What are the social and neural mechanisms that contribute to fluctuations in self-esteem in healthy adolescents and adolescents with depression?

... studies the developmental course and dynamics of cognition, self-regulation, and emotional competence, and the implications for educational and clinical practice.

What are the circadian disturbances underlying depression vulnerability? How are they related to mood, cognition and sleep ?

Heightened activation of the striatum that adolescents show in response to reward is often associated with risk-taking and negative health consequences. This article in Nature Communications investigates a potential positive side of this heightened activation. It shows that the activity peak in late…

What role do parent-child interactions play in the development, maintenance and treatment of depression in young people?

Nowadays children grow up with social media. This may influence the development of brain regions involved in social interaction. In their review article in Nature Communications, Crone and Konijn illustrate how neuroscience can contribute to a better understanding of how media and peers influence adolescents'…

Is blended care a feasible and effective treatment method for social anxiety in adolescence?

The Leiden Index of Depression Sensitivity (LEIDS) measures cognitive reactivity (CR) to sadness, an aspect of cognitive vulnerability to depression, conceptually similar to rumination.

Fundamental insights into the working of the adolescent brain help lecturers and parents to teach adolescents to function better. Professor Eveline Crone studies executive functions – such as planning and behaviour – in the adolescent brain.

A study on the development of prosocial behaviour.

Serious forms of anxiety concerning other people’s opinions can hinder teenagers at school in social interactions or carrying out tasks. Psychologist Anne Miers is looking for ways to reduce this so-called ‘social anxiety’.

What is the neural basis of social decision-making across childhood, adolescence and adulthood and what are the developmental patterns in terms of behavior and brain activation?

Trust and reciprocity are two important social behaviors that help adolescents to navigate their social world successfully. In their empirical article in Journal of Research on Adolescence, van de Groep, Meuwese, Zanolie, Güroğlu, and Crone describe the development of trust and reciprocity in adolescents…

The master's specialisation Child and Adolescent Psychology offers intensive studies in developmental psychopathology.

We found that, next to the effectiveness of the intervention, it’s also very likely that the intervention is cost-effective compared to attention only.

How do genetic and environmental factors make us vulnerable to depression?

In online games conflicts between players may arise. Novin, Bos, Stevenson and Rieffe investigated factors that may explain why some adolescents react more angrily than others in this type of situation. In their realistically designed gaming environment, the (pre-programmed) fellow player suddenly started…

Promotores: C.A.J. Knibbe; J.N. van den Anker, Co-promotores: H.P.A. van Dongen; B. van Ramshorst

How does having limited access to the social world affect Deaf or Hard of Hearing (DHH) children’s emotional development? And in turn, how do impairments in emotional functioning affect social development and the development of psychopathology?

-

Why do children with an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have difficulties with acquiring emotion regulation skills; and how is this related to their social impairments and comorbid psychopathology?

Pharmacokinetic studies in obese adolescents and obese adults

Studievoorlichting

To investigate the effectiveness of an online self-help programme for people with HIV and depressive symptoms.

Prof. Bernet Elzinga (Clinical Psychology Unit) is one of the seven scientists from the Leiden University who has received a Vici grant of 1.5 million euros from NWO. Vici is one of the largest grants for individual scientists in the Netherlands. The funding will enable her to do research for the next…

Children and adolescents really do use their ‘smart’ brain areas. This has been confirmed by an extensive and long-running study of the brain carried out by developmental psychologist Sabine Peters . Her findings can have important consequences for education. PhD defence 27 January.

I want to understand the overlap between physical health, mental health, and healthy aging and whether/how stress (behaviorally and biologically) may tie these concepts together.

Depression has traditionally been linked to increased inflammation. Innovative research by psychologist Eiko Fried refutes this popular assumption. He shows that specific depression symptoms such as sleeping problems explain this relationship. Publication in Psychological Medicine .

Evidence that the right diet can prevent or alleviate depression is weak. In literature reviews on the subject, the authors often reach strong conclusions, nonetheless. This is what Florian Thomas-Odenthal, a master’s student in Psychology at Leiden University, discovered in his thesis research. Publication…

... which build on self-regulation and stress-regulation theories and considers the modification of cognitions as a mediator of therapeutic change.

The ‘empathic mind’ in children with Specific Language Impairments (SLI); what can children with SLI understand of other people’s minds and emotions?

What is the effectiveness of (booklet or online) self-help programmes for people with somatic stressors and depressive symptoms? What works best for whom? How to improve motivation and adherence?

The overall aim of the project is to investigate effective ways to strengthen vocational identity of at-risk adolescents in order to contribute to a successful transition from late secondary to post secondary lower vocational education or to work.

Development and validation of instruments that can measure different aspects of emotional competence in children with normal and atypical development, and in different cultures

Adolescents who were more popular among their classmates in junior school are often the ones who are more inclined to share things fairly with others. During this sharing process, 'social' areas of the brain are more strongly activated than in adolescents who are less popular. This is the finding of…

-

Can positive peer feedback break the cycle of negative self-relevant cognitive processes and reduce self-reported anxiety in early adolescents?

Parents often see that when their sweet, socially-minded children become adolescents they change into selfish 'hotel guests' who think only of themselves. But adolescents become increasingly better at weighing up one another's interests. This discovery has been made by development psychologist Rosa…

The brains of adolescents react more responsively to receiving rewards. This can lead to risky behaviour, but, according to Leiden University research, it also has a positive function: it makes learning easier. Publication in Nature Communications.

Why does social anxiety increase in adolescence and how does it grow out of control in some adolescents?