Pioneered health gaming. A doctor of psychology and communication, Dr. Lieberman was an early researcher of the benefits of interactive media on cognition and behavior. In the 1990's, she developed some of the first interactive games designed to help children with chronic illnesses, like Nintendo's  Packy & Marlon (diabetes) and Bronkie the Bronchiasaurus (asthma). Clinical trial data gave hard results: children who played Packy & Marlon incurred 77 percent fewer diabetes-related emergency and urgent care visits. Her work is a precedent to Omidyar's efforts at HopeLab. Now affiliated with the University of California, Santa Barbara, she is also director of Health Games Research, an $8.25 million program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Its first grantees were announced in May.

"There is tons of research of interactive media on learning and behavior change, and we draw on all of that. But there is also a huge body of research on behavioral health. [Taken together] we know how to design messaging that will change people’s concepts and change their health."