Dr Andrew Wooff

he/him

Andrew is an Associate Professor of Criminology at Edinburgh Napier University and the Head of Social Sciences and former Programme Leader for BSc (Hons) Policing and Criminology.

His research interests are varied and interdisciplinary, informed by extending theoretical developments in criminology, geography and rural sociology. He is interested in how the police use their power in different ways and on different populations, particularly in relation to rural policing, police custody, police education and the use of police volunteers. He has published on a number of topics, including police custody, rural policing, vulnerability and volunteering in the police. He has recently published in the Journal of Rural Studies, Policing Journal, Policing and Society, Punishment and Society, European Journal of Criminology and Policing: A journal of policy and practice .

He is currently working on 2 externally funded COVID-19 focused pieces of research: the first (PI, SFC funded, £44k) is examining the pluralised policing responses to the pandemic in Scotland. The second (Co-I, ESRC funded, £36k) explores local authority partnership responses to the pandemic.

In the past 5 years, he has completed 3 externally funded projects as PI (totalling £33,000). He has also been Co-I on a further 3 projects (totalling £308,800). As a result of his research and publications, he has been invited to sit on the Home Office Custody Review Design Board, the editorial board for two book series and the international advisory panel for a research project at the University of Sheffield. He is also the co-lead for the Education and Leadership network within the Scottish Institute of Policing Research (SIPR) and he is a member of the British Society of Criminology. He has experience of supervising PhD students (2 completions) and he is always keen to chat with prospective students.

Prior to joining Edinburgh Napier University in 2015, he completed his PhD in 2014 under the supervision of Professor Nick Fyfe at the University of Dundee. This focused on anti-social behaviour in rural Scotland. During his PhD he was seconded into the Police Reform team where he completed research on partnership working. He subsequently completed a Post-Doc at the Centre for Criminological Research at the University of Sheffield, funded by the ESRC, which explored police custody in England and Wales.

Recent publications

Skinns, L. Wooff, A. and Sprawson, A. (2021) ‘My best day will be my last day!’: appreciating appreciative inquiry in police research, Policing and Society, Available open access: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10439463.2021.1984471

Aston, L. O’Neill, M. Hail, Y and Wooff, A. (2021) Information sharing in community policing in Europe: Building public confidence, European Journal of Criminology, Available open access: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/14773708211037902

Enang, I. Murray, J. Dougall, N. Aston, A. Wooff, A and Heyman, I. (2021) Developing an Evidence-Informed Framework to Underpin Vulnerability Assessment across the Frontline of Law Enforcement and Public Health: A Systematic Review. Policing and Society, Open access: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10439463.2021.1927025?src=