Obesity Canada works with some of Canada’s best and brightest minds working in obesity research, treatment, policy and other areas. Together, we are working to improve the lives of Canadians living with obesity. Watch for more profiles coming soon.
Dr. Angela Alberga completed both a MSc and PhD in the School of Human Kinetics at the University of Ottawa, specializing in exercise physiology (the study of how exercise impacts health). There, her research focused on how exercise can improve the cardiometabolic health of children and adolescents living with obesity.
Through her experience working with youth, Dr. Alberga learned how prevalent and harmful weight-based stigma is, and she has since devoted her career to research, teaching and knowledge translation efforts to reduce weight discrimination in society. For her work, Dr. Alberga was awarded a Banting CIHR Postdoctoral Fellowship by the government of Canada at the University of Calgary to support her research on weight stigma reduction in education, healthcare and public policy.
Dr. Alberga is now an assistant professor in the Department of Health, Kinesiology and Applied Physiology at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec. Her current research program focuses on understanding how societal, school and other institutional factors influence weight-related issues including obesity, eating disorders, physical inactivity and weight stigma and discrimination. She’s also a member of Obesity Canada’s EveryBODY Matters collective, a group of weight bias and obesity stigma researchers who promote behaviour, practice, and policy change among key stakeholders.
Alongside her interdisciplinary research program in health promotion and disease prevention, she has over 15 years of experience working with children, youth and adults as a camp counselor, educator, mentor, coach, instructor, personal trainer and clinical exercise physiologist in academic and community settings across Canada.
