The social effects of flooding are the focus of a brand new public archive thanks to researchers at Lancaster University.

For more than ten years, social scientists at Lancaster University have researched the experience and impacts of floods on the lives of adults and children.

The research team has collected videos, pictures and stories, which express the social effects of flooding. These resources are now collated and available to both authorities and the public as an open archive.

While floods in the UK can damage property, businesses and infrastructure, we also know that floods dramatically affect people’s lives and livelihoods.

They destroy homes, treasured possessions and can damage social networks and affect education. Floods can affect physical and mental health, alongside family and community cohesion.

'Flooding – A Social Impact Archive' is hosted, administered and managed by Lancaster University.

This dedicated website provides a doorway to research material such as primary data, case studies, films and other research outputs.

The website also features a clear and concise guide for flood risk authorities on the current ethical and data protection context for the collection, storage and use of mixed media social data.

This unique resource also forms a part of Lancaster University Library’s Special Collections.

Professor Maggie Mort, from Lancaster University, said: "Evidence about the social effects of flooding is important to improve future response by authorities and to help people understand what a flood could do to their lives.

"Moreover, providing accounts of how people’s lives are affected enables both authorities and the public to connect with flood impacts better than through hydrological or economic data."

Dr Jacqui Cotton, from the Environment Agency, said: “Those whose homes have flooded and whose lives have been disrupted by floods have the most powerful voices to describe that experience.

“This archive provides the opportunity for those voices recorded by Lancaster University to be heard and for flood risk authorities to learn from them.”

For further information: www.lancaster.ac.uk/floodarchive