Rate My Professor Kitty Foley

Dr. Kitty Foley is an Adjunct Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Health at Southern Cross University, where she previously served as Senior Lecturer from 2018 to 2024 and Lecturer at the Gold Coast campus from 2014 to 2017. An AHPRA-registered paediatric occupational therapist, she earned a Bachelor of Science in Occupational Therapy (Honours) from Edith Cowan University in 2010 and a PhD from Edith Cowan University in collaboration with the Telethon Kids Institute in 2014. Following her PhD, she completed a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at UNSW Sydney from 2014 to 2018, during which she co-led the development of the Australian Longitudinal Study of Autism in Adults (ALSAA). She currently also holds a position as Senior Research Fellow at the Mater Research Institute in the Queensland Centre of Excellence in Autism and Intellectual Disability Health.

Dr. Foley's research program centers on the health and wellbeing of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, encompassing autism, Down syndrome, quality of life, participation, physical health, neurodiversity-affirming practices, daily living skills, and co-produced research with the autistic community. Her studies address topics such as pathways to autism diagnosis in adulthood, internalized stigma post-diagnosis, assistive technology for older autistic adults, and leisure participation. Key publications include "Diagnosis of autism in adulthood: A scoping review" (Huang et al., Autism, 2020), "Loneliness in adults on the autism spectrum: A systematic literature review" (Ee et al., Autism in Adulthood, 2019), "Anxiety and depression from adolescence to old age in Autism Spectrum Disorder" (Uljarević et al., Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 2019), "Daily living skills of autistic adolescents and young adults: A scoping review" (Auld et al., 2022), "Occupational therapists' use of autism terminology" (Foley, Australian Occupational Therapy Journal, 2020), and recent works such as "Daily living skill support for autistic people through a neurodiversity-affirming practice lens" (2024) and "Complementary and Alternative Medicine for Autism – A Systematic Review" (2024). With 44 publications garnering over 2,300 citations, her research has informed the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect, and Exploitation of People with Disability and been cited in the National Autism Strategy, contributing to real-world policy changes and UN Sustainable Development Goals.