Applied behavioral research at FrayaTech
Longitudinal interaction data, pre/post instruments, and clinical risk protocols inside GetBackup, a live mental wellness platform with a paying user population.