dr. JA (Jonas) House

I am a postdoctoral researcher in the Environmental Policy group and a lecturer in the Consumption and Healthy Lifestyles group. My research broadly focuses on the topic of dietary change, from a sociological perspective. I am interested in how food practices are established, maintained and changed, with a particular focus on shifts in food consumption: for example, novel foods becoming established, foods travelling to new places, shifting public tastes, or changing notions of what ‘food’ actually is.

I completed my PhD at the University of Sheffield (UK) on public acceptance of insects as food in the Netherlands. During the project I also undertook historical research on the establishment of sushi in the US. My scientific publications can be viewed here.

I am currently involved in two research projects. My main focus is the NWA-funded ‘Transition to a sustainable food system’ project. This large interdisciplinary project investigates pathways to a sustainable Dutch food system, as part of which I am researching questions around the cultural appropriateness of sustainable food and how ‘futuring’ methods can be applied to explore potential transition pathways.

I am also part of a project funded by the WUR Protein Transition Investment Theme, entitled ‘The dark side of meat analogues: developing innovative methods to understand risk and uncertainty in the protein transition’. This project is a collaboration between natural and social scientists, and has two main objectives: (i) to provide a critical overview of risks and uncertainties of meat analogues as a means to achieve a protein transition; (ii) to pilot innovative methodological approaches to investigate this topic.

As part of my educational activities I teach on the Principles of Consumer Studies course, as well as supervising BSc and MSc thesis projects.

I am keen to engage people with my research topics and contribute to popular debates, for example through my video ‘Will insects be the new sushi?’ for the University of the Netherlands.