The Committee

Grainne is a Health Psychologist and a Director of Behavioural Insights at Magpie. Grainne’s role at Magpie involves overseeing all the behavioural science work that takes place in the form of research projects and research to inform behaviour change campaigns. Prior to joining Magpie, Grainne worked in Public Health for 16 years in various roles. Grainne’s Public Health experience during that time includes smoking cessation, teenage pregnancy, Public Health Intelligence, Health Protection, and children's Public Health. Throughout all these roles Grainne embedded behavioural science. Grainne has also worked at Kirklees Council as a Behavioural Insights Transformation Lead - leading Transformation projects across the council. Grainne is an honorary behavioural science lecturer at Bradford University and is a school governor.

Vickie is a Behavioural Science Specialist in the Behaviour Change Unit at Hertfordshire County Council and a qualified Health Psychologist. She has had experience in applying psychological and behavioural science skills across various settings such as the voluntary sector, academia, the NHS and in Local Government. Vickie has worked across a wide range of topics such as NHS health checks, long-term condition management, vaccinations, and healthcare service improvement. Currently, she is working on projects in collaboration with Adult Social Care, Public Health, and Workforce Wellbeing. Within the committee, for the last two years Vickie has been the Conference Chair for the annual BSPHN conference. She has now changed roles and is now the Honorary Secretary for the BSPHN.

Harriet is a Behavioural Science Specialist in the Behaviour Change Unit at Hertfordshire County Council. She trained as a research psychologist in cognitive psychology at the University of Warwick and has worked in applied behavioural science since 2017 within the public and private sector. Harriet has worked on the application of behavioural science to various areas, including digital design, digital behaviour change interventions, children’s diet, vaccine uptake, workplace health, integrating healthcare services, and adult education. She is passionate about leveraging digital tools for behaviour change and is website manager for the BSPHN.

Dr Paul Chadwick is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist and Honorary Associate Professor at the world-renowned UCL Centre for Behaviour Change. He works on the development of interdisciplinary approaches to research and practice in behaviour change, with a focus on chronic disease self-management, public health, decarbonisation and fuel poverty, systems and organisational change and social justice (e.g. racism and misogyny). He has held senior leadership positions in the NHS, government, and private sector, and is on the advisory board of the World Cancer Research Fund. Most recently he has been developing methods to integrate systems and behaviour change theory and testing their application to transform complex systems such as those involved in energy, biodiversity, food, and social justice.  He is also recognised as an authority on the application of behavioural science to bullying and harassment in organisations, gender-based violence, and gender and race-based inequities, and is an advisor to the College of Policing taskforce on reducing violence against women. Until 2019 he was the professional lead for Psychology within the award-winning Camden Intergrated Care Service for Diabetes and is co-investigator and collaborator on a number of NIHR, NMHR, and NIH grants concerned with improving the health outcomes of individuals with obesity and diabetes. In addition to nearly 20 years of direct clinical experience working with individuals with weight disorders and long-term conditions, Dr. Chadwick has considerable experience in overseeing the development, implementation, and evaluation of group-based behaviour change interventions at a national and international scale.

Dr Lou Atkinson is a behavioural scientist, researcher, consultant, and educator with over 15 years’ experience of working in partnership with public health organisations. Lou has previously held the roles of Conference Chair and Publication Editor and is currently the Publicity & Liaison Chair. Lou is passionate about understanding and supporting health behaviour change, particularly around maternal health, women’s health, physical activity & child obesity. Lou is the Head of Research for EXI, a digital healthcare company which provides tailored exercise prescription services for individuals with long term conditions. She is also a Visiting Research Fellow at Aston University, and an Honorary Clinical Lecturer at Warwick Medical School.

Suhana is a Practitioner Health Psychologist and Senior Public Health Specialist. Her research specialises in behaviour change (diet, physical activity and substance misuse) within a public health context using evidence-based methodology to devise behaviour change interventions; evaluation of healthcare services and public health interventions; the wider determinants of health (such as the links between employment, fuel poverty, food poverty, the impact of quality of housing and health) and reducing health inequalities.

Lesley is a Behavioural Science Specialist and Health Psychologist, leading the Behavioural Science Unit at Somerset Council. Her work involves applying the latest evidence in behavioural science to the development of public health interventions. Lesley has worked across a wide range of topics in public health, including obesity, smoking, Covid-19, screening, and vaccinations and has delivered numerous training workshops to support public health professionals to apply behavioural science to their work. Within the committee, Lesley is a Publication Assistant and is keen to share learning in the application of behavioural science and to bridge the gap between academia and practice.

Abby is a PhD candidate at the University of Bedfordshire, where she is researching the use and implementation of behavioural science within public health. Her research aims to understand how to effectively support the translation of behavioural science into everyday practice by understanding the complex systems and factors that influence this implementation process. Alongside this, Abby works within Buckinghamshire Council’s Public Health Team as a trainee Health Psychologist where she supports the application of behavioural science evidence and approaches within public health interventions. She also plays a role in capacity building through the provision of training aimed at upskilling the public health workforce in the use of behavioural science. Abby has a keen interest in individual and organisation-level behaviour change and implementation science. She enjoys working collaboratively with others to enhance the use of behavioural science across the public health system and hopes she can further support this through her role as Publicity and Liaison Officer for Social Media.

Stu King is the Founder and CEO of BeeZee Bodies, an organisation that is dedicated to using behavioural science to help people become happier and healthier. He has a long and varied career in public health, having worked in the NHS and Local Authority as an Obesity lead, and as a Senior Scientist in the Obesity and Healthy weight team and a National Implementation Manager in the Adults and Older People's Team at Public Health England (now OHID). Stu is the host of the Real World Behavioural Science Podcast, in which he interviews leading figures from academia, industry and public health, working to implement behavioural science across a range of topics and areas.

Nicky is a Senior Behavioural Science Specialist based within the Behavioural Science Unit at Public Health Wales and a trainee Health Psychologist undertaking a Professional Doctorate in Health Psychology at Liverpool John Moores University. Her role focuses on increasing behavioural science capability and capacity across the system with a view to optimising the impact of public health policies, services, and communications. Nicky has previously worked within a local public health team in the North of England during which time her portfolio included Tobacco Control, Substance Misuse, Whole System Approaches to Obesity, and COVID 19. Nicky currently leads on the development of a BSPHN hub for Wales and was previously co-chair of the BSPHN hub for Yorkshire and Humber. Nicky is the Stakeholder Liaison Officer for BSPHN and is passionate about enhancing connections and collaborations across the system to enhance collective efforts in enabling application of behavioural science in public health policy and practice.

Ellie currently works as a Behavioural Science Specialist in North Yorkshire’s Public Health Team, leading on developing and implementing an organisation-wide approach to embedding and utilising behavioural science to improve health-related outcomes. She has previously worked on a range of portfolios including sexual health, teenage pregnancy, COVID-19 response in adult social care, cardiovascular disease, primary care, and research. Ellie holds a PhD in Health Psychology, completed in conjunction with Liverpool Heart and Chest NHS Foundation Trust’s cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation services, where she developed and implemented a behaviour change CPD package for healthcare professionals working in cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation. Ellie is currently Regional Hub Lead for the BSPHN where she supports Local Authorities to utilise behavioural science, as well as co-chair of the Yorkshire and Humber Behavioural Science Hub and was previously co-chair of the Health Psychology Exchange’s Public Health Forum. She studied a BSc in Psychology, MSc in Sport, and Exercise Psychology before completing her PhD between 2016-2020.

Liz is a Health Psychologist and the National Lead for Behaviour Change at Everyone Health Ltd. Liz is passionate about health and wellbeing, in particular, translating theory into practice and providing tools for practitioners to use in behaviour change interventions that result in long-term, sustained behaviour change. At Everyone Health Ltd, she has strategic oversight, responsibility, and quality assurance of behaviour change elements in Everyone Health Ltd’s commissioned services and leads a team of five professional leads. Liz is passionate about sharing learning and best practice for both efficient use of resources and for collaboration and partnership opportunities.

Emma is a behavioural science lead on a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) project, that aims to strengthen the collaboration between academia and industry. She has 10 years’ experience working as a researcher in public health, around substance misuse and harm reduction. More recently, her research has focused on applying theoretical models of behaviour change, to inform intervention development, to improve health outcomes for people living with long-term conditions, including chronic non-cancer pain and neurodegenerative diseases. Currently, Emma is using behavioural science to revolutionise the development of health care communications for rare and hard to treat diseases, with the aim of optimising treatment choice for patients. Within the committee, Emma is an Event Officer.