Professor James Rubin is a Professor of Psychology and Emerging Health Risks at King's College London. He specialises in understanding how people perceive potential health risks, and how those perceptions affect their behaviour and wellbeing.

Professor Rubin's research spans two overlapping areas. The first examines public and individual responses to sudden exposures to potentially hazardous agents, including infections, chemicals and radiation. This has led to numerous studies conducted in collaboration with Government agencies to explore public reactions to health risks including: COVID-19; pandemic influenza; biological and chemical terrorism; the Fukushima nuclear meltdown; the polonium 210 incident; the Ebola outbreak; the Salisbury Novichok incident; Mpox; avian influenza; and multiple episodes of major flooding across England.

The second area focuses on the psychological and social mechanisms underlying symptom development after perceived exposure to a potentially hazardous substance, including nocebo effects and attribution processes. Professor Rubin has studied these issues in relation to, among other things, multiple chemical sensitivity, electromagnetic hypersensitivity, wind turbine syndrome, mass psychogenic illness, and side-effects attributed to medications and vaccination. 

Research Interests

• Nocebo effects
• Symptom perception and attribution
• Help seeking behaviour
• Risk perception
• Health communication
• Emergency preparedness
• Vaccination uptake
• Adherence to prophylaxis
• Idiopathic environmental intolerance
• Mass psychogenic illness

Research Groups

Professor Rubin is the Director for the NIHR Health Protection Research Focus Award in Outbreak Related Behaviour.

Teaching 

Professor Rubin is the Education Lead for the Department of Psychological Medicine. He developed and leads a multi-award winning 30-credit MSc module on the psychology of disaster response as part of our MSc in Mental Health Studies. He provides regular projects for the students on this course, gives guest lectures on several other postgraduate courses at King’s and elsewhere, and is a member of the PhD subcommittee for the Department of Psychological Medicine.

Expertise and Public Engagement

Professor Rubin has served on several committees which provide advice to Government agencies. These have focused on topics including: the provision of support to victims of terrorist attacks; the soil and environmental checks around Grenfell Tower; the risk from new and emerging viruses; the role of behavioural science in improving and protecting public health; and the assessment of risk in relation to major emergencies that might affect the UK in the future. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Professor Rubin was a regular participant in the UK Government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, and set up and co-chaired its behavioural science subgroup (‘SPI-B’). Professor Rubin has acted as an expert witness in several group litigation cases in England and internationally, providing independent expert reports on issues relating to symptom attribution, nocebo effects, and help-seeking.