A space to explore, share and shape the issues facing social and behavioral scientists
Amid the encomiums and eulogies surrounding the late German sociologist Ulrich Beck, Robert Dingwall asks how far Beck’s body of published work represents a model that other sociologists should seek to follow
There is a genuine cost from ignoring lessons from social science in the fight against Ebola. What’s even sadder — these lessons were taught in blood three decades ago in the fights against AIDS. Are we ready for the next malady?
WHO is supposed to be a global health organization, not a global biomedical organization. The Ebola crisis, argues Robert Dingwall, reveals the extent to which it has lost sight of this mission.
As the independence vote moves from all-consuming question to historical incident, what are the lessons that Scottish universities and in particular Scottish social scientists should take away?
Doctor Who’s sobriquet implies he’s earned a doctorate in something. The Doctor’s not telling what he might have studied, but his actions and attitudes make a strong case for one discipline …
What does the Facebook emotional contagion study really tells us about research ethics? Perhaps, argues Robert Dingwall, that its time to deregulate public social science.
Robert Dingwall argues that numeracy and and a grasp of quantitative method of course have a place in the education of a social scientist, but they shouldn’t be the only skills in the graduate’s quiver. How about he ability to walk around, for one?
Many social scientists find themselves members of a cult of quantification, argues Robert Dingwall, in love with numbers for their own sake even when those numbers produce no useful knowledge.
No one expected Tamiflu to be a wonder drug, but indications are that it’s moderately useful in fighting a serious public health threat. But that message was lost last week in an ill-starred rush to beat up on ‘wicked’ Big Pharma, argues Robert Dingwall.
Applying ethics to social science research can raise as many issues as it answers. A new set of guidelines on which Robert DIngwall consulted gives clarity in some cases like manipulation of images and duplicate publication but leaves some other controversies unsettled.
Feel-good interventions that don’t provide a practical good, or at least one not supported by evidence, generate questions that hinge specifically on future responses to climate change and more broadly on government decision-making in general.
Back in the summer, John Holmwood, the current BSA President, sent me an email about impact and research ethics. Various […]
