Karin has had seven professional names. When she started acting as a child in the UK, her mother registered her with Actors Equity as Karin Allan, feeling that De la Peña (Karin's maiden name) would be too confusing. When Karin graduated from college, she took her brother's first name and worked as Karin Dominic until moving to the US. Throughout her childhood, people had mispronounced Karin's first name, so when she became a member of the Screen Actors Guild, she decided to change her first name too. She became Elizabeth E. Moore for her first job, but that name was already taken, so she changed it to Elizabeth Dartmoor. After a few years she was tired of people shortening her name to Liz and decided to educate people on how to pronounce Karin, but registered with her married name as Karin Mary Shea. On her return to acting after a long hiatus, she decided to use her maiden name, but to spell it the Portuguese way since that was her heritage. She worked as Karin de la Penha for several years until signing with a new agent who asked her to change her name to something more Anglo, given her current very Anglo look. Hence, Karin Collison (also a family name).
