BIO
In Brief
Dr. Britt Wray is a Human and Planetary Health Postdoctoral Fellow at the Stanford Center for Innovation in Global Health, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment and London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Centre on Climate Change and Planetary Health. Her research focuses on the mental health impacts of the ecological crisis. Britt is the creator of the weekly newsletter about “staying sane in the climate crisis” Gen Dread (gendread.substack.com) and author of Generation Dread: Finding Purpose in an Age of Climate Crisis (Knopf 2022). Britt has a PhD in Science Communication from the University of Copenhagen. Her first book is Rise of the Necrofauna: The Science, Ethics and Risks of De-Extinction (Greystone Books 2017). She has hosted several podcasts, radio & TV programs with the BBC and CBC, and is a TED speaker.
Research
Interests
Mental health impacts of climate change
Psychosocial support for eco-distress
Youth mental health
Climate psychology
Science communication
Genetic Rescue
De-extinction
Britt’s first book, Rise of the Necrofauna: The Science, Ethics and Risks of De-Extinction was published by Greystone Books in collaboration with the David Suzuki Foundation). Her second book Generation Dread: Finding Purpose in an Age of Climate Crisis (Knopf ) comes out May 2022. Her work has been featured in The New Yorker, The New York Times, TIME, The Guardian, BBC, CBC, Washington Post, LA Times, National Post, Globe and Mail, Financial Times, Wired, among others. She has written for international literary and news outlets including The Walrus, BBC Future, Nautilus, Motherboard, The Globe and Mail, and The Scientist. She was a 2019 TED Resident, 2019 Logan Nonfiction Fellow at the Carey Institute for Global Good, and 2020 Writer in Residence at Mesa Refuge.
Britt has a PhD in Science Communication (with a focus on synthetic biology) from the University of Copenhagen, an Interdisciplinary Master's in Art, Media and Design from OCAD University, a BSc (Hon) in Biology from Queen's University, and a Graduate Diploma in Communications from Concordia University. She has been a Visiting Scholar at the NYU Arthur L. Carter Institute for Journalism. The interactive audio diary platform Aurator, inspired by her PhD research on the function of emotion in science communication about synthetic biology, won the Society for the Social Studies of Science (4S) Making & Doing award.
Britt has been making radio since she was 19. Along with Ellie Cosgrave she hosted the BBC podcast Tomorrow's World. She has also hosted CBC’s Radio’s national science show Quirks and Quarks and produced numerous other programs for CBC (on Radio 1, 2 and 3), NPR and celebrated podcasts such as Love and Radio. Though seldom on camera as compared with on air, Britt hosted the CBC The Nature of Things feature TV documentary, The Nature of Invention.
Britt is an Advisor to Climate Cares, Imperial College London, the Good Energy Project for climate storytelling, and the Climate Mental Health Network, and
