Tinnitus, or the ringing of the ears, is defined as the perception of a continuous sound, in the absence of a corresponding acoustic stimulus in the external environment. It is estimated that in Europe over 70 million people experience tinnitus and that for 7 million it creates a chronic incapacitating condition, tenaciously haunting them up to the point where it interferes with every aspect of their daily living. Residing within and confined to the individuals subjective and perceptual experience, tinnitus is not measurable or quantifiable by objective physical recordings, and is furthermore not traceable to disease, injury, or pathology in the brain or elsewhere. Empirical evidence for either the effectiveness of curative tinnitus treatments or for audiological interventions, such as hearing-aids, and sound-generating devices to mask the sound, is lacking. Moreover, the audiometric characteristics of the tinnitus sound (loudness/pitch) hardly predict severity of the condition, or treatment outcomes. Contrary to scientific evidence, the clinical practice of masking/attenuating the tinnitus-sound is still the most widespread tinnitus-treatment approach. Presently I propose the counterintuitive conjecture that it is not the sound itself which is so devastating, but rather the fear-conditioned responses and the associated threat appraisals that maintain severe tinnitus disability. Indeed, empirical evidence is growing for the effectiveness of a cognitive behavioral approach and our recent findings support the importance of addressing tinnitus-related fear and fear-responses in the management of patients with disabling tinnitus. In this project I will experimentally test the idea that initial threat-appraisal and fearful responses predict increased tinnitus suffering. In addition, I will test the idea that exposure to the tinnitus sound is an effective way of decreasing fear of tinnitus and disability in the long term, whereas masking the sound is counterproductive. My research may provide an important impetus for the development of novel tinnitus-treatment approaches. Keywords: Tinnitus, threat-appraisal, fear-conditioning, exposure, masking

Just press print – 3D Printing of safe and sustainable buildings 3D Printing of buildings can provide an answer to the housing shortage and the sustainability challenge in the construction industry. But how to design safe and sustainable buildings when the material behaviour is far more complex and existing design rules no longer apply? In this research, a novel multi-scale approach is developed, to predict the behaviour of 3D printed structures, and enable faster construction with less material.

Trust is identified by medical ethicists as a fundamental value in medicine. It is typified by the doctor-patient relationship, in which a patient?s trust in her physician is essential for effective communication and conducive to shared ethical responsibility for choices and outcomes. Telecare, the practice of medicine using information and communication technology to monitor and treat patients at home, redefines the relationship between patient and clinician and moves health care to a new context. It promises to reduce health care costs and produce better outcomes, but it also impacts patient trust. This study aims to find out how chronically ill patients establish trust in telecare, and when this trust is well-grounded. Patients, clinicians and designers associated with a private company will be interviewed, and an extensive database of existing patient survey data will be analyzed. An ethical framework will be used to analyze the expectations and reasons grounding trust attitudes among chronically ill telecare patients. Although there have been substantial studies in science and technology studies of the new rhetoric, routines, and roles that accompany telecare, these studies have not yet been brought to bear on policy, medical ethics, and the ethics of technology design. The present study provides a bridge between the theoretical understanding of telecare and the societal evaluation of telecare in terms of concepts such as responsibility, privacy, legitimacy, autonomy, freedom, and independence. It also generates preliminary recommendations for technology and human interface design of future telecare applications both in the Netherlands and abroad.

(Independent) living is a fundamental need that must give inhabitants a voice. However, in todays residential (care) environments, the direct involvement of the (vulnerable) residents remains a distant prospect. Despite the strong intention of the involved parties, there is still a lack of practical instruments to ensure the systematic participation and (sense of) ownership of the (vulnerable) residents. In cooperation with a housing corporation, a care organization, and the residents of a neighborhood in Waalre, a participation instrument is developed for designing residential communities that enable senior citizens (long-term) involvement in the process and increase the chance of community building.

There is a need for more energy system integration, while the autonomy of individual systems is necessary to cope with the exploding complexity of multiple buildings and their interaction with the electricity grid. The use of Big Data in combination with deep learning techniques offers new opportunities to better predict energy consumption and decentralized production of renewable energy (for example, based on local weather data taking into account local phenomena such as urban heat islands). This combined with multi-agent systems with a cooperative approach provides decentralized control and monitoring autonomy to further reduce the complexity of energy system integration.