Dr Isabel Richter

Research Fellow

University of Plymouth, UK

Growing up in a family of musicians, Isabel is everything but a musical talent. Despite all effort of her parents to teach her the piano, conservation and marine environments yielded her interest from an early age on. Isabel studied psychology in Germany and New Zealand and specialized on Environmental Psychology during the end of her Diploma. While her diploma was on the relation between power and environmentalism, her doctorate, which she is to complete at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim in Spring 2019, had a marine conservation focus. In her PhD she explored barriers and facilitators of sustainable seafood consumption, the role of social norms as well as risks and side effects in environmental communication. Besides her educational career, Isabel was involved in various conservation projects. She was working in the Dzanga Sangah National Park in the Central African Republic where she supported the WWF in setting up park management strategies and a sustainable tourism program. Isabel collaborated with marine biologists in Greece in Mediterranean dolphin research (Ionian Dolphin Project in Vonitsa), with a whale watching company on the Azores (Futurismo in Sao Miguel) and in Norway (Arctic Experiences in Tromsø). During her PhD studies she was teaching Master courses on plastic pollution and held numerous workshops on marine conservation issues and environmental psychology. Isabel also started a project named “From Fascination to Conservation” which targets plastic pollution in tourism contexts. “Blue Communities” caught her interest because of the broad spectrum of topics, the interdisciplinarity and the focus on practical implications. Isabel will work closely together with Dr. Sabine Pahl who also is her post-doctoral supervisor. Besides her working life, Isabel loves learning new languages, is a passionate traveller, diver and sports fanatic.