Lori Peek

Lori Peek is an American sociologist, academic, and author. She is a professor in the Department of Sociology as well as the director of the Natural Hazards Center in the Institute of Behavioral Science at the University of Colorado Boulder. Furthermore, she is a presidentially-appointed member of the board of directors at the National Institute of Building Sciences.

Peek is most known for her works on the sociology of disaster, children and youth, gender, religion, qualitative methods, and environmental sociology. Among her authored works are her publications in academic journals, including Sociology of Religion, Child Development, and Natural Hazards as well as books such as Behind the Backlash: Muslim Americans After 9/11, Children of Katrina, and The Continuing Storm: Learning from Katrina. Moreover, she has co-edited two volumes including Displaced: Life in the Katrina Diaspora and the Handbook of Environmental Sociology. She served as social science lead and a contributing author to Safer, Stronger, Smarter: A Guide to Improving School Natural Hazard Safety.

Education Peek earned her Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from Ottawa University in Ottawa, Kansas in 1997, followed by a Master's in Education and Human Resource Studies from Colorado State University in Fort Collins, Colorado in 1999. In 2005, she completed her Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology from the University of Colorado Boulder in Boulder, Colorado. Notably, she was the first woman to be elected to this role. She also serves on the board of directors at the National Institute of Building Sciences for the term 2021 to 2025, having been appointed by President Joseph R. Biden and approved by the U.S. Senate. Since 2014, she has served as a founding board member for the Bill Anderson Fund, which provides mentoring to Black, Latinx, and Indigenous doctoral students in disaster research and hazard mitigation.

Works In her first book, titled Behind the Backlash: Muslim Americans After 9/11, Peek drew on federal hate crime statistics, bias crime reports, field observations, and 140 in-depth interviews to characterize the discussed post-9/11 experiences of young Muslim Americans.

In 2012, sociologist Lynn Weber and Peek co-edited Displaced: Life in the Katrina Diaspora, offering an examination of Hurricane Katrina evacuees' challenges, emphasizing the disproportionate impact on low-income African American women and showcasing their resilience in rebuilding lives nationwide.

Alice Fothergill and Peek's 2015 book, Children of Katrina, is an ethnography of children after a disaster. Over nearly a decade of research, they explored the recovery trajectories of children and youth, highlighting the impact of Katrina on child well-being, family dynamics, and community connections, and emphasizing the crucial factors that either facilitated or hindered their recovery.

Peek co-edited the 2021 Handbook of Environmental Sociology. Consisting of 25 chapters, the text offers an overview of the state of the field.

Kai Erikson and Peek's 2022 book, The Continuing Storm: Learning from Katrina, is the last volume in the Katrina Bookshelf series. The book focuses on the human causes and consequences of Katrina and offers an expanded view of the enduring human costs of the catastrophe across time and space.

Research Peek's research has primarily centered around the ways in which various forms of social inequality manifest in everyday lives and during times of disaster. Her published work explores vulnerabilities as related to the intersections between race, ethnicity, religion, gender, social class, and age. She has conducted meta-reviews on topics such as poverty, gender, the elderly, and children. She, along with collaborators has published work on ethics in disaster research, qualitative approaches in youth-centered research, interdisciplinary research, and convergent approaches to solving societal problems.

In 2000, Peek collaborated with Dennis Mileti to examine public responses to impending nuclear power plant emergencies, underscoring the importance of effective warning dissemination methods. She delineated the three fundamental components of a warning system, summarized elements of public response, and dispelled popular myths, drawing on recent research.

Moving forward to 2004, Alice Fothergill and Peek's 2004 study shed light on the disproportionate vulnerability of the economically disadvantaged in the United States to natural hazards. Factors such as residential location, building construction, and social exclusion were identified as key contributors to their heightened exposure of those in poverty to disaster susceptibility. This research advocated for a comprehensive approach to disaster risk reduction, acknowledging the need for tailored support mechanisms for the economically challenged.

Peek's 2005 study delved into the formation of religious identity in second-generation Muslim Americans. The study identified three developmental stages and emphasized the pivotal role of 9/11 in shaping identity salience for religious minorities. Additionally, her collaborative research with Elaine Enarson and Alice Fothergill emphasized the importance of an international, nuanced approach to gender in disaster social science. This work also underscored the necessity of addressing sex and gender-based inequalities for effective disaster risk reduction, particularly focusing on safeguarding the rights of women and girls in crisis situations. In 2021, she and Mithra Moezzi explored the use of researchers' and practitioners' stories as tools to advance interdisciplinary disaster research, suggesting that integrating such narratives into interdisciplinary teams can foster collaborative learning, provide naturalistic insights often missed by formal theories, and break away from discipline-specific reasoning.

Peek serves as the principal investigator for several research projects including the Clearinghouse on Natural Hazards Applications and the CONVERGE facility. She also is the principal investigator for the Social Science Extreme Events Research (SSEER) and Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Extreme Events Research (ISEEER) Networks. Prior to that, she led an evaluation effort to understand the readiness of Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster (VOAD) to protect children in emergencies.

Awards and honors 2007 – Best Teacher Award, Colorado State University Alumni Association and the Student Alumni Connection 2009 – Early Career Award for Outstanding Contributions to Scholarship, American Sociological Association Section on Children and Youth 2010 – Professor of the Year, Colorado State University Greek Life and the Panhellenic Council 2012 – President's Award for Volunteer Service, National Hazards Mitigation Association 2012 – Distinguished Book Award for Behind the Backlash: Muslim Americans after 9/11, Midwest Sociological Society 2013 – Best Book Award for Behind the Backlash: Muslim Americans after 9/11, American Sociological Association Section on Altruism, Morality, and Social Solidarity 2015 – Ann Gill Excellence in Teaching Award, College of Liberal Arts, Colorado State University 2016 – Board of Governor's Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award, Colorado State University System 2016 – Outstanding Scholarly Contribution Award for Children of Katrina, American Sociological Association 2016 – Betty and Alfred McClung Lee Book Award for Children of Katrina, Association for Humanist Sociology 2017 – Outstanding Achievement Award, Ottawa University Alumni Association 2019 – Outstanding Postdoc Mentor Award, Office of Postdoctoral Affairs, University of Colorado Boulder 2021 – Environmental Sociology Distinguished Contribution Award, Section on Environmental Sociology, American Sociological Association