Kjersten Bunker Whittington

3203 SE Woodstock Blvd. Portland, OR 97202
whittington@reed.edu | (503) 517-7628

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I am a sociologist whose research and teaching interests center on the topics of gender and work, scientific careers and science-based organizations, science policy (particularly with respect to women’s health research), networks and social structure, and the knowledge economy.  My ongoing research in these areas addresses gender disparities in research productivity – patenting and publishing - across academic and industrial sectors, gender and motherhood dynamics among science professionals, and gendered decision-making in venture capital contexts, among other topics. Another line of research focuses on formal organizations, regional dynamics, and the science economy. With collaborators, I am engaged in research that examines the influence of inter-organizational network structure on firm-level innovative output, and the determinants of successful regional clustering in the biotechnology industry. A third area of research focuses on science policy related to the use of sex and gender based measures in health-based research, and race and technology in the genomic age.

I teach courses in our department that focus on the science, technology and social difference, gender, work, and organizations, networks methodology and network theory, our introductory core, and sociological methodology and empirical approaches.