She subsequently attended a finishing school in Paris for a year and then studied psychology, music, logic and economics at the University of Adelaide.

These included the Queen Victoria Maternity Hospital, the Mothers' and Babies' Health Association, and the Australian Comforts Fund, established to support soldiers during World War II.

Gordon Davidson had been appointed by the South Australian parliament to replace Pearson but did not contest the casual vacancy.

When a federal election was called on 11 April 1974, both houses were dissolved in a double dissolution and she chose to retire, having served a total of sixteen and a half years.

It is said that, with the encouragement of the then prime minister, Sir Robert Menzies, she broke down a long-established convention in Old Parliament House by becoming the first woman to drink at the previously male-only Members' Bar.

After leaving the Senate she retired to a farm at Chain of Ponds; while the house was under construction she and her husband lived in disused railway carriages.