February 2021 A warm welcome to Selin Topel, who has joined our lab as a PhD candidate on a project that is a unique collaboration between three departments (Clinical, Developmental, and Cognitive Psychology). See Projects & People for more information.
May 2020 Congratulations to Sandy! She received a grant from the LUF (Leiden University Fund) to investigate how cognitive flexibility moderates the relationship between empathy and traumatic symptoms in immigrant Syrian children. These children have fled their country over the course of the Syrian Civil War and have applied for asylum in the Netherlands. In this project, Sandy will also employ a clinical perspective that will advance our understanding of the development of PTSD in populations at risk.
April 2020 Myrthe's paper on a study in which we used our newly developed error-reponsibility paradigm in healthy volunteers scoring high on obsessive-compulsive symptoms has been accepted for publication in Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience.
Ellen was interviewed about the effects of the current social distancing measures on mental health and hormones for a national newspaper (Algemeen Dagblad; click here for article in Dutch), for Radio (Radio2; click here), Elsevier Weekblad (click here), and for TV (RTL4 Editie NL; click here).
February 2020 Congratulations to Myrthe, as her 1st first-author paper of her PhD project has been accepted for publication in Frontiers in Psychiatry! It's an impressive review on all studies conducted so far on social cognition alterations in patients with obsesssive-compulsive disorder. Francesca's help with checking the extensive tables is definitely also worth mentioning! See Publications for link to open access full text.
January 2020 Christian Tudorache from the Biology department was awarded a grant from the KNAW Dobberke Foundation to enable collaboration between his department and Clinical Psychology. In this project, social behavior as part of coping styles in zebra fish will be investigated. Congratulations to Christian!
December 2019 Sandy's paper on the neural correlates of social performance monitoring in individuals scoring high on psychopathic traits has been accepted for publication in Cortex.
November 2019 Ellen was invited to give a presentation at the annual Dutch meeting for Neuropsychology in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. See the meeting's website for more information.
May 2019 Ellen was invited to present the lab's past and present research at the Institute of Psychology of the Deutsche Sporthochschule in Cologne, Germany. It was an inspiring visit and very good to meet up with former colleagues!
August 2018 Sandy wrote a blog about our recent paper published in Scientific Reports. The paper addresses how being right can activate reward-related brain areas, even if it means losing money. You can find the blog here, and the paper here.
January 2018 Congratulations to Sandy, as she received a KNAW Sara van Dam research grant! Together with Dr. Einat Levi-Gigi (Bar-Ilan university in Israel) she will investigate the development of social performance monitoring processes in adolescents and the impact of growing up in a stressful environment.
November 2017 Ellen was invited to present our research on social performance monitoring at Todd Handy's Attentional Neuroscience Lab at the University of Britisch Columbia in Vancouver Canada.
October 2016 Sina received the prestigious 'Heinz-Heckhausen' young investigator award from the German Society for Psychology for her outstanding work in her dissertation. Congratulations Sina, well deserved indeed!
September 2016 Myrthe and Naomi, second year research master students of the research master in Clinical and Health psychology at Leiden University, joined our lab on the project on trustworthiness and social conformity in individuals scoring low and high on psychopathic traits. Welcome Myrthe and Naomi!
July 2016 Desiree's paper on the influence of genetic variations on the acute effects of cocaine and cannabis on reversal learning was accepted for publication in Psychopharmacology.
March 2016 Desiree successfully defended her PhD thesis entitled 'Individual differences in the acute effects of cannabis and cocaine on cognitive control' AND her paper on performance monitoring after administration of these drugs was accepted for publication in European Neuropsychopharmacology. Congratulations Dr. Spronk!
February 2016 Margit's paper on the effects of cooperative and competitive game play (Tetris!) on self-other integration was accepted for publication in Frontiers in Psychology.
January 2016 Javier successfully defended his PhD thesis entitled 'Every cloud has a silver lining: social cognitive skills and deficits in schizophrenia'. Congratulations Dr. de la Asuncion!
June 2015 Sandy joined the VIDI project as a postdoc, see Projects & People section for more info. Welcome Sandy!
May 2015 Desiree's paper on the acute effects of cannabis and cocaine on response inhibition has been accepted for publication in Addiction Biology.
April 2015 Margit's paper on behavioral and ERP effects of oxytocin administration on self-other integration has been accepted for publication in Cortex.
March 2015 Javier's paper on ERP correlates of self-other integration in schizophrenia patients has been accepted for publication in Social, Cognitive, and Affective Neuroscience.
August 2014 Sina's paper on social approach-avoidance tendencies in patients with major depression has been accepted for publication in Psychiatry Research.
July 2014 Anne's paper on reduced performance monitoring in patients with bipolar disorders has been accepted for publication in Bipolar Disorders.
April 2014 Desiree's paper on the (combined) effects of MDMA and alcohol administration on performance monitoring has been accepted for publication in Psychopharmacology.