Committees
Operational Planning Committee
BR-UK:
Prof. Linda Bauld
BR-UK Co-Director, University of EdinburghLinda Bauld (OBE, FMedSci, FRSE, FRCPE, FAcSS, FFPH) is the Bruce and John Usher Chair in Public Health in the Usher Institute, University of Edinburgh and Chief Social Policy Adviser to the Scottish Government. Linda has led a range of studies to prevent or treat the main modifiable risk factors for Non-Communicable Diseases with a particular focus on tobacco, alcohol, diet and inequalities in health. Along with serving as Co-Director of BR-UK she is Director of SPECTRUM, a research consortium that focuses on the commercial determinants of health. In her Scottish Government role, she provides Ministers with social and behavioural science advice and works on primary prevention across a range of policy areas from child poverty to population health. She is a former Scientific Adviser to the UK Department of Health, the World Health Organisation and Cancer Research UK on prevention and public health.
Nia is a Research Fellow at the University of Manchester. She is a qualitative researcher and behavioural scientist by background, with broad research experience across the areas of mental health, health psychology and public health. Nia completed her MPhil (Primary Care) and a PhD (Health Psychology) at the University of Manchester, and prior to this role was working as both principal behavioural and social scientist in the Department of Health and Social Care, and a lecturer in psychology. She brings expertise specifically in health behaviour change, health inequalities, intervention design, qualitative methods and stakeholder involvement. She has a keen interest in behaviours which impact both public and planetary health, and is co-chair of the UKSBM Climate Change SIG.
Niamh is a Research Fellow working on
qualitative aspects of building capability in behavioural research, the
behavioural concepts group and public engagement and stakeholder input. Before
BR-UK, Niamh graduated with a BSc in Psychology from Ulster University and an
MSc in Physical Activity for Health at the Physical Activity for Health
Research Centre (PAHRC), University of Edinburgh, with an interest in health
behaviours. Niamh went on to complete a PhD “PAUSE… Breathe & Stretch:
Creating an Evidence-Based Yoga Resource for Mainstream Schools” at the
University of Edinburgh, utilising stakeholder input to understand and manage
the barriers and facilitators experienced by students and teachers to using
yoga in schools. Niamh is also a qualified yoga instructor delivering yoga and
yoga-related education within Edinburgh since 2017.
Sancha Martin
BR-UK Programme Manager, University of Edinburgh
Sancha is a project/programme manager at the University of Edinburgh. She has over 15 years of experience in research management. She began her scientific journey as a Finisher on the Human Genome Project, which fostered her belief in the importance of collaborative research and publishing the outputs of that research freely and widely for others to build upon. Previous projects Sancha managed include: the SPECTRUM Consortium (University of Edinburgh), Precision-Panc and Scottish Genomes Partnership (University of Glasgow) and the International Cancer Genome Consortium Breast Cancer Working Groups (Wellcome Sanger Institute).
Centre-UB:
Professor of Forensic Psychology, Director of Centre-UB
Jess Woodhams is a Professor of Forensic Psychology and the Director of Centre-UB. She was previously the Director of the Centre for Applied Psychology and also her school’s Head of Research.
Her study of human behaviour includes offenders/suspects, victims of crime and the behaviours of those trying to tackle and prevent crime. She recently published a study of how Covid-19 public health interventions were associated with changes in suspect and victim behaviour.
She has co-produced research via projects, studentships and fellowships with police, law enforcement and criminal justice partners for 20+ years. She has won awards for her translation of psychology and her study of human behaviour into positive, societal impact.
Most recently, she has collaborated with the National Crime Agency, the University of Leicester and Imperial College London to create an AI-enabled decision-support tool to aid in crime linkage with sexual offences. With Dr Fazeelat Duran, she has also studied the impact of exposure to distressing material in employment and research settings, leading to the development of practical resources for organisations to support their employees.
Scientific Committee
BR-UK:
Sharon Cox is a Principal Research Fellow in the Tobacco and Alcohol Research Group at UCL's Department of Behavioural Science and Health. For nearly 20 years, she has been studying the psychology of addictive behaviours, specifically around tobacco, nicotine and alcohol use. Her main research interest is tobacco-related health inequalities. She has a special interest in understanding the relationships between the social determinants of health and smoking. For this, she uses observational and experimental studies to highlight inequalities in smoking and designs clinical trials and other pragmatic studies to help people quit. She leads a programme of work on smoking and health inequalities at UCL and also leads several studies which aim to reduce smoking among people experiencing homelessness. Sharon is also the BR-UK Co-Lead on Equality, Diversity, Inclusion and Intersectionality and Lead on Open Science.
Julze is a Research Fellow in public engagement,
working on embedding public engagement and stakeholder involvement approaches,
as well as equality, diversity, inclusion, and intersectionality principles in
behavioural research. Before joining academia, Julze worked as a health
promotion and policy specialist for government and international non-government
organisations in the Philippines and the UK, focusing on food, nutrition, and
health and social care policies. Interested in health, environmental sustainability,
behaviour change, and knowledge mobilisation, Julze completed his PhD in
sustainable healthcare and implementation science as a Scottish Government
Hydro Nation scholar at Glasgow Caledonian University, where he designed
Scotland’s first blue-green prescribing programme for primary mental
healthcare. Julze also worked on One Health and Planetary Health policies, as a
senior parliamentary intern at the House of Lords of the UK Parliament. Julze
completed his MSc in Public Health and Health Promotion as a UK Government
Chevening scholar at Bangor University in Wales, and a BSc in Nutrition at
University of the Philippines.
Harriet is a lecturer in Psychology at the University of Sheffield. She has interests and expertise in self-regulation and in the design, application, and evaluation of interventions designed to promote positive changes in people’s behaviour. Harriet collaborates with a range of stakeholders to understand behaviour in different contexts, and she works on a number of large, interdisciplinary projects. Most recently Harriet’s research has considered the role of human behaviour in tackling environmental challenges (e.g., reducing plastic waste), and on projects that use ontologies to advance research in the behavioural sciences. From a methodological perspective, Harriet has expertise in conducting systematic reviews, meta-analyses, and quantitative data analysis.
Elif is a Research Fellow in Environmental Behavioural Research, working on understanding how climate adaptation and mitigation behaviours might complement or contradict each other, and how longitudinal behavioural interventions with multiple and complex components can address these. Before BR-UK, Elif completed her DPhil (PhD) at the University of Oxford where she designed and implemented social norm based behavioural interventions to reduce meat consumption for improving planetary health outcomes. She is particularly interested in science communication and public engagement, and has been a guest speaker on podcasts, radio shows, and seminar series. Elif holds an MPhil in Social and Developmental Psychology from the University of Cambridge, a BA in Psychology and Sociology from Columbia University, and a second BA in Political Science from SciencesPo.
Oliver is Professor of Public Policy and
Democratic Innovation at the University of Edinburgh. He works on public
participation, policy innovation, the commons, political inequalities, and the
governance of the future. Oliver combines research and practice to develop
social and democratic innovations across various policy and community contexts
in Scotland and internationally. He co-led the projects European Smart Urban
Intermediaries (2017-2020), Distant Voices (2017-2020), and What Works
Scotland (2014-2019), and currently co-leads on public engagement at the UKRI
Behavioural Research Hub (2023-2028) and on political economy at the EU Horizon
programme on Intersectional Spaces of Participation (2024-2027).
Prof. Jo Hart
Professor of Health Professional Education & Head of the Division of Medical Education and Deputy Head of the School of Medical Sciences, University of Manchester
Jo is a Health Psychologist, Professor of Health Professional Education, Head of the Division of Medical Education and Deputy Head of the School of Medical Sciences at the University of Manchester. She studies and supports the behaviour of healthcare professionals internationally, with a focus on education/training as a behaviour change intervention. She delivers and evaluates interventions that build capacity in health professionals to use behaviour change approaches. She co-founded The Change Exchange, a collaboration in which behavioural scientists work with UK and LMIC health partnerships.
Dr. Milly Massoura
Administrative Support, University College London
Based at the UCL Centre for Behaviour Change
(CBC), Milly provides administrative support across BR-UK. Before BR-UK, Milly was at the University of
Kent working in Research and Innovation Services. Milly has a background in
life sciences, completing her BSc (hons) in Medical Biochemistry and PhD in
molecular pharmacology at the University of Birmingham. Following this she worked at the National
Institute for Biological Standards and Control (NIBSC) as a business support
officer. Milly has a wide range of
experience in providing support to researchers at all levels in a variety of
disciplines.
Lucy Porter is a Lecturer in Behaviour Change at
UCL Centre for Behaviour Change and a BR-UK Senior Research Fellow. She
co-leads BR-UK's Demo Project 1, which aims to explore the barriers to the
effective use of evidence-based behavioural science advice in national
policy-making during the first years of the COVID-19 pandemic. Lucy specialises
in using qualitative methods and the Behaviour Change Wheel framework to assess
behavioural barriers and enablers and develop behaviour change interventions.
Having previously worked as a Principal Behavioural Scientist at Public Health
England and the Office for Health Improvement & Disparities, her research
typically focuses on behaviour change within the field of public health across
individual, organisational and population levels, with specific interests in
eating behaviours and reducing health inequalities. Lucy has a PhD in
Psychology from the University of Exeter.
Amy is a Research Fellow at the University of Edinburgh. She utilises quantitative and mixed methods to assess human decision-making and behaviour change, focusing on pivotal policy issues like public health and climate change. Passionate about methodology and meta-science movements to enhance behavioural research rigour, she oversees BR-UK's presence on the Open Science Framework platform. She is also leveraging her experience as a Scottish Government research intern to develop the hubs 'Ask BR-UK' service. Amy completed her MSc in Research Methods of Psychological Science and PhD, "Water drinking is a complex health behaviour: implications for theory and intervention development," at the University of Glasgow. She has also evaluated behaviour change interventions targeting sustainable consumption and student well-being through various research assistant roles. Amy has begun collaborating with the UN’s Playing for the Planet programme to assess the potential of video games to foster climate action within player communities.
David is Professor of Energy and the Built Environment at the UCL Energy Institute and Chair of the User-Centred Energy Systems Technology Collaboration Programme by IEA. His research focuses on how people use technologies to turn energy into the services they want such as comfort, mobility and cleanliness. At the individual level he is interested in the ways people permit, purchase and allow their technologies to participate in the energy system to provide demand flexibility, and how product manufacturers, energy regulators, and the design of buildings can facilitate this. At the community level he is interested in how communities reach and maintain social consensus around the socially good outcomes they want from their energy system and how these can be aligned with delivering national energy and environmental requirements. David speaks and consults widely in the UK and internationally the role of users in the energy transition.
Maggie is a mixed-methods behavioural researcher and Research Fellow at the Centre for Behaviour Change, UCL. She contributes to WP1’s capability scoping studies and is responsible for the multilevel latent class analysis of the 2022 OECD household survey within Demo 4. She holds a BA in English, an MPhil in Environmental Policy from the University of Cambridge, and a PhD in Social and Environmental Psychology from UCL. Her doctoral research at the UCL Energy Institute explored the role of social norms in promoting personal cooling behaviours in financial offices in Southern China, employing semi-structured interviews, online experiments, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses. Her expertise includes pro-environmental behaviours, behavioural economics, behaviour change, and user experience research and design.
Centre-UB:
Dr. Prof. Jet Velhuijzen van Zanten (Chair)
Professor in Biological Psychology & Deputy Director of Centre-UB
Director of Graduate Research, University of Birmingham
Jet Veldhuijzen van Zanten is a Professor in Biological Psychology and Deputy Director of Centre-UB. She is also the Director of Graduate Research in the College of Life and Environmental Sciences at the University of Birmingham.
Her interdisciplinary research investigates the impact of behaviour on physical and psychological health. She explores determinants of different types of behaviour, including physical activity and stress, and uses advanced statistical methods throughout her work. She works with populations to co-produce interventions to support behaviour change to achieve benefits for physical and psychological health. She specifically focusses on clinical populations (including rheumatoid arthritis) and on under-represented populations (including ethnic minorities, people from sociodemographically disadvantaged communities).
She aims to support equal access to behaviour change programmes for all people, regardless of their individual characteristics or contextual circumstances. She has strong national and international collaborations with healthcare professionals, patient organisations, and community groups who are co-applicants on funding applications.
Chris Baber is Chair of Pervasive and Ubiquitous Computing in the School of Computer Science at the University of Birmingham. He graduated from Keele University with a BA in Psychology and English Literature in 1987, and completed his PhD in Speech Technology in Aston University's Applied Psychology Unit in 1990. That year he joined Birmingham University to lecture on the MSc Work Design and Ergonomics degree. His research developed from speech technology to wearable computing and is now concerned with Artificial Intelligence. In each of these areas, his concern is with the impact of technology on human behaviour, and on the design and evaluation of technology that can aid and enhance human decision making.
Dr. Arkady Konovalov
Associate Professor in the School of Psychology and Centre for Human Brain Health, University of Birmingham
Arkady Konovalov is an Associate Professor in the School of Psychology and Centre for Human Brain Health at the University of Birmingham. His research focuses on neuroeconomics and decision making in general, including models of the choice process, value-based learning, and social and strategic interactions, using methods of computational neuroscience such as response times modeling, fMRI, EEG, eye-tracking, and mouse-tracking. Before coming to Birmingham, he received his PhD from the Ohio State University (USA) and completed his postdoctoral training at the University of Zurich (Switzerland). Arkady is particularly interested in interdisciplinary projects across psychology, economics, computer science, and other related disciplines.