Lab Website
RESEARCH AREAS
Risk perception
Individual level decision making
Modeling behavioral heterogeneity
Climate adaptation
Resource management (soil, water, forests)
Private lands conservation
COURSES OFFERED
ENR 3400 – Psychology of Environmental Problems
ENR 7150 – Environment, Risk and Decision Making
ENR 7400 – Communicating Environmental Risk
Dr. Wilson is an author on over 70 peer-reviewed journal articles, and book chapters, and a PI or co-PI on approximately $20 million in awarded grants. Since beginning her academic career at Ohio State in 2007, her work has focused primarily on the interplay between intuitive and analytic information processing and the influence this has on risk perception and ultimately judgment or choice behavior. She is also interested in the development of risk communication and decision support tools to inform decision making and risk management. Her current research focus is on adaptation to climate-exacerbated hazards (e.g., wildfire, algal blooms), and what motivates and constrains different land use and land management decisions on private and public lands.
Dr. Wilson is very active as a leader on campus and in her professional organizations as demonstrated by her service on several committees and advisory boards related to behavioral decision-making and environmental science. She serves on the Ohio State Sustainability Institute Faculty Advisory Board and the President and Provost’s Council for Sustainability, both of which advise University administration on issues related to the environment and sustainability. She is currently serving as the past-President of the Society for Risk Analysis and is a member of the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) Resilient America Roundtable and the US EPA Board of Scientific Counselors Social and Community Science Subcommittee. She is a former member of the NASEM Board on Environmental Change and Society, and the EPA Chartered Science Advisory Board.
Dr. Wilson received her B.A. in Environmental Studies with Honors from Denison University, and her M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Environment and Natural Resources from The Ohio State University. Dr. Wilson’s research over the past several years has been supported by the National Science Foundation (Innovations in Food, Energy, Water Systems; Coupled Natural Human Systems; Decision, Risk and Management Science), the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (Resilient Agroecosystems in a Changing Climate; Water for Food), the USFWS Joint Fire Sciences Program, The USEPA Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, The Nature Conservancy, The Great Lakes Protection Fund, The Great Lakes Observing System, and The Fertilizer Institute (4R Research Fund).
