Prof Sally Priest

Research activities

Sally undertakes many research and knowledge exchange activities investigating the impacts of flooding and how these can be reduced. She has explored a diverse range of flooding issues including: the benefits of flood warning, the potential for risk to life from flooding, flood vulnerability, risk communication, benefit appraisal, flood risk governance and the current and future viability of flood risk insurance, and therefore has a good overall appreciation of many areas of flood risk management. Through various projects she has linked socio-economics with hazard modelling and developed various flood risk assessment methodologies (risk to life, flood recovery, impacts of household displacement) and has studied the health impacts of flooding. Sally leads the methodological development of non-property damage data and methodologies of the Multi-coloured Manual suite which includes approaches for estimating the benefits of preventing flood disruption to utility and transport networks and to other institutions such as schools and hospitals.

Specific areas of research interest and competency:

• Flood insurance and recovery mechanisms – understanding of the role of recovery and insurance following flooding and their viability, issues of availability and affordability and the development of an optimum approach.
• Public awareness-raising and risk communication – effectiveness of public information in raising awareness about flooding and the influence that it has on attitudes and behaviour, including the role of flood risk maps and the impact of different data sources.
• Flood Warning Systems – Dissemination, communication and behavioural responses and developing models to estimate the damage reducing benefits of flood warnings.
• Flood incident management – Research into loss of life modelling and evacuation to improve flood emergency management.
• Analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of flood management institutions and policy regimes – Research about the governance arrangements of flood risk
• Justice and distributional consequences of flood risk management decision-making.

 Knowledge exchange

An externally recognised flood risk management expert Sally is repeatedly called upon by national and international flood policymakers/practitioners for her expert opinion; fulfilling invitational roles on steering committees, advisory groups and undertaking governmental peer review. Recently, for the Environment Agency (EA) she undertook a critical review of approaches to measure and monitor flood resilience which is being adopted nationwide. Since 2016, she has also served as an invited member of the Joint Defra/EA Flood and Coastal Risk Management R&D Programme setting the agenda for directing flood risk management practice. She was also an invited expert on the Ambition group to deliver the English National Flood Risk Management Strategy to 2100. Published in 2020 this the key document setting the direction for flood risk management for the next 80 years.

Current Teaching

Sally currently provides research-led teaching to a range of different programmes at undergraduate and post-graduate level (e.g. Occupational Safety and Health; Environmental Health, Public Health, Sustainability and Environmental Management, Global Governance and Sustainable Development). Her teaching focusses on three core subject areas: sustainability, flood risk governance and the impacts of floods on human health. Additionally, she brings utilises her research experience to teach research methods to students to prepare them for their projects.

Sally has supervised four PhD students to completion and is currently supervising another four doctoral students:

• Adesola Akindejoye-Adesioye (PhD): Systemic Societal Vulnerability to Coastal Flooding: A Case Of Eti- Osa, Lagos Nigeria(Supervisor)
• Malcolm Bevan (MPhil/PhD):The impact of flooding/environmental disasters has on the occupational well-being of professional emergency responders (Director of Studies)
• Arzoo Hassan (MPhil/PhD): Social inclusivity of flood risk management policies (Director of Studies)
• Rachel Flowers (DProf): Exploring the leadership role of English Directors of Public Health during a major incident(Supervisor)
• Samaneh Serpooshan (MPhil/PhD): Understanding community notions of flood resilience (Director of Studies)