Nina is a human geographer with a strong affinity for social science research methods and approaches. She has always been captivated by cities. These are ostensibly brimming with opportunities for social contact, yet many people still feel isolated. This apparent contradiction is the central focus of her research. Which place-based factors are most crucial in determining social connection?

Currently supported by a two-year mobility fellowship from the Swiss National Science Foundation, Nina is based at the University of Manchester. There, she works with longitudinal data from the UK, organises international workshops on place-based interventions for loneliness, and conducts research for the World Health Organization to better understand how governments around the world are addressing loneliness. She is also guest editor for a special issue titled "Loneliness and the Built Environment" for the Journal Health & Place.

Nina maintains a strong connection with the University of Basel, teaching an annual introductory course in social science methods for the Land Use Changes research group. This course equips students with essential skills in research design and grant writing.

Nina’s PhD thesis, The Taming of the Flu, completed at the University of Basel, examined the interplay of health and place by integrating geo-referenced data from the university hospital with a large-scale household survey. During her subsequent postdoctoral research at the Technical University of Munich, she investigated the complexities of recruiting study participants through social media for both clinical and non-clinical medical studies, drawing on interview data to assess the benefits and challenges involved.

Visit my google scholar or research gate page to access all publications and get updates on projects.

Since 2017 she has taken students on excursions and developed her own courses. She enjoys interacting with students, which has been insightful and inspiring for her own research.

BA courses

• Introduction to Empirical Social Research, 2023/24
• Exercise: Applied Empirical Social Research, 2022
• Exercise for the main lecture: System Earth, 2019/20/21/22
• Jura field course, 2 days, 2018/19
• Human geographic field course, block course, 2017/18/19

MA courses

• Seminar: Urban Geography and Urban Health, 2022
• Current Studies in Human Geography, 2018

Excursions                       

• Urban Health, 1 day, 2022
• Conference visit: Swiss Geoscience Meeting, 2 days, 2022/23
• Ecology in agriculture and forest management, Basel-Land, 1 day, 2021
• Energy and sustainability, Basel, 1 day, 2020/21
• Poverty, Basel, 1 day, 2017/18/19/20/21
• Spatial transformations and space (re)uses, Zurich, 1 day, 2019/20/21
• Urban development and spatial structures, Berlin, 3 days, 2018/19
• City and port development, Basel, 1 day, 2019
• Trinational human geography excursion, Switzerland/Germany/France, for the Sun Yat-sen University (China), 14 days, 2018