Current Post: Senior Lecturer

Room Number: ZICER 0.09

Telephone: 01603 593122 (+44 1603 593122)

Fax: 01603 591327 (+44 1603 591327)

Email: p.simmons@uea.ac.uk

Web Page: Personal web page

Publications: EPrints Digital Repository

Posts of Special Responsibility:

• Chair of PG Examining Board

Research Interests

The relationship between technical experts and 'lay' publics and stakeholders; multi- and inter-disciplinary research practice; public and stakeholder participation in science, technology and risk decision-making; public understandings of and responses to risk (associated with both technological and natural hazards); place and risk; risk framing processes; science in society; participatory technology assessment; institutional and organisational responses to risk.

I am happy to discuss potential PhD projects related to any of the research areas listed, and including topics related both to technological risk and to natural hazards.


Biography

My disciplinary background is in sociology, including the field of science and technology studies (STS), but much of my research has involved working with colleagues from other disciplines.

My recent research has focused mainly on the nuclear sector, in particular on issues associated with radioactive waste management. I have two current interdisciplinary projects on geological disposal of radioactive waste, both funded by the European Commission's Framework 7 Programme. The first, MoDeRn, is focused on the monitoring of geological repositories and involves an exploratory ‘upstream’ stakeholder engagement exercise. The second, InSOTEC, aims to map and analyse a range of socio-technical challenges to geological disposal. I am, in addition, exploring the potential for whole-system equity analysis of nuclear power as part of the EPSRC-ESRC-funded Interdisciplinary Cluster on Energy Systems, Equity and Vulnerability (InCluESEV). Other projects that have focused on the nuclear sector include a comparative study of stakeholder involvement and participation in the field of radioactive waste management, with research partners from Belgium, Finland, Slovenia and Sweden and international consortium funding; and a study of local experience of living with nuclear facilities, conducted in collaboration with colleagues at Cardiff University and funded as part of the ESRC Priority Network in Social Context and Risk Response (SCARR).


Significant Publications

• Parkhill, K. A. Henwood, K. L. Pidgeon, N. F. Simmons, P. (2011) Laughing it off? Humour, affect and emotion work in communities living with nuclear risk, British Journal of Sociology, 62(2): 324-346 doi:10.1111/j.1468-4446.2011.01367.x
• Latawiec, A., Simmons, P., and Reid B. (2010) Decision-makers’ perspectives on the use of bioaccessibility for risk-based regulation of contaminated land, Environment International, 36(4): 383-389. doi:10.1016/j.envint.2010.02.007

• Parkhill, K., Pidgeon, N., Henwood, K., Simmons, P., Venables, D. (2010) From the familiar to the extraordinary: the ebbs and flows of local residents' perceptions of risk when living with nuclear power in the UK, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 35(1): 39-58. doi: 10.1111/j.1475-5661.2009.00364.x

• Venables, D. Pidgeon, N., Simmons, P., Henwood, K, Parkhill, K. (2009) ‘Living with nuclear risk: A Q-method study’, Risk Analysis, 29(8): 1089-1104. doi:10.1111/j.1539-6924.2009.01259.x

• Henwood, K., Pidgeon, N., Sarre, S., Simmons, P., Smith, N. (2008) ‘Risk, Framing and everyday life: Methodological and epistemological reflections from three sociocultural projects’, Health, Risk and Society 10(5): 421–438. doi:10.1080/13698570802381451

• Bickerstaff, K., Lorenzoni, I., Pidgeon, N., Poortinga, W., Simmons, P. (2008) ‘Framing the energy debate in the UK: nuclear power, radioactive waste and climate change mitigation’, Public Understanding of Science 17, 145-169. doi: 10.1177/0963662506066719.

• Bickerstaff, K., Simmons, P., Pidgeon, N. (2008) ‘Constructing responsibilities for technological risk: negotiating citizen-state relationships’, Environment and Planning A 40, 1312-1330. doi:10.1068/a39150

Page last updated 31 October 2011