Alex Rushforth, PhD

Alexander Rushforth is a post-doctoral researcher at CWTS. Trained as a sociologist, since joining CWTS he has worked in collaboration with colleagues in the Science, Technology and Evaluation group (formerly EPIC). He uses ethnographic methods to engage with various issues of theoretical and empirical interest to social studies of science and critical organizational literatures, including:

• Accountability, audit cultures, and new public management
• The rise of performance indicators in managerial and evaluation contexts
• Institutional transitions towards ‘translational research’ in academic medicine
• Multi-disciplinary collaboration between researchers, clinicians, and patients; recently focusing on rare disease research
• Standards and knowledge infrastructures in clinical trials

Alexander also participates in commercial contract work performed by CWTS and teaches on the social dimensions of science in the 2017 honors course 'The Academic Life' at Leiden University. 

Publications

Journal publications (8)

• Rushforth, A.D., & De Rijcke, S. (2017). Quality monitoring in transition: The challenge of evaluating translational research programs in academic biomedicine. Science and Public Policy.
• De Rijcke, S., Wouters, P., Rushforth, A.D., Franssen, T.P., & Hammarfelt, B.M.S. (2016). Evaluation practices and effects of indicator use - A literature review. Research Evaluation, 25(2), 161-169.
• Hammarfelt, B.M.S., De Rijcke, S., & Rushforth, A.D. (2016). Quantified academic selves: The gamification of science through social networking services, : eSM1. Information Research, 21(2).
• Rushforth, A.D. (2016). What's in a slogan? The meanings of translational science among academic cancer researchers in an English medical school. Nordic Journal of Science and Technology Studies, 4(1), 32-42.
• Rushforth, A.D., & Weaire, D. (2016). All or nothing? Debating the role of evaluative bibliometrics in the research system. Research Evaluation, 25(2), 230-231.
• De Rijcke, S., & Rushforth, A.D. (2015). To intervene, or not to intervene, is that the question? On the role of scientometrics in research evaluation. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 66(9), 1954-1958. doi:10.1002/asi.23382.
• Rushforth, A.D. (2015). Meeting pragmatism halfway: Making a pragmatic clinical trial protocol. Sociology of Health & Illness, 37(8), 1285-1298. doi:10.1111/1467-9566.12311.
• Rushforth, A.D., & De Rijcke, S. (2015). Accounting for impact? The journal impact factor and the making of biomedical research in the Netherlands. Minerva, 53(2), 117-139. doi:10.1007%2Fs11024-015-9274-5.