Rebecca L. Jackson, PhD

Curriculum Vitae

Refereed Publications

see CV for full list of publications

ORCid: 0000-0003-2199-1045

Google Scholar Profile: Dr. Rebecca L. Jackson

• Cornu, Armel, Sarah Hijmans, and Rebecca L. Jackson. 2026 [accepted pending minor revisions]. “The Drop and the Metric System: How an Unruly Unit Survived Revolutions.” Annals of Science.

  • Winner of 2025 Trevor Levere Best Paper Prize.

• Gross, Mechthild M., and Rebecca L. Jackson. 2026 [in press]. “The History of the Early Labour Phase: Women’s Experiences Embedded in Methodological Considerations,” in Early Labour and Maternity Care: Research for Practice, edited by Vanora Hundley and Helen Cheyne. Routledge.

• Jackson, Rebecca L. and Luchetti, Michele. 2026 [in press]. “History and Philosophy of Measurement: Past, Present, and Future Integrations,” for The Blackwell Companion to the Integrated History and Philosophy of Science, ed. Yafeng Shan. Wiley.

• Jackson, Rebecca L. 2025. “The Apgar Score and Race: Why Healthy Babies Are Supposed to be ‘Pink’.” History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences 47 (4):45. doi: 10.1007/s40656-025-00693-3.

• Jackson, Rebecca L. 2025. “Constructing Centimeters: Emanuel Friedman’s Cervimeter and the Dilatation-Time Curve.” Bulletin of the History of Medicine 99 (1): 51–93. doi: 10.1353/bhm.2025.a963726. Open access link here.

• Jackson, Rebecca L. 2023. “How the Cervix Killed the Cervimeter: A Nonstandard Story of Successful Measurement.” Measurement 222: 113652. doi:10.1016/j.measurement.2023.113652.

• Cristalli, Claudia and Rebecca L. Jackson. 2023. “From Postal Scale to Psychological Apparatus: A History of Experimental Psychology Through the Reconstruction of Peirce and Jastrow’s ‘On Small Differences of Sensation’ (1885).” Nuncius 38 (3): 553–582. doi:10.1163/18253911-bja10066.

• Jackson, Rebecca L., and Merlin Wassermann. 2022. “When Standard Measurement Meets Messy Genitalia: Lessons from 20th Century Phallometry and Cervimetry.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 95: 37-49. doi:10.1016/j.shpsa.2022.06.014.

• Jackson, Rebecca L. 2021. “‘The Uncertain Method of Drops’: How a Non-Uniform Unit Survived the Century of Standardization.” Perspectives on Science 29 (6): 802–841. doi: 10.1162/posc_a_00395.

Selected Fellowships and Awards

see CV for full list

• 2025 Trevor Levere Best Paper Prize – Annals of Science, Taylor & Francis “The Drop and the Metric System: How an Unruly Unit Survived Revolutions,” coauthored with Armel Cornu and Sarah Hijmans ($1000).

• 2025 Essay Prize in History and Philosophy of Science (Runner-up) – International Union of History and Philosophy of Science and Technology (IUHPST). “History and Philosophy of Measurement: Past, Present, and Future Integrations,” coauthored with Michele Luchetti, awarded special presentation session for paper at 27th International Congress of History of Science and Technology in Dunedin, NZ.

• 2024-2025 Bridging Fellow in Medical Humanities - Discovery Research Platform in Medical Humanities, Institute of Medical Humanities, Durham University, UK. 12-month residential fellowship (£39,347) with an additional £5,000 for research collaborations and conference travel.

• 2023 Maurice Daumas Prize – International Committee for the History of Technology (ICOHTEC) (€500). “‘The Uncertain Method of Drops’: How a Non-Uniform Unit Survived the Century of Standardization” awarded prize for best history of technology article published in the past two years by student or early career scholar.

• 2023 – 2024 Postdoctoral Fellowship - Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin, Germany. 12-month residential fellowship (€31,200).

• 2023 Victor E. Thoren Graduate Student Research Fellowship – IU Dept. of History and Philosophy of Science and Medicine (HPSC) ($3,000).

• 2022–2023 Doan Dissertation Fellowship - Beckman Center for the History of Chemistry at the Science History Institute, Philadelphia, PA. Nine-month residential fellowship ($30,000).

• 2022 Graduate Student Essay Award Honorable Mention - Forum for the History of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences (FHHMLS) and Cambridge University Press

• 2021–2022 John C. Slater Predoctoral Fellowship in the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine - American Philosophical Society Library & Museum, Philadelphia, PA. 12 month residential fellowship ($25,000).

• 2021 - Interdisciplinary Organized Session Prize - International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology (€500). For Diverse Format Session, “‘Your Genitals Don’t Lie!’ An Escorted Encounter with the History and Philosophy of Phallic and Cervical Measuring” Participants: Rebecca Jackson, Kärin Nickelsen, Jutta Schickore, Caterina Schürch, and Merlin Wasserman.

• 2020-2021 - President’s Diversity Fellowship - IU, Bloomington, IN. 12 month fellowship ($20,000).

• 2020 - Norwood Russell Hanson Prize for Outstanding Graduate Student Paper – IU Dept. of History and Philosophy of Science and Medicine (HPSC). For paper, “‘The Uncertain Method of Drops’: How a Non-uniform Fluid Unit Survived the Century of Standardization.”

• 2016-2017 - President’s Diversity Fellowship - IU, Bloomington, IN. 12 month fellowship ($20,000).

Selected Presentations

Invited Research Talks

see CV for full list

• 2025 “The Experience of Being Measured: The Apgar Score, Construct Realizations, and the Scale of Clinical Judgments.” Presented at Cambridge Philosophy of Science (CamPoS), Nov. 19th 2025, at Cambridge University, UK.

• 2025 “The Cervimeter, Centimeters, and the Friedman Curve: A Historical Case of Imprecision Medicine.” Presented at University of Dundee, School of Health Sciences, May 8th, 2025, Scotland, UK.

• 2025 “The Apgar Score and the Scale of Clinical Judgments.” Presented at On Scale and Measurement in the Sciences (ScAM Workshop), Mar. 28th, 2025, University of Oslo Department of Philosophy, Classics, History of Art and Ideas, Oslo, Norway.

• 2024 “Peirce and Jastrow’s Pressure Balance and Their 1884 Experiment: Lessons for HPS.” Presented at Scientific Instruments in History of Psychology (Workshop) with Claudia Cristalli, Oct. 18th, 2024, Tilburg University Department of Philosophy, Tilburg, Netherlands.

• 2024 “‘Clinimetrics’ or ‘Clinical Psychometrics’?: Reexamining Disciplinary Boundaries & Measuring Methodologies.” Presented at Region Uppsala Close Care and Health - Research and Development Uppsala X-Talks, April 29th, 2024, Uppsala, Sweden.

• 2024 “Where Does ‘Validity’ End and ‘Fit for Purpose’ Begin?: Towards Implementation Validity.” Presented at Uppsala University Dept. of Women’s and Children’s Health (Physiotherapy and Behavioral Medicine), April 22nd, 2024, Uppsala, Sweden.

• 2024 “‘The Uncertain Method of Drops’: How a Non-uniform Fluid Unit Survived the Century of Standardization.” Presented for Italian Society for the History of Science (Online), April 2nd, 2024.

• 2023 “‘The Uncertain Method of Drops’: How a Non-uniform Fluid Unit Survived the Century of Standardization.” Presented for Technical University Berlin (Technische Universität Berlin) Department of History of Science, Nov. 20th, 2023, Berlin, Germany.

• 2023 “‘The Uncertain Method of Drops’: How a Non-uniform Fluid Unit Survived the Century of Standardization.” Presented for Maurice Daumas Prize Session at International Committee for the History of Technology (ICOHTEC) General Assembly (Online), Nov. 16th, 2023.

• 2023 “Feeling Centimeters of Dilation: Why You’ve Never Heard of a Cervimeter” Presented at Lunchtime Lecture Series (Online) hosted by the Science History Institute, Mar. 3rd, 2023.

• 2022 “Feeling Centimeters: The History of Cervical Measurement and Why You’ve Never Heard of a Cervimeter.” Presented for Science on Tap Philadelphia (Online), March 14th, 2022.

• 2019 “On the Virtues of Inconsistent Metrics: Why Evaluations of Reliability (Not Just Validity) Need a Gold Standard” Presented at Continuity, Improvement, & Innovation in Experimental Methodology (Workshop), Oct. 30th, 2019, IU Bloomington, IN, USA.

• 2019 “‘The Uncertain Method of Drops’: How a Non-uniform Fluid Unit Survived the Century of Standardization” Presented at Unification and Measurement: Philosophical Perspectives on Evidence and Theory Construction (Workshop), Apr. 17th, 2019, University of Montreal, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Competitive Papers Presented at Conferences

see CV for full list

• 2025 “History and Philosophy of Measurement: Past, Present, and Future Integrations.” Presented online at 27th International Congress of History of Science and Technology (ICHST Conference) with Michele Luchetti, June 30th, 2025, Dunedin, New Zealand.

• 2025 “Heretical Iterations: Pragmatism’s Challenge for Measurement Dogmas.” Presented at Measurement and Pragmatism: New Directions (Workshop) with Morgan Thompson and Aja Watkins, Mar. 16th, 2025, Center for Philosophy of Science, University of Pittsburgh, PA, USA.

• 2024 “Integrating History and Philosophy of Measurement: Reflections on Its Past, Present and Future.” Presented for Committee for Integrated HPS at Philosophy of Science Association (Conference) with Michele Luchetti, Nov. 14th, 2024, New Orleans, LA, USA.

• 2024 “Patient-Centered Measurement: Perspectives from Philosophy and Health-related Quality of Life.” Presented at International Society for Quality of Life Research (ISOQoL Conference), in Symposium with Jan R. Boehnke, Alessandra Basso, Sebastian Rodriguez Duque, Melanie Hawkins, Leah McClimans, Richard Sawatzky, and Kevin Weinfurt, Oct. 15th, 2024, Cologne, Germany.

• 2024 “When the Self Doesn’t Want Help: Implications of Ego-syntonic Diagnoses for Concepts of Normalcy and Patient-centered Care. ”Presented by coauthor Mikael Andersén at International Society for Quality of Life Research (ISOQoL Conference), Oct. 15th, 2024, Cologne, Germany.

• 2024 “Integrating History and Philosophy of Measurement: Reflections on Its Past, Present and Future.” Presented at Society for the Study of Measurement (Conference) with Michele Luchetti, Aug. 7th, 2024, UC Berkeley, CA, USA.

• 2023 “‘Clinimetrics’ or ‘Clinical Psychometrics’?: Reexamining Disciplinary Boundaries and Methodological Commitments.” Presented at International Society for Quality of Life Research (ISOQoL Conference), Oct. 21st, 2023, Calgary, Canada.

• 2022 “Where Does Validity End and ‘Fit for Purpose’ Begin? Towards a Typology for Implementation Validity.” Presented at International Society for Quality of Life Research (ISOQoL Conference), Oct. 22nd, 2022, Prague, Czech Republic.

• 2022 “The Cervix, the Cervimeter, and Centimeters: A Historical Case of (Im)Precision in Clinical Practice.” Presented at Measurement at the Crossroads 2020-2022: Measuring and Modeling (Conference), June 29–July 1st, 2022, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan, Italy.

• 2021 “Constructing Centimeters: Emanuel Friedman’s Cervimeter and the Dilatation-Time Curve.” Presentation for Committee for Integrated HPS at Philosophy of Science Association (Conference), Nov. 11th, 2021, Baltimore, MD, USA. Symposium: “Case Studies: Putting the H back in HPS.”

• 2021 “‘Your Genitals Don’t Lie!’ An Escorted Encounter with the History and Philosophy of Phallic and Cervical Measuring.” Diverse Format Session at International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology (Online), July 19th, 2021. Participants: Rebecca Jackson, Kärin Nickelsen, Jutta Schickore, Caterina Schürch, and Merlin Wassermann

• 2021 “Emanuel Friedman’s Cervimeter: The Birth of ‘Normal’ Labor and the Dilatation-Time Function.” Presented at Boston University Philosophy Graduate Student Conference (Online), Apr. 23rd, 2021.

• 2019 “Sending Knowns into the Unknown: Towards an Account of Positive Controls in Experimentation.” Presented at CLMPST 2019 – 16th International Congress of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science and Technology (Conference), Aug. 6th, 2019, Prague, Czech Republic.

• 2019 “Sending Knowns into the Unknown: Towards an Account of Positive Controls in Experimentation” Presented at Canadian Society for the History and Philosophy of Science (Conference), June 2nd, 2019, UBC, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

• 2018 “‘The Uncertain Method of Drops’: How a Non-uniform Fluid Unit Survived the Century of Standardization” Presented at Measurement at the Crossroads: History, Philosophy and Sociology of Measurement (Conference), June 27–29th 2018, Paris Diderot University (Paris 7), Paris, France.