‘As a researcher, you learn a lot from projects outside your own area of expertise’
image: Peter Valckx
As a new professor of Development Psychology, Anna van Duijvenvoorde advocates for more collaboration in science. She encourages young researchers to join a network. ‘It gives you a broader view of the world of science.’
Six years ago, Anna van Duijvenvoorde wrote in the Leiden Psychology Blog about her vision of academic careers. She had wanted to acquire one of the coveted young researcher subsidies, but to no avail. ‘As a researcher, I grew up in a system that centred around personal subsidies,’ she says now. ‘They were the main focus of attention and were strongly emphasised in the academic world, so I was very disappointed.’
Beyond your own expertise
In her blog she called for a broader view of the possibilities for funding, and more opportunities for collaboration for young researchers. ‘I wanted to let people know that there are other possibilities to grow as a researcher, and I also felt the need to work off some of my frustration. Personal subsidies offer researchers the freedom to develop their own ideas and they can really boost your career,’ she says. ‘But I realised that there has to be a balance. A healthy academic environment also promotes opportunities for collaboration, through interdisciplinary initiatives that are seen and supported by the university. As a young researcher, you learn a lot from working in teams and on projects that are outside your own field of expertise. That’s enormously valuable! It’s the combination of personal subsidies and joint projects that help you progress as a researcher.’
Team science
Van Duijvenvoorde is a member of the Young Academy Leiden and she works closely with researchers from other disciplines within research consortia, such as the Growing Up Together in Society (GUTS) Gravitation project. In the GUTS consortium, seven universities and different knowledge partners pool their strengths to study how young people grow up healthily and resiliently in today’s complex society. The study involves tracking the brain development and social development of young people over a period of ten years. ‘We work not only with researchers, but also with young people, societal groups and knowledge partners. This is by definition team science. It challenges you to look further than your own specialist field. That’s an enormous challenge, but I get a lot of energy from it.’
'Student associations are a pressure cooker of social relations'
Student associations as pressure cooker
The research is divided into different work packages, one of which Van Duijvenvoorde leads. ‘In one of the work packages we focus on involving young people from diverse backgrounds. Together with psychologists, sociologists and brain researchers, we look at the opportunities these young people have to make a contribution to society. In another work package we work with student associations to examine how young people form social relations.’ She believes that student associations act as a kind of ‘pressure cooker’ for social relations. In a short space of time, hundreds of students who have only just met interact intensely with one another. This phase is an ideal setting to study social development.
Not only in the scanner
Her earlier research focused on the developing teenage brain, but over the years her perspective has become broader. But she is still fascinated by the question of how young people learn. ‘In the first instance, I studied that by looking at the brain: how does the brain react to feedback and rewards, and how do we modify our behaviour? In our research we discovered that the teenage brain is particularly well attuned to learning, which a lot of people may find surprising. Although she is still working on this research, she now also focuses on social learning. It’s a subject that has intrigued her for some years. How do young people look at others? How do they perceive the behaviour and responses of contemporaries, and how does that influence their own choices? How does our brain learn from other people? What might we discover about learning if we focus not only on what we see in the scanner, but also on social settings, such as schools?
‘The teenage brain is well attuned to learning'
Innovative perspective
‘You can do some amazingly interesting experiments with social learning that examine learning processes in a social context. But it also offers opportunities for more natural, repeated measurements that combine wellbeing and learning; for example, by repeatedly asking young people throughout the day how they are feeling, what they are experiencing in their social interactions, and how that influences their motivation or choices. By combining fundamental knowledge with these kinds of daily measurements, you gain an innovative perspective on how young people learn, including how they learn from one another.’
Motivational teaching
That wellbeing is a key factor in learning is something Van Duijvenvoorde is now researching in an NRO project in partnership with educationalists, secondary schools and universities of applied sciences. ‘We test whether a training course that we give to teachers also enables them to teach motivationally, which hopefully means that they are better able to get through to their students and that these young people both feel and learn better.’ As a result of that enrichment of her research from theory to practice, she has also become more involved with policy. As one of the experts in the European Education Area, part of the European Commission, she has worked on the Supporting wellbeing at school: new guidelines for policymakers and educators report, with eleven recommendations for education. ‘We can also use these recommendations to expand our research further.’
Brain rot
Ultimately, all her work comes down to the question of how we, as a society, can improve the wellbeing of young people. ‘I recently heard someone say: “Don’t just talk about mental wellbeing, but about actually feeling good about yourself." That’s a more active form that shows that you yourself have influence and that it can also change. I like that idea.’ This theme is more relevant than ever for young people because they are growing up in a tense political climate, surrounded by social media and performance pressure. ‘On the one hand, you see young people discussing mental wellbeing more, including online, but there is still a strong stigma. These two narratives go hand in hand.’ She sees clearly how important the online world is in the lives of teenagers. ‘A short while ago, a group of secondary school pupils came along for the pre-university programme. When I asked them what they wanted to learn about, they all said: “brain rot”. In other words: after hours of scrolling, why does my brain feel so exhausted and empty? It’s interesting to answer these kinds of questions together with young people.’
'Young people discuss mental wellbeing more, but there is still a strong stigma'
Flywheel
As professor and section chair of Development and Educational Psychology, Van Duijvenvoorde wants to make it clear how important collaboration is in research and teaching. ‘If you want to have impact, you have to work with a team.’ In June, she will be leaving the Young Academy Leiden. ‘I’m very grateful for this time as part of YAL. Every year we organised events where as a young researcher you could learn to work in an interdisciplinary team and communicate with people from other disciplines. For me it’s been a kind of flywheel experience.’ In her leadership role, she therefore wants to give young researchers space and encouragement to also seek collaboration and join a network. ‘It offers you a broader view of the world of science.’