Research programme
Self-regulation models
... which build on self-regulation and stress-regulation theories and considers the modification of cognitions as a mediator of therapeutic change.
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- Willem van der Does

This research programme has its emphasis on self-regulation and stress-regulation theories of health, disease and psychopathology.
Clinical psychology subprogramme
“Stress-regulation, cognition and psychopathology” aims to improve assessment, understanding and treatment of stress-related psychopathology. The focus is transdiagnostic, across anxiety disorders, mood disorders and somatoform disorders. The programme investigates how distant, recent and current stressors interact with cognitive processes (e.g., attention and memory), behavioural processes (approach and avoidance) and biological processes to produce psychopathology.
Research into this interaction is aimed at uncovering an underlying vulnerability for mental disorders. The approach is experimental and translational. Information processing is studied in individuals exposed to emotional challenges and environmental pressures with a strong research emphasis on the biological basis of these processes. In addition, the effectiveness and mechanisms of interventions derived from basic research are studied in controlled clinical trials with an emphasis on the modification of information processing.
Health psychology subprogramme
In “Self-regulation models for health and illness behavior”, Ford’s motivational systems theory (1992) is used as the main theoretical framework. The role of personal goals in the adoption of health behaviors and the adaptation to chronic disease is a central research focus.
The health psychology line of research aims to investigate the adoption of health enhancing and the avoidance of health-compromising behaviours in healthy and diseased populations, including psycho-physiological measures. The primary aim is to develop empirical knowledge that will enhance the effectiveness of psychological interventions based on self-regulation.
Connection with other research
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Self-regulation models
- Improving PTSD treatment for adults with childhood trauma (IMPACT-study)
- OPENup: Optimizing exposure therapy for Posttraumatic Stress disorder
- Music and Health
- MS@Work study
- EEG theta\beta ratio as a potential biomarker for resilience to performance anxiety.
- Determinants of and Interventions in Chronic Fatigue.
- Identity processes during health behavioral change
- Role of psychophysiological factors in acute and chronic itch and pain.
- Stress and stress management in chronic inflammatory conditions
- The neurobiology of depression and the relation between stress, mental health, ageing and chronic illness
- Criteria for recovery from eating disorder patients: a comparison between therapists, patients and a healthy control group
- Sensory Processing Sensitivity, development of a new measurement scale
- Effects of noninvasive vagus nerve stimulation on perseverative cognition
- Bridging the gap between ethics and neurotechnology - the case of Brain-Computer Interfaces
- The power of expectations: Unraveling the role of placebo and nocebo effects in somatic symptoms
- The SAFE study: Suicidal ideation Assessment: Fluctuation monitoring with Ecological momentary assessment
- STARS: Shyness and Confidence in Social Situations
- BAT: Breaking the Transmission of Anxiety in the Family
- Brain-Computer Interfacing
- Stress, hormones and emotion regulation
- The effect of an Emotional Working Memory training on emotion regulation capacities in Borderline Personality Disorder
- Implementation of an online cognitive behavioural therapy intervention for chronic pain
- A three-step approach to supporting patient self-management in clinical practice
- Screening and self-management interventions for chronic conditions
- e-Coach: Tailored cognitive-behavioral e-Health care for patients with chronic somatic conditions
- Epilepsy and anxiety: targeting a vicious cycle
- We all BENEFIT: The Ecosystem for Healthy Living
- Development and evaluation of evidence based self-help and online programs for people with a somatic stressor and depressive symptoms
- Self- and group-identity in the process of quitting smoking
- Leiden Index of Depression Sensitivity
- Neuropsychology of navigation
- Contextualisation of health goals
- Anxiety and cognitive performance: better insights and new treatments
- Social Feedback and Emotion Regulation in Borderline Personality Disorder: An fMRI study
- Genetic, biochemical and neural correlates of vulnerability to depression.
- Implementation of evidence-based interventions promoting healthy lifestyles
- Role of epigenetics in long-term health effects of early life stress
- Psychoneurobiology in itch and pain
- Placebo research: Training of the immune and endocrine system
- The 3Generation study: Stress and Emotions in a Family Context
- Stress-related prolonged cardiovascular activity: The impact and changeability of stressful cognition without awareness
- Chronobiology of depression
- An online self-help programme for people with HIV and depressive symptoms
- Placebo research: Pain and itch
- Locked-in? Locked-out!
- Influence of dissociation on the neural correlates of Emotional Working Memory in Borderline Personality Disorder
- Controlling anxiety in late life (CALL)
- Migraine@Work: work ability in employees with migraine
- Different components of impulsivity in relation to emotional stress in patients with Borderline Personality Disorder and patients with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
- Cognitive and behavioural emotion regulation after negative and traumatic life events
- Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (CERQ)
- Unraveling the Neural Basis of Self-Esteem in Adolescent Depression