Dr Erika Mansnerus
British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow
My current research project as a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow: 'Life-cycles of models: a sociological study of modelling techniques in public health policy' focuses on how modelling techniques function at the interface of public health research and policy making. Currently, modelling techniques help public health policy makers and researchers to overcome ethical and financial restrictions when evaluating effective measures to protect and promote public health. How do researchers and policy makers jointly acknowledge, use and evaluate model-based evidence?
Prior to my British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship, I was an ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow at the Centre for Analysis of Risk andRegulation (2009). My main interest was to study pandemic influenzae preparedness planning and the utilisation of computer-based modelling techniques in that process. After finishing my PhD in sociology and philosophyof science, at the University of Helsinki (2006), I worked as a postdoctoral researcher in an ESRC/ Leverhulme Trust funded 'Nature of Evidence: How Well Do‘Facts’ Travel?' project (led by ProfessorMary Morgan at the Economic History Department, 2006-2008). In this interdisciplinary project, I studied the dissemination of model-based ‘facts’ across different research communities andto national health policies.
Research interests
- Sociology and history of public health
- Sociology and philosophy of science
- Models and simulations in scientific practice and policy-making
- Governance of risk in public health policy
Selected publications
Mansnerus, Erika (forthcoming, 2010): “Using Models toKeep Us Healthy: Productive Journeys of Facts across Public Health ResearchNetworks” Forthcoming in M. Morgan and P. Howlett (eds.): How Well Do‘Facts’ Travel? CambridgeUniversity Press: Cambridge. (under final revision)
Mansnerus, Erika (forthcoming, 2010): “Explanatory andpredictive functions of simulation modelling: Case: Haemophilus Influenzae typeb dynamic transmission models” Forthcoming in G. Gramelsberger (ed.): FromScience to Computational Sciences. Studies in the History of Computing and ItsInfluence on Today’s Sciences. Diaphenes: Zuerich.
Mansnerus, Erika (2009): “The lives of facts inmathematical models: a story of population-level disease transmission ofHaemophilus influenzae type b bacteria”. BioSocieties Vol. 4 (2/3).
Mattila, Erika (2007): "Struggle betweenspecificity and generality: How do infectious disease models become asimulation platform?" In Küppers, Günther, Lenhard, Johannes and Shinn,Terry (eds.): Simulation: Pragmatic Constructions of Reality. Sociology of the Sciences Yearbook vol 25pp. 125-138. Springer
Mattila, Erika (2006): "Interdisciplinarity ‘Inthe Making’: Modelling Infectious Diseases." Perspectives on Science 13:4. Pp. 531-553.
