Julia Ioane

Apaula Julia Ioane is a Samoan New Zealand clinical psychologist and academic, and is a full professor in the School of Psychology at Massey University, specialising in childhood trauma, family violence and youth offending.

Early life and education
Ioane was born in New Zealand to Samoan parents, and speaks Samoan and English. She was raised in South Auckland. She holds the chiefly title Folasāitu from the village of Fasito’o uta, and also has ancestral links to the village of Leauva’a.

Ioane graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Auckland in 1998. Ioane's interest in psychology had developed when working at the Ministry of Education. She realised that a family who were new migrants from Samoa were not going to understand the interventions they were being asked to make, and was told by the psychologist involved that there were not enough Samoan psychologists. Ioane then returned to Auckland University for a postgraduate diploma in psychology (2007), an honours degree (2010), and a Doctor of Clinical Psychology degree with a thesis titled A comparison of Pacific Island violent youth offenders with Maori and Palagi violent youth offenders (2012).

Academic career
Ioane worked for a community provider of a programme for sexual offenders, and then the Regional Youth Forensic Service, before joining the faculty of Auckland University of Technology as a lecturer. She also began to research how psychology practice could be changed to be more responsive to the needs of Pacific people. Her work with young offenders also led her to question why some Pacific youths enter the youth justice system and others don't, when from the outside the family may seem similar. Ioane later joined the faculty of Massey University, rising to full professor from 2024.

Ioane was an expert witness for the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care, providing evidence on the system changes required to provide redress from a Pacific perspective. She has also consulted to the judiciary in Samoa, and is on a number of governance boards and advisory boards in New Zealand.