Henry Dixson

Dr. Henry Dixson serves as a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Australian National University, jointly appointed to the Research School of Social Sciences (RSSS) and Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs (CPAS), with additional affiliation as a Visiting Scientist at CSIRO's Responsible Innovation Future Science Platform. His work bridges sociology, environmental science, and cognitive psychology, focusing on societal interactions with emerging technologies through the School of Sociology within RSSS.

His research examines public reasoning around genetic technologies in conservation and medicine, climate change communication, and cross-cultural influences on human perception. Key methodologies include focus groups, case studies, and comparative analyses across diverse populations, with notable emphasis on how environmental factors shape facial preferences and theory-of-mind development. This interdisciplinary approach integrates Science and Technology Studies with evolutionary psychology to address real-world policy challenges.

Recent publications (2022-2025) reveal a concentrated exploration of genetic technology acceptance, highlighting tensions between innovation and risk perception in conservation contexts, vaccine hesitancy drivers, and ethical frameworks for gene drives. Earlier work (2017-2018) established foundations in cross-cultural cognition, examining pathogen prevalence effects on mate selection and theory-of-mind scaling in Vanuatu.

Dr. Dixson contributed as Co-Investigator to the 2024-2025 project "Looping Genetically Modified Waste: The Circular Economy Challenge for Agricultural Biotech," addressing biotechnology waste streams. His collaborative network spans ANU's National Security College, CSIRO, and international partners, facilitating transdisciplinary research on science-society interfaces without dedicated lab infrastructure.