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Dr Sara Waring
Research Coordinator
Sara Waring is the Deputy Programme Director for and lectures on the MSc in Investigative and Forensic Psychology. She is the Research Director at the Centre for Critical and Major Incident Psychology Research, a member of the Liverpool Institute of Risk and Uncertainty and a Chartered Member of the British Psychological Society. Her core research focus is on identifying and understanding the impact of individual, situational and organisational factors on emergency service decision making with a view to implementing these findings into training to improve performance and resilience. Sara received a First Class BSc (Hons) in Psychology, an MSc (with distinction) in Investigative and Forensic Psychology, and a PhD at the University of Liverpool. Using a combination of simulations, 10kV electronic focus groups and interviews, her PhD thesis examined the impact of accountability on police judgments and decisions in critical and major incidents. The findings, implications and best practice identified through this body of research were disseminated amongst practitioners and academics through reports and publications.
Sara has been involved in the debriefing of critical incidents across the UK and has delivered practitioner reports to various UK emergency and public services including police, fire, health, social services and education. Her current research interests include identifying factors that affect the formation of advice provided by emergency service advisors and the use of this advice in decisions, examining the impact of risk and uncertainty on critical and major incident decisions, simulation design and developing expertise in emergency response. In conjunction with partners from Engineering and Computer Sciences, Sara is involved in the development of autonomous systems for use in critical and major incidents in order to reduce cognitive load, improve access to information and emergency service interoperability, and improve decision making. She is also involved in a project funded by the FBI to identify strategies for reducing use of counter interrogation tactics during interviews with recalcitrant terrorist suspects. This work is being expanded to examine whether such strategies are applicable to other criminal subpopulations such as child abuse offenders. Sara is involved in the development of large scale multiagency emergency service training events, one of which will form part of the Home Office funded Joint Emergency Services Interoperability Programme, the aim of which is to improve emergency service interoperability and decision making. She has also been commissioned to conduct an evaluation of a northwest family centred domestic abuse offender programme.
