The Institute of Health and Society bases its work on a complex understanding of disease, health and health systems. Culture, environment, economics, society and biology play direct and indirect roles. Our teaching responsibilities include seven Master’s programs, one Bachelor program and part of the Faculty’s medical school and PhD-program. We employ about 220 FTE and have almost 700 Bachelor and Master students. Annual income is about 200 mill NOK, half of which is external funding. Our researchers play an active part of public policy and disseminate new knowledge through many channels.
Bridging epistemological and ontological perspectives and their normative implications for clinical decision-making in transgender care.
We seek a highly motivated PhD Research Fellow to join the Centre for Medical Ethics (CME), Institute of Health and Society (HELSAM), University of Oslo, to study different epistemic perspectives on transgender care (e.g. in literature, policy texts, etc), interview health care professionals and transgender clients about normative implications of different epistemic perspectives for transgender care, and co-create an ethics support tool that helps health care professionals and clients navigate these so-called ‘meta-moral challenges’ in transgender care. The position is part of the international “Gender-InSIGHT” network (see below) and includes a 6-12-month secondment at a transgender clinic in the Netherlands as well. You will perform literature and text analyses, individual and focus group interviews and use participatory research methods for the co-creation of an ethics support tool.
About Gender-InSIGHT
‘Gender-InSIGHT’ is an international network for the Investigation of biopsychosocial Influences on Gender during (diverse) Hormonal Transitions. The network brings together a range of disciplines including psychology, history, ethics, endocrinology, neuroscience and public health. Through co-creation and mixed methods research the projects will increase our understanding of the influence of biopsychosocial factors during hormonal transitions such as puberty and menopause, both in the general population, in people with variations of sex characteristics and in trans and gender diverse individuals. Historical, clinical and societal lenses will focus attention on different aspects. The historical lens will document historical and ethical implications of the shifts in meaning given to biopsychosocial factors in the framing of hormones and gender over time. The clinical lens will provide clinical guidance informed by a biopsychosocial understanding of gender to assist patients and healthcare providers with decision-making regarding diverse hormonal transitions. The societal lens will uncover societal pressures and polarisation regarding the biopsychosocial nature of gender and how these are communicated across cultures and through different channels. Collaborating with a range of partners from the non-academic domain, the project aims to have a lasting impact on culture and media, healthcare, and public policy.
Gender-InSIGHT consists of 15 doctoral projects, all of which are now open for applications (you can find a list of all projects at http://www.genderinsight.eu).
This PhD project aims to:
– Analyse different ontological and epistemological presuppositions in scientific and societal narratives about gender dysphoria, and their implications for transgender care.
– Study how Norwegian and Dutch transgender clients and health care professionals experience ‘meta-moral challenges’ in clinical contexts and identify needs for ethics support.
– Co-create and pilot an ethics support tool for clients and health care professionals to recognise, address and constructively handle these challenges in concrete, comprehensible ways (meta-communication).
The duration of appointment is 3 years.
The PhD candidate will get positioned within the Centre for Medical Ethics (CME) at the University of Oslo in Norway. CME, established in 1989, is positioned within the Institute of Health and Society (HELSAM) and is one of Europe’s largest centers for medical and healthcare ethics and hosted 41 PhD candidates who actually graduated. CME’s area of study spans from moral challenges in the patient-provider encounter, priority setting in health care, to research ethics and philosophy of medicine and science. CME has a strong record when it comes to clinical ethics, medical ethics and clinical ethics support, yet also a strong interdisciplinary approach to ethics with an international staff from 15 different countries. Since decades they have the national responsibility (given by Norwegian Health Care Authorities) to support all Norwegian health care institutions and health care professionals with various moral challenges. They are responsible for the teaching of research integrity to all PhD students at the Medical Faculty. Furthermore, CME often integrates the work of theoretical and philosophical scholars, such as philosophy of science and meta-ethics, into the field of medical ethics.
The secondment (6 to 12 months) will take place at transgender clinics in the Netherlands and the department of Ethics, Law & Humanities at Amsterdam UMC.
– Conduct historical-philosophical analysis of narratives about gender dysphoria across disciplines and public discourses.
– Design and carry out qualitative studies with transgender clients and health care professionals in Norway and the Netherlands.
– Co-create, document, and pilot an ethics support tool; evaluate feasibility and acceptability in clinical settings.
– Collaborate closely with supervisors and international partners; contribute to Gender-InSIGHT training events and secondments.
– Disseminate findings through publications, presentations, and stakeholder engagement.
– Excellent communication and collaboration skills; capable of independent work and effective teamwork.
– Sensitivity to ethical, cultural, and societal dimensions of transgender care.
– Organized, proactive, and capable of advancing co-creation processes with diverse stakeholders.
Employment in the position is based on a comprehensive assessment of all qualification requirements applicable to the position, including personal qualifications.
UiO is an open and internationally oriented comprehensive university that strives to be an inclusive and diverse workplace and academic environment. You can read more about UiO’s work on equality, inclusion, and diversity at uio.no.
We fulfill our mission most effectively when we draw upon our variety of experiences, backgrounds, and perspectives. We are looking for great colleagues — could you be the next one?
We will do our best to accommodate your needs. Relevant adjustments may include modifications to working hours, task adaptations, digital, technical, or physical adjustments, or other practical measures.
If you have an immigrant background, a disability, or CV gaps (Norwegian), we encourage you to indicate this in the job application portal. We always invite at least one qualified candidate from each group for an interview. In this context, disability is defined as an applicant who identifies as having a disability that requires workplace or employment-related accommodations. For more details about the requirements, please refer to the Employer portal (Norwegian).
The selections made in the job application portal are used for anonymized statistics that all state employers include in their annual reports.More information about gender equality initiatives at UiO can be found here.
We hope you will apply for the position with us.
Read more about the benefits of working in the public sector at Employer Portal.
Your application should include:
Application with attachments must be submitted via our recruitment system Jobbnorge, click “Apply for the position”.
When applying for the position, we ask you to retrieve your education results from Vitnemålsportalen.no. If your education results are not available through Vitnemålsportalen, we ask you to upload copies of your transcripts or grades. Please note that all documentation must be in English or a Scandinavian language.
The best qualified candidates will invited for interviews.
Applicant lists can be published in accordance with Norwegian Freedom of Information Act § 25. When you apply for a position with us, your name will appear on the public applicant list. It is possible to request to be excluded from this list. You must justify why you want an exemption from publication and we will then decide whether we can grant your request. If we cannot, you will hear from us.
Please refer to Regulations for the Act on universities and colleges chapter 3 (Norwegian), Guidelines concerning appointment to post doctoral and research posts at UiO and Regulations for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor (PhD) at the University of Oslo.
The University of Oslo has a transfer agreement with all employees that is intended to secure the rights to all research results etc.
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