Dr Emma McKinley is a Research Fellow at Cardiff University. Her research focuses on understanding the complex relationships between society and the sea, taking account of diverse perceptions, attitudes and values held by different communities and audiences, and considers how this insight can be used to support effective ocean governance. Recent projects include the INTERREG Ireland-Wales funded project, Coastal Communities Adapting Together (CCAT – www.ccatproject.eu), which focuses on understanding public perceptions of climate change, building on models of ocean literacy and marine citizenship to explore the notion of climate citizenship; the GCRF Catalyst funded project Transforming Resilience across Food and Water Systems, including an assessment of social, economic and cultural impacts of algal blooms; and, the recently funded SMMR project, Integrating Diverse Values into UK Marine Management, leading work on ocean literacy. 

Emma is the founder of the Marine Social Science Network, a global, interdisciplinary community of marine social science researchers and practitioners and is Chair of the Royal Geographic Society’s Coastal and Marine Research Group. She is the Co-Chair of the Marine Social Science Task Group of the UK’s Marine Science Coordinating Committee, sits on the International Science Advisory Group for MEOPAR and the IOC-UNESCO’s Ocean Literacy Research Community.