Insight Manager – Email
Zara joins the team as Insight Manager, leading key research projects to explore how significant life stages impact on girls and women’s relationships with physical activity and sport.
Prior to joining Women in Sport, Zara conducted a PhD in Experimental Psychology at University of Cambridge. Her PhD research explored the learning and memory processes of habit formation. Following her PhD, Zara held roles supporting researchers at Cancer Research UK and Anglia Ruskin University. Most recently, she was an Advisor at the Behavioural Insights Team, applying behavioural science to improve public policy and design interventions to encourage healthy behaviours.
After believing she was ‘too geeky’ for sport and disliking PE lessons at school, it wasn’t until University that Zara discovered the life-changing joy and fulfilment of sport. She joined her college rowing team to try something new (and mainly to go to the socials…). Unexpectedly, she found a life-long love for sport and can now usually be found rowing or running. She is a big believer that it’s never too late to learn a new sport, so has just started swimming lessons!
Zara is excited to be part of the change happening in women’s sport. However, there is still so much work to do. In particular, she wants to champion the use of research and insight to drive evidence-based change, so that no girl feels excluded from sport because she is not ‘sporty’ enough and women of all ages feel empowered to seek out new sport challenges. In this way, she wants to ensure every girl and woman can experience the joy, fulfilment, and lifelong benefits of sport.