RAE Score 2008: 2.65
Satellite image of the Earth
There are six research groups in Geography.
Geography and Environment’s spatial focus provides a unique viewpoint on changes in the human and physical environment that will have an impact on our future. From rapid changes in the global economic network that affect societies around the world to the glacial dynamics that slowly but surely are changing global sea level, geographers at Southampton are addressing fundamental challenges in physical, environmental and social science.
We employ the newest remotely-sensed data, innovative environmental sensing, and powerful spatial-analytic tools to understand a variety of processes: the role of vegetation in the global carbon cycle; the historical trajectories of ecosystems derived from lake sediments; the ways in which people flow into, through, and out of a large city during the course of a day—information essential for efficient planning of transport networks and responses to large-scale emergencies.
We carry out fundamental research to understand socio-economic processes such as the globalisation of retailing and supply chain networks, the welfare of factory workers in developing countries and the impact of interventions on smoking behaviour. Geography leads the ESRC’s Retail Industry Business Engagement Network (RIBEN) centre and the University’s Living with Environmental Change strategic research group. Our researchers work closely with the Institute of Complex Systems Simulation, Electronics and Computer Science and Social Science on a range of interdisciplinary research topics.
We receive funding from several of the UK research councils, notably ESRC, NERC, MRC and BBSRC and from the EU, and staff members have advisory roles with UK and overseas governments and international agencies.
All staff and early career researchers belong to one of five research groups that reflect our main areas of research and link into activities carried out in the GeoData Institute, a research and consultancy unit specializing in environmental management issues that has a range of clients among UK and international agencies. The groups are Earth Surface Dynamics; Economy, Society and Space; Population, Health and Wellbeing; Global Environmental Change and Earth Observation; and Palaeoenvironments (PLUS).