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Dr. Paula R. Buchanan
About Me
About Me
My research focuses on people’s and communities’ access to sustainable clean drinking water sources in metropolitan areas and cities, specifically from public water systems. I also explore how public water utilities and other interested parties, including emergency managers, communicate with urban populations about how their behaviors can either positively or negatively impact the drinking water cycle. In the context of disaster and emergency management research and practice, clean drinking water access is included as part of the Emergency Support Function 11 (ESF 11): Food and Water to provide safe, sufficient drinking water during disasters.
With this socio-hydrology-based work, I ask how human behaviors, perceptions, and communication patterns can make urban drinking water systems more resilient and sustainable to improve public health before, during, and after disasters occur. My work also focuses on improving risk communication by enhancing researchers’ and practitioners’ science communication skills to make messaging more effective for public education and outreach purposes.
As a water + data nerd, I am interested in (you guessed it) drinking water access issues, how data science impacts science communication + science policy, and the intersection of the two areas.
Check out part of my portfolio to learn more about me.
My Research
My Research
As a socio-hydrologist, my research focuses on how people interact with drinking water systems, and human behavior’s impact on these systems that support the drinking water that we receive to support our lives.
I seek to understand how the use of technologies as communication tools influence the effectiveness of drinking water messaging in urban, marginalized, and minoritized communities.
I am passionate about public education and outreach efforts—and the science communication messages that they should contain—to more effectively educate populations about drinking water, its supporting green and built infrastructures, and the human impacts on the water cycle.
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