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Dr Peter WG Tennant

Dr Peter WG Tennant

  • Position: Associate Professor of Health Data Science
  • Areas of expertise: Data Science; Epidemiology; Biostatistics; Causal Inference; Causal Diagrams; Directed Acyclic Graphs; Maternal and Child Health; Pregnancy; Obesity; Diabetes
  • Email: P.W.G.Tennant@leeds.ac.uk
  • Location: Leeds Institute for Data Analytics, Level 11 Worsley Building, University of Leeds, Leeds, LS2 9NL
  • Website: Mastodon | Alan Turing Institute | Twitter | LinkedIn | Googlescholar | ORCID

Profile

I am an Epidemiologist and Data Scientist with a primary interest in adapting and translating contemporary causal inference methods into the health and social sciences

CONTENTS

CURRENT ROLES

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RESEARCH INTERESTS

  • Causal inference
  • Reproductive Epidemiology
  • Longitudinal Epidemiology
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PUBLICATIONS

HIGHLIGHTED ARTICLES

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OTHER ARTICLES

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PUBLISHED LETTERS

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PRE-PRINTS

  • Tennant PWG, Tomova GD, Murray EJ, Arnold KF, Fox MP, Gilthorpe MS. Lord's 'paradox' explained: the 50-year warning on the use of 'change scores' in observational data. ArXiv. DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2302.01822
  • Berrie L, Arnold KF, Tomova GD, Gilthorpe MS, Tennant PWG. Depicting deterministic variables within directed acyclic graphs (DAGs): An aid for identifying and interpreting causal effects involving tautological associations, compositional data, and composite variables. ArXiv. DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2211.13201
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FUNDING AWARDS

RESEARCH AWARDS

  • De Kamps M, Gilthorpe MS, Tennant PWG. (2022) Generalising Data Science. The Alan Turing Institute for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence, £225,000
  • Tomova G, Gilthorpe MS, Harrison W, Tennant PWG (PI). (2019) Doctoral Scholarship: Evaluating the use of anthropometric composite variables for prediction and causal inference in cardio-metabolic research. The Alan Turing Institute for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence, £92,500
  • Tennant PWG. (2018) Turing Fellowship: Improving the use and understanding of causal statistics in social science research. The Alan Turing Institute for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence. ~£5,000
  • Salotti J, Tennant PWG, Windebank K, Rankin J. (2012) Histiocytic disorders in children with congenital anomalies; a population-based record linkage study. Newlife Foundation for Disabled Children, £14,899
  • Tennant PWG (PI), Glinianaia SV, Rankin J. (2011) Investigating the epidemiology of partial urorectal septum malformation sequence: a population-based study using data from the British Isles Network of Congenital Anomaly Registers (BINOCAR). Newlife Foundation for Disabled Children, £14,956
  • Pearce MS, Gibson GJ, Tennant PWG. (2008) Lifecourse predictors of respiratory function and the link to systemic inflammation: a follow-up at age 61 years. British Lung Foundation, £24,761
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OTHER FUNDING AWARDS

  • Gilthorpe MS, Tennant PWG. (2019) Bursaries funding for Third Leeds Summer School in Causal Inference with Observational Data. Society for Social Medicine & Populaton Health, £4,760
  • Gilthorpe MS, Tennant PWG. (2017) Bursaries funding for 2017 LIDA Summer School in Advanced Modelling Strategies for Robust Causal Inference with Observational Data. Society for Social Medicine, £3,441
  • Tennant PWG, Pearce A, Bhopal R, Mckee M, Lacey R, Leyland A, Clarke, A (2017) Funding for SSM one-day event on Health and Brexit. Health Foundation, £4,300
  • Bhala N, Goodman A, Tennant PWG (2012) Funding for inaugural SSM one-day pre-conference workshop for early career researchers. Medical Research Council, £3,500
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ESTEEM INDICATORS

PANEL & COMMITTEE POSITIONS

  • Alan Turing Institute, UK:                             
    • Causal Inference Interest Group (Lead: 2019-)
  • Cancer Research UK, UK
    •  Epidemiology Expert Review Panel (Member: 2019-2021)
  • Society for Epidemiological Research, USA
    • Education Committee (Member: 2019-)
  • Society for Social Medicine and Population Health, UK and Ireland
    • Mid-Career Researcher Subcommittee (Chair: 2022-)
    • Main Committee (Member: 2012 & 2022-, Honorary Secretary: 2015-2019)
    • Executive Officers Committee (Honorary Secretary: 2016-2019)
    • Health & Brexit One-day Event Organising Committee (Member: 2016-2017)
    • Early Career Researcher Subcommittee (Chair: 2012, Member: 2011 & 2013)
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DOCTORAL EVALUATION AND EXAMINATION

  • Sørbye LM. PhD thesis (2019). Maternal weight, weight change and perinatal outcomes: Can physical activity and gestational weight gain modify the risk? University of Bergan, Norway. First opponent.
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INVITED PRESENTATIONS

  • ‘The State of Artificial Intelligence in Assisted Reproduction’ at Canadian Fertility and Andrology Society (CSAS) Annual Meeting 2023 (Toronto, September 2023). Invited by CSAS Annual Meeting 2023 Organising Committee.
  • 'Introduction to Causal Inference’ at Ohio State University (Online, March 2023). Invited by Kristen Henkaline (Ohio State University, USA).
  • 'Introduction to Causal Inference' at The Dogs Trust DataHive Seminar Series (November 2022, Online). Invited by Dr Ben Cooper (The Dogs Trust, UK)
  • ‘From Hype to Hospital: What are the challenges for AI in healthcare?’ at Pan Wales Alan Turing Institute on Health and Medicine (September 2022, Cardiff, UK). Invited by Dr Emily Bebbington (Bangor University, UK).
  • 'AI has a long way to prove its worth in embryology and ART' at European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) 38th’s Annual Meeting (July 2022, Milan, Italy). Invited by ESHRE 38th’s Annual Meeting Organising Committee.
  • 'Analyses of change-scores do not estimate causal effects in observational data' at Boston Children’s Hospital Biostatistics Seminar Series (March 2022, Online). Invited by Dr Paul Mitchel (Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, USA).
  • 'Use of Directed Acyclic Graphs (DAGs) to identify confounders in applied health research' at Society for Epidemiological Research (SER) Journal Club (January 2022, Online). Invited by Dr Jennifer Mongioli (SER, USA, and Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, USA)
  • 'Causal inference in health and social science research: a primer' at Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ) Seminar Series (October 2021, Online). Invited by Kirsten Patrick (Editor-in-Chief, CMAJ, Canada).
  • 'Why analyses of change-scores do not estimate causal effects in observational data' at American Statistican Association (ASA) Section on Statistics in Epidemiology (September 2021, Online). Invited by Prof Charles Hal (ASA, USA, and Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York, USA)
  • 'Introduction to causal inference and directed acyclic graphs' at UK Reproducibility Network (UKRN) Training Workshop (July 2021 and February 2022, Online). Invited by Prof Marcus Munafo (UKRN, UK, and University of Bristol, Bristol, UK)
  • 'Diabetes and the risk of late stillbirth’ at Diabetes UK Professional Conference (April 2021, Online). Invited by Diabetes UK Organising Committee (UK). 
  • 'Why algorithmic interpretability needs more than transparency' at John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public International Vaccine Access Center Seminar Series Health (February 2021, Online). Invited by Dr Naor Bar-Zeev (John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, USA)
  • 'Table 2 Fallacy: Or why interpretation needs more than transparency' at RSS Workshop: 'Interpretable Machine Learning & Causal Inference' (December 2020, Online). Invited by Dr Richard Tomsett (IBM Research Europe, London, UK)
  • ‘Richard Doll Lecture: Lord's Paradox and the problem with change-scores‘ at Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford (December 2020, Online). Invited by Dr Gracia Fellmeth (University of Oxford, Oxford, UK).
  • ‘Resolving Lord’s Paradox and Why Change-scores Don’t Capture Change’ at Berlin Epidemiological Methods Colloquium, Berlin, Germany (December 2020, Online). Invited by Dr Jessica Rohman (Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Berlin, Germany).
  • 'Analyses of change: a causal inference perspective' at RSS Medical Section Session: 'Solutions to Causal Inference' (May 2019, Leeds, UK). Invited by RSS Medical Section, UK.
  • 'Acknowledging the Third Pillar of Data Science' at Causal Inference in Epidemiology Seminar Series, Nuffield Department for Population Health, University of Oxford (March 2019, Oxford, UK). Invited by Dr Sarah Floud. (University of Oxford, Oxford, UK) 
  • 'Causal inference' at ESRC White Rose: Advanced Quantitative Methods Taster Day (January 2018, Sheffield, UK). Invited by Dr Gwilym Pryce. (University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK)
  • 'Analytical Challenges with N-of-1 Data' at UK Society for Behavioural Medicine Pre-Conference Workshop on 'Working Together to Advance Personalised Behavioural Medicine using N-of-1 Methods' (December 2017, Liverpool, UK). Invited by Dr Nicki O'Brien (Newcastle University, Newcastle, UK)
  • 'Using N-of-1 data to inform design of personalised interventions: what can we learn from causal inference methods?' at 'How Can N-of-1 Methods Contribute to Health Psychology Research and Practice? Developing and Advancing Methods for Personalised Behaviour Change' (October 2017, Newcastle, UK). Invited by Dr Suzanne McDonald (Newcastle University, Newcastle, UK).
  • 'Intention-to-tweet: Taking statistics to social media' at Burwalls Annual Meeting for Medical Statistics Lecturers (June 2017, Nottingham, UK). Invited by Dr Matthew Grainge (University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK).
  • 'Introduction to Directed Acyclic Graphs' at Research Unit of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, University of Southern Denmark (May 2017, Odense, Denmark). Invited by Prof Ellen Nohr (University of Southern Denmark, Denmark, UK).
  • 'Obesity and diabetes in pregnancy and the risk of congenital anomalies' at Leeds Institute of Genetics, Health and Therapeutics (LIGHT), University of Leeds (January 2014, Leeds, UK). Invited by Dr Richard Feltbower (University of Leeds, Leeds, UK).
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PRIZES

  • Highest Scoring Abstract (Shortlisted) at the Society for Social Medicine 66th Annual Scientific Meeting (2022)
  • Best Poster Presentation (Winner) at Society for Epidemiologic Research 2022 Meeting (2022)
  • Rising Star Award (Nominated) at Society for Perinatal and Pediatric Epidemiology (2020). Nominated by: Dr Dominique Heinke (Massachusetts Department of Public Health), Dr Eleanor Murray (Boston University), and Dr Mollie Wood (University of Harvard).
  • THE Innovative Teaching Award (Nominated) at Times Higher Education Awards (2019). Nominated by: University of Leeds MSc Health Data Analytics, Class of 2018/19
  • Best Blogger (Shortlisted) at Mind Media Awards (2014)
  • Best Poster Presentation (Runner-up) at Society for Social Medicine 57th Annual Scientific Meeting (2013)
  • Highest Scoring Abstract (Shortlisted) at the Society for Social Medicine 56th Annual Scientific Meeting (2012)
  • Young Investigator Award (Winner) for Best Poster Presentation at 19th International Epidemiology Association World Congress of Epidemiology (2011)
  • Young Investigator Award (Shortlisted) for Best Oral Presentation at 19th International Epidemiology Association (IEA) World Congress of Epidemiology (2011)
  • Best Oral Presentation (Runner-up) at Newcastle University Institute of Health & Society / Institute of Neuroscience Research Day (2011)
  • Highest Scoring Abstract (Winner) at the Society for Social Medicine 54th Annual Scientific Meeting (2010)
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STUDENT SUPERVISION

RESEARCH POSTGRADUATE SUPERVISION

  • De Beznac C, lead supervisor. Causality in Complex Systems. PhD (Leeds Institute for Data Analytics) at University of Leeds and Alan Turing Institute. Current.
  • Tomova G, lead supervisor. Evaluating the use of anthropometric composite variables for prediction and causal inference in cardio-metabolic research. PhD (Leeds Institute for Data Analytics) at University of Leeds and Alan Turing Institute. Current.
  • Gadd S, secondary supervisor. Development and application of statistical methods for addressing the heterogeneity of data collection intervals common in longitudinal datasets. PhD (School of Geography) at University of Leeds. Graduated 2021.
  • Alghamdi A, secondary supervisor. The Associations between Poor Sleep in Pregnancy and Obstetric, Perinatal and Neonatal Outcomes. PhD (School of Medicine) at University of Leeds. Graduated 2018.
  • Alfawaz R, secondary supervisor. Exploring the relationship between metabolic syndrome and sleep among adults in the UK. PhD (School of Medicine) at University of Leeds. Graduated 2017.
  • Al Afif N, secondary supervisor. Social, health, and lifestyle predictors of sleep during pregnancy. PhD (School of Medicine) at University of Leeds. Graduated 2017.
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TAUGHT POSTGRADUATE SUPERVISION

  • Brown H, secondary supervisor. Quantification of inaccuracies of effect estimate in multimorbidity research. Graduated 2021.
  • Philips R, secondary supervisor. Determining blood pressure treatment from frailty: A question of post-diction? MSc in Medical Statistics. Graduated 2019.
  • Tomova G, lead supervisor. To what extent has routine adjustment for total energy intake biased the apparent effect of individual dietary components on health outcomes? MSc in Health Data Analytics at University of Leeds. Graduated 2019.
  • Craig Z, lead supervisor. Is the association between gestational weight gain and pregnancy complications an artefact of mathematical coupling? MSc in Epidemiology and Biostatistics at University of Leeds. Graduated 2018.
  • Eversfield C, secondary supervisor. Latent class modelling for stratification on mediators. MSc in Epidemiology and Biostatistics at University of Leeds. Graduated 2018.
  • Hamoni R, lead supervisor. Could ‘collider-bias’ explain ethnic-specific differences in the risk of diabetes for a given body size? MSc in Epidemiology and Biostatistics at University of Leeds. Graduated 2018.
  • Rosca A, lead supervisor. Birth by Caesarean section and the risk of asthma and eczema. MSc in Epidemiology and Biostatistics at University of Leeds. Graduated 2018.
  • Celebi S, lead supervisor. Is the joint effect of ethnicity and Body Mass Index on the risk of type II diabetes an artefact of composite variable confounding? MSc in Epidemiology and Biostatistics at University of Leeds. Graduated 2017.
  • Illingworth L, secondary supervisor. A Randomised Controlled Crossover Trial of a Commercial Sleep Application (Sleep Cycle) using: an unmasked control and a sham application. MSc in Epidemiology and Biostatistics at University of Leeds. Graduated 2017.
  • Raza F, secondary supervisor. Maternal age and the risk of structural congenital anomalies. MSc in Public Health and Health Services Research at Newcastle University. Graduated 2009.
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STUDENT EDUCATION

PROGRAMME LEADERSHIP

  • Deputy Programme Leader, MSc Health Data Analytics, University of Leeds (2018-2021)
  • Deputy Programme Leader, MSc Epidemiology & Biostatistics, University of Leeds (2017-2019)
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MODULE LEADERSHIP

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LECTURES, SEMINARS, AND ASSESSMENT

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ENGAGEMENT AND MEDIA ACTIVITIES

PRESS CONTRIBUTIONS

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BLOG CONTRIBUTIONS

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PODCAST CONTRIBUTIONS

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YOUTUBE PRESENTATIONS

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TWITTER PROFILE

  • @PWGTennant (14k+ followers)
    • Named on 100+ lists with titles including, 'Epidemiology', 'Population health', 'Methodology', 'Higher Education', and 'Science communication'.
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PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT

  • 'What is Data Science?'. Eat Drink Do, London, UK. 27 November, 2019.
    • This stand-up comedy set was delivered as part of the 'Bright Club from the Alan Turing Institute' public engagement event to ≈80 paying members of the public at a commercial comedy club.
  • 'Eight Minutes of Avoidance'. Stand Comedy Club, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. 26 November, 2013.
    • This stand-up comedy set was delivered as part of the 'Bright Club North East' public engagement event to ≈150 paying members of the public at a commercial comedy club. The YouTube recording has over 800 views.
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