Events

This event will be hosted by the Centre for Society and Mental Health at King's College London.

The ARISE initiative co-ordinates a twice-yearly Coastal Resilience Community of Practice. At this event we joined in with participatory workshops looking at collaborative values and aims of the community of Practice.

As part of a National Centre for Research Methods training seminar, Dr Emily Murray discussed using the Understanding Society dataset for her work examining the environments of English youth and their association with mental health.

Dr Emily Murray was the keynote speaker the East Suffolk Community Partnerships Forum 2025.

As part of the University of Essex Cross University Research Event on Food Security and Sustainability, Dr Jordan Lazell delivered a presentation on his work "The Paradox of Surplus food: Exploring the resilience of food supply in the community food sector".

Dr Emily Murray attended the SLLS Annual Conference 2025, with the theme "Life Course Transitions and Patterns: Stronger Evidence for Better Policies".

As part of Stream 1: Health & Wellbeing, Emily presented her paper "Which Environmental Characteristics Explain the Worse Mental Health of Young People Who Lived in Deprived Coastal Communities in Adolescence?" She was also co-author for a related paper, "Understanding the Coastal Effect in England: Are Young People in Coastal Communities Less Likely to Get Degree-Level Qualifications?" presented by Zongpu Yue (University College London).

Dr Emily Murray has recently completed and published findings from a research project on the mental health of young adults in coastal communities, compared to their peers inland. It had used the UK Household Longitudinal Study with follow up interviews.

The results showed that there was a significant difference between the two, with a lower mental functioning on the coast.

This session considered possible environmental reasons for this, including economic (such as employment and housing), social (such as crime), education and infrastructure. In almost all measures the indicators were worse for those living by the coast, other than access to green space and air quality.

With funding from Arts Council England, the University of Essex’s gallery Art Exchange devised ‘Glimmer’, a community-led project which takes inspiration from ‘glimmers’ - the complete opposite of triggers – which are moments that spark joy.

Jess Twyman (Curator (Exhibitions & Public Programme), Library and Cultural Services, University of Essex), will talk to us about the project and the impact it made in Clacton and other coastal communities in Tendring, Essex. She will expand on how the arts can enrich the lives of young people from isolated coastal communities.

Dr Paul Mee from the Lincoln International Institute for Rural Health at the University of Lincoln will be speaking on ‘Commonalities and differences between the Lincolnshire coast and Essex coasts and how our two institutions can work together to address challenges in our coastal communities.’

Professor Avril Keating and Dr Sam Whewall, from University College London, will present, 'The push and pull of place: the role of local employment opportunities in youth mobility aspirations in coastal towns in England.'

Professor Ewen Speed from the School of Health and Social Care will be speaking on 'Researching with marginalised communities from an inclusive involvement perspective', and Professor Gina Reinhardt from the Department of Government will discuss the ARISE Initiative.

The launch event of the Centre for Coastal Communities investigated the challenges coastal communities face and the opportunities they offer.

The event gave those attending an overview of the scope of the Centre for Coastal Communities and the focus of its work. Rapid Research presentations were given by Centre Director Dr Emily Murray on coastal excess in the youth mental health crisis; Alix Power-Mason on understanding the mental health needs of England’s coastal communities; Professor Anuj Kapilashrami on social determinants of mental health; Professor Reza Majdzadeh on inequality for stroke care; and Dr Kostis Roussos on community supermarkets and food security: the case of the Brooklands Store in Jaywick.

Coastal communities have some of the worst health and wellbeing outcomes in England, with a higher burden of disease, across a wide range of physical and mental health conditions (CMO Annual Report 2021). In these communities there are also higher levels of unemployment, lower levels of educational attainment and an ageing population. There is a complex link between health, the environment and the economy and an urgent need to improve the life chances within these coastal communities.

Following the launch we are continuing to speak with partners and people living in the communities themselves to understand their experiences, priorities and needs.

This workshop explores how local authorities, NHS trusts, ICBs and others can tackle the issues around the collection, analysis and use of data relating to coastal communities.

In 2021 the Chief Medical Officer looked at health in coastal communities (.pdf), and highlighted that the available data on health and wellbeing were poor and lacked granularity. He recommended that this should be addressed to support the development of policies aimed at improving the health of coastal communities.

This one-day workshop takes a step towards this. Led by the Eastern Arc Coastal Data (‘Coda’) Network, it is an opportunity to work together to address key issues identified through the EARC workshops on coastal health data held in July 2022.