Professor of Psychology & Emerging Health Risks

Management and Support

King's College London

James has been a researcher at King’s College London since 1999. He specialises in understanding how people perceive potential health risks, and how those perceptions affect their behaviour and wellbeing. This work broadly encompasses two areas: why people attribute physical symptoms to particular hazards, and how best to support people who find themselves suddenly exposed to a health risk following a disaster or major public health incident.  

He has explored reactions to possible health risks including pandemic influenza and coronavirus, biological and chemical terrorism, the Fukushima nuclear meltdown, the polonium 210 incident, the Ebola outbreak, the Salisbury Novichok incident, episodes of major flooding across England, Wifi, mobile phone and police radio signals, chemical exposures, wind turbines, surgery, medication side-effects and more.  

As a result of this work, James has been invited to sit on UK, EU and WHO committees investigating the potential health effects of newly identified health risks. He has provided legal expert witness statements as part of several group litigation cases in which the claimants attributed symptoms to controversial medical or industrial exposures. James was also a participant in the UK's Scienctific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) during the COVID-19 pandemic and set-up and co-chaired SAGE's behavioural science subgroup. 

James is the Director for our Unit.