Science Advisor, Pacific Disaster Center

Heather Bell serves as the Science Advisor at Pacific Disaster Center (PDC), where she is part of the senior management team. She is also a research affiliate of the Social Science Research Institute at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.  At PDC, one of Heather’s key objectives is connecting risk related research and practice. She has worked to help multiple communities of practice operationalize risk and vulnerability information and associated assessments. Prior to coming to PDC, Heather taught at the University of Miami and the University of South Florida, where her research focused on risk communication and perception. Her studies have dealt with both intensive and chronic hazard contexts, and she has experience in a variety of quantitative, qualitative, and geospatial techniques used for data collection and analysis. She currently serves as editor-in-chief of the journal Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy. Heather has degrees in Philosophy (BA) and Geography (MA, PhD) and worked for several years as a naturalist onboard small cruise ships traveling the west coast of North America.