Education & Early Career

My professional interest in how personalities and characters develop (what makes us who we are as adults?) led me to obtain my master’s degree in Orthopedagogics at the University of Amsterdam (UvA) in 2015. This kickstarted my career as a research assistant at the UvA, where I worked on two main projects from 2013 until 2019: 1) a study about the development of social anxiety in children and 2) the development of a screening questionnaire on attachment problems in children aged 2-5.

In 2019 I started working at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam for a research project that aims to support people with intellectual disabilities in their social relationships and attachment. I worked there for 1 year before I took time off for a sabbatical.

Advancements in Research & Retraining to UX Design

After the sabbatical I returned to the VU to advance my career in research, this time starting my own research project. From 2021 to 2024 I learned a lot about kickstarting several projects simultaneously and being responsible for all aspects of research and data collection. Although I have always loved research in the scientific field, I also discovered it was time to make a big change in my career. Because UX Design is a perfect symbiosis of my research interest and my love for visual aesthetics and creativity due to my passion for photography, I finally decided to retrain myself in this exciting new field.