Claims about the effectiveness of pharmaceutical interventions, the health impacts of diets, or the causes of death in cases of particular individuals need to be backed up by evidence. But how much evidence is needed for making such claims? Which studies should we rely on? Does it matter who paid for the studies? And what role should scientific evidence play in policy-making?
I am a philosopher of science specialized in health-related disciplines. I am particularly interested in using tools from social epistemology to explore how scientific knowledge is produced and how institutional factors influence the reliability of research. For example, I have studied evidence-based practice, the impact of the commercialisation of research on the objectivity of medicine, standards of evidence in nutrition science, and the impact of institutional context on evidence practices in forensic medicine. I am also interested in alcohol research and policy.
I received my PhD in 2015 from the University of Jyväskylä (with a dissertation examining the conditions for achieving the objectivity of science). Afterwards, I worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Johannesburg in South Africa and at various universities in Germany (e.g. Bielefeld and Bochum). Currently I work as an Assistant Professor at the University of Twente in the Netherlands.