Isla Rippon

Dr Isla Rippon serves as a Research Fellow II in the Department of Health Sciences at Brunel University London's College of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences. She leads research on the ESRC-funded project 'Socially inclusive ageing: a lifecourse study of new ageing populations' investigating social health in minority older adults under Professor Christina Victor's leadership.

Her educational background comprises a PhD in Epidemiology and Public Health from University College London, MSc in Demography and Health from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Postgraduate Diploma in Information Science from City University, and BA in Sociology and Politics from Royal Holloway.

Dr Rippon specializes in gerontological research examining health and wellbeing across the lifecourse, with particular focus on loneliness/social isolation, dementia care experiences, age discrimination, and secondary data analysis. Her work frequently employs dyadic methodologies analyzing relationships between people with dementia and their caregivers using large-scale datasets like the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) and the IDEAL programme.

Analysis of her 15 most recent publications (2019-2025) reveals consistent emphasis on underrepresented aging populations, including minority ethnic and LGBTQ+ groups, with methodological strengths in longitudinal analysis and mixed-methods approaches. Key trends include the social determinants of dementia care quality, environmental influences on wellbeing, and resilience factors in caregiving relationships.

As a member of the British Society of Gerontology (BSG), Dr Rippon contributes to significant research initiatives including the current ESRC-funded lifecourse study and the IDEAL programme (Improving the experience of dementia and enhancing active life), which identified factors enabling people to live well with dementia. Her collaborative work extends across multidisciplinary teams analyzing complex interactions between social health, environmental factors, and mental wellbeing in aging populations.