Former Executive Director of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication, Cambridge University, UK
Before joining the Winton Centre in 2016, Alex Freeman had a 16 year career at the BBC, working on series such as Walking with Beasts, Life in the Undergrowth, Bang Goes the Theory, Climate Change by Numbers and as series producer of Trust Me, I’m a Doctor. Her work won a number of awards, from a BAFTA to a AAAS Kavli gold award for science journalism. In addition to developing and making television series, Alex worked with associated content across a whole range of other media – designing websites, games, formal learning resources and social media content – to bring science to the widest possible audience. Now at the Winton Centre she has a particular interest in helping professionals such as doctors, journalists or legal professionals communicate numbers and uncertainty better, and in whether narrative can be used as a tool to inform but not persuade. She is an advocate of Open Research practices and the reform of the science publishing system, and in her spare time leads the Octopus platform for primary research publication. In May 2024, it was announced that she would be made a non-party political life peer and member of the House of Lords.
Research Interests
- Risk and Evidence Communication
- Health Management
- Medicine
Selected Publications
Brick, C., & Freeman, A. L. (2024). Communicating evidence in icons and summary formats for policymakers: what works?. Behavioural Public Policy, 8(3), 441-469.
Recchia, G., Moser, K. S., & Freeman, A. L. (2024). What Affects Perceived Trustworthiness of Online Medical Information and Subsequent Treatment Decision Making? Randomized Trials on the Role of Uncertainty and Institutional Cues. MDM Policy & Practice, 9(1), 23814683241226660.
Martinez Garcia, A., Kaye, J., & Freeman, A. (2023). Enabling open research practices-connecting the Octopus platform with research institutional repositories.
Dryhurst, S., Schneider, C. R., Kerr, J., Freeman, A. L., Recchia, G., Van Der Bles, A. M., ... & Van Der Linden, S. (2022). Risk perceptions of COVID-19 around the world. In COVID-19 (pp. 162-174). Routledge.
Sutherland, H., Recchia, G., Dryhurst, S., & Freeman, A. L. (2022). How people understand risk matrices, and how matrix design can improve their use: Findings from randomized controlled studies. Risk Analysis, 42(5), 1023-1041.