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Professor Rowena Hill

Rowena Hill

Professor

School of Social Sciences

Staff Group(s)
Psychology

Role

Rowena Hill is a Professor of Resilience, Emergencies and Disaster Science at Nottingham Trent University. Her work builds opportunities to translate evidence and research on risk, resilience and wellbeing, in to policy and practice. Her work focusses on applying evidence to inform policy and practice at the individual, group, organisation and societal level. Her research tends to focus on societal wide risks and societal resilience as well as the wellbeing of communities and responders.

Research areas

As an active researcher, Rowena’s research tries to increase resilience to emergencies and disasters. Her work seeks to provide an evidence base to inform policy and practice in disaster and emergency contexts. This includes focusing on communities, responders and the resilience structures through which threats and risks are identified, prepared, mitigated, managed, recovered and adapted to. Broadly, her work considers how the UK can increase societal resilience to societal wide risks (such as the pandemic, impacts of climate change and civil protection). This work uses evidence on group behaviours, communication and public narratives of risk, and psychological and social health of communities and responding organisations.

Her work spans across organisations, sectors, and governance structures. She is currently the embedded scientist supporting the Climate Security National Foresight Group, is the Chair of the national Academic Collaboration, Evaluation and Research Group aligned to the National Fire Chiefs Council, Climate Resilience and Civil Contingencies lead for the NTU Police Academic Centre of Excellence, is a Visiting Fellow at the Durham Institute of Research, Development, and Invention, and she has been an ESRC Policy Fellow to MHCLG (formerly DLUCH) on Climate Change. She has worked with a number of government departments at national level, as well as the Senedd. These have been to deliver one off projects, as a member of expert round tables, to deliver expert challenges, or to contribute to longer term workstreams and portfolios.

From March 2020 to February 2021 she was the embedded scientist on secondment to the C19 National Foresight Group set up in response to the pandemic. Within this secondment, she led multiple teams who delivered over 60 reports to provide evidence-based quality research findings to decision-making for policy makers and leaders across the UK, for which she was awarded an MBE in 2024 for Public Service.

External activity

She holds a number of membership and positions within other organisations:

  • Visiting Fellow at the Durham Institute of Research, Development, and Invention, National Strategic Research Group
  • Chartered Psychologist and Fellow of the British Psychological Society (British Psychological Society; BPS)
  • Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
  • Member of the academic reference group of His Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabularies Fire and Rescue Services
  • ESRC Policy Fellow on Climate Change to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (formerly the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
  • Chair of the National Fire Chiefs Council Academic Collaboration, Evaluation and Research Group

Press expertise

Emergency Services

Climate Change

Resilience Structures and Humanitarian Assistance

Wellbeing and Psychological Health

Civil Contingencies and Civil Protection