Ryan OConnor

Bio

Ryan O’Connor is an Environmental Social Scientist and current Postdoctoral Scholar in the Environmental Social Sciences Department at Stanford University. Ryan’s research focuses broadly on understanding the Human Dimensions of Environmental Governance and how human societies interact with, learn about, and manage social-ecological systems. His research employs an innovative blend of quantitative and qualitative social-ecological methods to elevate and highlight community voices and local ecological knowledge in conservation and to investigate how communities learn about and act upon convergence crises of climate change, biodiversity loss, and social-ecological resilience. By understanding how a person's relationship to the nature-rich world, personal history with nature, and social context shape individual perceptions of the environment management, Ryan seeks to inform the co-production of sustainable governance programs. Ryan also teaches courses on research methods, human-nature interaction, the history of the oceans, and environmental governance at Stanford and has supervised undergraduates on projects ranging from computer vision machine learning models for marine mammal monitoring to expert interviews of marine protected area officials. Ryan has also been an Ethics in Society Fellow with the McCoy Family Center for Ethics in Society at Stanford. Learn more at https://ryanoconnorresearch.com

Prior to his work at Stanford, Ryan served as an officer in the US Navy working on international logistics policy research and development. Ryan most recently worked as an environmental policy consultant and geospatial project manager for AECOM Technical Services, helping to administer the National Flood Insurance Program, leading multi-hazard mapping, policy analysis, and legislative affairs efforts in support of disaster and climate resilience across the United States.

Ryan earned his Bachelor's Degree in Environmental Science from the University of Virginia in 2017.

Professional Education

• Doctor of Philosophy, Stanford University, ENVRES-PHD (2025)
• Bachelors Degree, University of Virginia, Environmental Science (2017)

Stanford Advisors

• Nicole Ardoin, Postdoctoral Faculty Sponsor