Postdoctoral research fellowship

at  Folkehelseinstituttet FHI

ABOUT THE POSITION

We are seeking a postdoctoral fellow to work with longitudinal and multivariate data analyses in the PsychGen Centre for Genetic Epidemiology and Mental Health, at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH) in Oslo.
The postdoctoral position is a part of the EU Horizon Europe funded project «Running in the FAMILY - Understanding and predicting the intergenerational transmission of mental illness». FAMILY brings together the largest existing human genetic, epigenetic and neuroimaging datasets from both family population cohorts and familial high-risk offspring studies of psychotic and mood conditions.
The postdoctoral fellow will apply cutting-edge genetically informed methods to characterize the intergenerational transmission of risk for psychotic and mood symptoms and diagnoses from parents to children. The fellow will be involved in developing and applying methods and analysis pipelines using within-family genomic data, investigating stability and change in direct and indirect genetic effects through different life stages, identifying mechanisms underlying transmission of risk and resilience factors, and testing whether findings from the general population generalize to diagnosed cases.
Data from the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study (MoBa) and linked national health registry data will be central data sources. The postdoctoral fellow will also work with data from a range of other population cohort studies, as well as clinical studies of people with high familial predisposition for psychotic and mood conditions.
As a researcher in the PsychGen Centre for Genetic Epidemiology and Mental Health, you will be part of an international, interdisciplinary and diverse team including psychologists, pedagogues, sociologists, statisticians, geneticists, biologists and epidemiologists. We value open and reproducible science, user participation and co-creation, neurodiversity and diversity of perspectives and backgrounds. You will have opportunities to develop high-quality interdisciplinary research expertise, and collaborate with leading experts in neurodevelopment, mental health, genetic epidemiology and cohort studies.
The PsychGen Centre is organised in the Division for Mental and Physical Health at NIPH. The area has a multidisciplinary environment with expertise in research and health analysis related to neurodevelopment and mental health, physical health and substance abuse. The Centre is engaged in understanding neurodevelopment and mental health across the life course, in particular using national registries and general population cohorts.

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS

• PhD in a relevant field (e.g., psychology, epidemiology, genetics, statistics or medicine; completed or submitted with defense scheduled before the start date)
• Strong publication record in international peer-reviewed journals, including as first author
• Strong statistical and quantitative skills, ideally including experience with large data sources
• Demonstrable expertise in the use of R statistical software for data management and statistical analysis
• Experience in using genetic epidemiological methods
• Excellent skills in written and oral English
• Alignment of research interests with the project aims, as documented through previous experience, publications, or clearly articulated in the cover letter
• Interest in working collaboratively and in accordance with the practices and principles of open and reproducible science, as documented through previous experience, publications or clearly articulated in the cover letter

FAVOURABLE QUALIFICATIONS

• Experience working with large longitudinal cohort data and/or data from national registries
• Experience with user participation in research
• Experience with open science practices (e.g., pre-registered analytic plans, open sharing of analytic code, or involvement with registered reports)
• Experience generating and using polygenic scores
• Experience with within-family methods to investigate intergenerational transmission
• Experience with methods for causal inference using observational data, such as Mendelian randomization
• Experience presenting research internationally (at conferences or as a visiting researcher)

• Develop and preregister analysis plans
• Prepare data for analyses
• Contribute to work on user participation within the PsychGen Centre and the FAMILY project
• Perform statistical and genetic analyses, potentially including methods such as structural equation modelling, Trio-GCTA, trio- polygenic score analyses, and Mendelian randomization
• Write 3-4 scientific articles as first author
• Communicate results in various national and international scientific journals and popular science forums
• Present at international conferences (some travel is expected)