Daily language use contains many (implicit) expressions about social categories, like minority, age, and gender groups. These expressions construct and maintain stereotypes, and, often unknowingly, feed prejudice and discrimination. In this project we create a thorough understanding and awareness of stereotype communication, by studying when and how stereotypes are reflected in, and inferred from, spontaneously produced natural language. In addition, we develop a software toolset to automatically detect stereotypes and prejudices in texts. This toolset can uncover implicit biases in a variety of real-life contexts and thereby facilitates further (applied) research, content monitoring, correction, prevention and education about stereotyping.

Millions of selfies are posted on social media, prompting questions about how this activity impacts its users. How does selfie-taking, editing and sharing harm or benefit young people, and why? Theoretical conflicts exist on positive and negative effects. Hence, I aim to further our understanding of the circumstances, for whom and how selfie-taking, editing, and sharing exert harm or benefits. My research integrates innovative theories addressing online capacities for enhanced self-presentation, psychological impacts, and cultural aspects influencing users differently. Hypotheses are empirically examined cross-culturally, both short-term and long-term. Results will inform academic, parental and societal concerns over new media effects.

Immersive disinformation—realistic, AI-generated content that feels genuine, such as deepfakes or misleading 3D videos in virtual reality—poses a new risk. Traditional misinformation research has mainly focused on text, but immersive content can potentially influence people more strongly by creating lifelike experiences. This project explores how these realistic digital experiences affect our thinking and may lead people to adopt false beliefs. Through four studies, the project aims to explain how strongly immersive disinformation influences individuals, how this happens, and what new strategies can be developed to counter this powerful form of deception.

Over 41% of the Dutch population is overweight, a known risk factor for a range of debilitating conditions. Modifying behaviours associated with overweight, such as eating rate, or the speed at which people consume food, could reduce overweight and improve health. Eating rate is a basic determinant of appetite regulation, as people who eat more slowly feel sated earlier and eat less. Unfortunately without assistance, eating rate is difficult to modify due to its highly automatic nature. The current project examines the effectiveness of an innovative product, an augmented fork, to raise awareness of eating rate and help people eat more slowly. This product unobtrusively records behaviour and provides real-time haptic feedback on individual eating rates. Moreover, the fork is paired with applications to provide users with retrospective information about eating rate. We will test the effect of this persuasive technology on eating rate in the laboratory (Study 1) and over time at home (Study 2). The aim of these studies is to test both the short- and long-term effects of the intervention on eating rate and satiation, thus providing experimental evidence on the effectiveness of a persuasive technology to alter a habitual behaviour and support behaviour change. Our studies will lay a foundation for future research on the use of a persuasive technology in the domain of eating behaviour and inform prevention/intervention strategies in the context of overweight and obesity.

Satiric news is often controversial by challenging current politicians, institutions en policies. The researchers model how, across different media (e.g., TV, online), language use in satire is different from ‘regular’ genres like news, and how these differences in media and language use impact the public’s perception of the topic under discussion.