Veni grants for nine promising Tilburg researchers

NWO selects researchers based on the academic quality and the innovative character of the research proposal, the scientific and/or societal impact of the proposed project, and the quality of the researcher. The laureates are based in four Schools:

Tilburg School of Social and Behavioral Sciences

• Maria Bolsinova's research will focus on improving measurement quality in adaptive learning environments using process data. Obtaining accurate measures of abilities that change over time is essential for better personalization of the learning material, according to Bolsinova.
• Bastian Jaeger will create the first open-access database for the study of first impression accuracy. People (and facial profiling algorithms) rely on individuals’ facial appearance to infer their trustworthiness, intelligence, and many other characteristics. These first impressions have important consequences for legal, professional, and social outcomes.
• Personalized care is essential and urgent to answer the increasing mental health needs in youth. This asks for sufficiently personalized methods and adolescent-specific knowledge. By centralizing adolescents’ perspectives, Melissa de Smet’s research develops an innovative methodology adjusted to the needs of youth.
• Nora Waitkus’ project offers data and analysis on wealth, housing, finance, business, and debt inequality for more than countries across four continents and three decades. It advances science by providing new measures and theoretical tools for studying economic inequality worldwide.

Tilburg School of Humanities and Digital Sciences

• Huub Brouwer researches the philosophy of taxation. Wealth inequality in the Netherlands is largely due to the layout of the Dutch tax system. Due to growing awareness of the negative effects of rising wealth inequalities, reforms of the Dutch tax system are being debated. The aim of this project is to enrich academic and public debates about highly needed tax system reforms.
• In recent years, a new kind of grammar education has been developed, called metaconceptual grammar education, which has a positive effect on grammatical understanding. Jimmy van Rijt will examine whether metaconceptual grammar education can improve writing skills. He will also examine whether metaconceptual interventions have a stronger effect on writing skills when they are linked to contextualized grammar teaching.

Tilburg Law School

• Richard Clements’ project maps three global challenges (migration, pollution and pandemics) to trace the effect this management turn has had on the profession. Speaking with institutional experts and academics, the project will change our view of the profession as a practice of crisis management.
• Shirley Kempeneer will study what stress tests can tell us about the digital transformation of municipalities. This project will study the digital transformation of local government organizations by developing a so-called stress test. By doing so, Kempeneer hopes to find out how governments can handle data and technology in a safe and responsible way.

Tilburg School of Economics and Management

• Thomas Breugem’s research is titled: Redesigning humanitarian aid to meet future challenges. Breugem’s research aims at providing humanitarian organizations with mathematical methods to use limited resources as best as possible and continue to help vulnerable people all over the world.