Alison Adam

Alison Adam is a British researcher in the field of Science and Technology Studies and is known for her work on gender in information systems and the history of forensic science. She is professor emerita of science, technology and society at Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK.

Career Adam was a research fellow at Lancaster University, and a lecturer and senior lecturer in the Department of Computation at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology. She has been professor of science, technology and society at Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield since 2012. and Gender, Ethics and Information Technology. The book Gender, Ethics and Information Technology explores the "intersection of two areas; firstly gender and information and communication technologies and secondly, computer ethics." In 2012 she completed a three-year Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council funded research project on online privacy, in collaboration with researchers at Salford, Royal Holloway, University of London, and Cranfield University. She has evaluated the part that gender plays in ethics in on-line behaviour evaluating the gender divide in hacking, cyberstalking, and pornography to evaluate what gender differences exist in on-line experiences.

Since 2010 Adam has researched the history and sociology of forensic sciences. Her 2015 book, A History of Forensic Science: British Beginnings in the Twentieth Century, charts the history of forensic sciences in the UK, mainly England, considering the broad spectrum of factors that went into creating the discipline in Britain in the first part of the twentieth century.

Textiles are another long-standing interest. She states that "there's nothing quite like making a physical artifact. The culture of sharing information about making, on-line, is fascinating." and was a member of the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) 2008 sub-panel on Library and Information Management (UoA 37).

Selected publications Books A History of Forensic Science: British Beginnings in the Twentieth Century, Routledge; 2015 Gender, Ethics and Information Technology, Palgrave Macmillan; 2005 Artificial Knowing: Gender and the Thinking Machine, Routledge; 1998; 2006