One of the most crucial aspects of our behaviour is our motivation to explore novel environments and interact with new people. This became painfully clear during the COVID-19 lockdowns, when many people suffered from lack of new experiences and real-life social interactions. The relevance of novelty…

In Spring 2023, Simona Demková and Daniel Mândrescu from the Europa Institute secured the new Leiden University Starting Grant, valued at EUR 240,000, for a collaborative project: ‘The EU’s Human-Centred Digital Transformation.’

It is a familiar phenomenon: you ask the assistant on your phone to call your mother, but it calls a friend instead. Tom Kouwenhoven, PhD student in the SAILS programme, investigates how humans and Artificial Intelligence (AI) can better communicate with each other, so that these kinds of situations…

Political Scientist Gisela Hirschmann (Leiden University) asks how international organisations can be compelled to comply with respect human rights. She finds that this is done through ‘pluralist accountability’: external third parties such as courts, NGOs, or regional organisations holding international…

How to come to valid risk stratification of alcohol use disorder?

Serge Rombouts is a physicist whose PhD thesis was about functional MRI (fMRI). This visualises activity in regions of the brain. The appealing images of glowing brain regions that emerge from the computer are the result of calculations. According to Rombouts, this isn’t proper artificial intelligence.…

Learning about circadian rhythms can help students to improve their sleep and overall well-being

Can SMILE, our multi-component intervention, which combines cognitive-behavioural therapy for insomnia, mindfulness, stress, and lifestyle components, improve sleep quality? Can it also improve mood and quality of life and prevent depression and anxiety in the long term?

Can excessive worrying be reduced via stimulation of the vagus nerve?

Canadian Roméo Dallaire (1946) was UN Commander in Rwanda at the time of the genocide there, subsequently becoming a champion of human rights. He has worked as a researcher at several different universities, and was a senator in Canada for nine years. Dallaire will give this year's Cleveringa lecture…

Professor Paul van der Heijden (International Labour Law) has been awarded a grant of 50,000 euros by the city council of The Hague to start building a Business & Human Rights database.

Dr. Katharine MacDonald (Faculty of Archaeology) sketches the background to a recent paper in Science Advances, co-authored by her and other members of the Liveable Planet team.

The updated MRI scanner at the Leiden Institute for Brain and Cognition (LIBC) will become operational on 29 September. The new version is faster and better than the current model.

Peter Rodrigues, Professor of Immigration Law, has been appointed as a deputy member of the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights for a period of eighteen months.

Which challenges occur as a tool of sustainable peace in the emerging regime of international criminal justice? Andrea Marrone's study offers an overview. He will defend his thesis on the 28th October 2015.

Currently, the bill ‘Wet versterking waarborgfunctie Awb’ (strengthening the guarantee function of the Dutch General Administrative Law Act) is in preparation. The bill is intended to strengthen the human dimension in the execution and administration of justice.

An international team of researchers, involving members from the ERC Synergy project NEXUS 1492 based at the Leiden University, the Universities of Oklahoma, Copenhagen and York reveal challenges when studying ancient microbiomes in a recent issue of Scientific Reports.

The Leiden Leadership Programme (LLP) employs experts in the field of leadership. They equip master's students from Leiden University, TU Delft and Erasmus University Rotterdam with the necessary leadership knowledge, insights and skills to increase their social impact.

Social and Behavioural Sciences, Psychology

The changes that humans are making to the landscape are beneficial for mosquitoes that spread diseases such as Zika, chikungunya and dengue. This is what biologist Maarten Schrama and his colleagues write in the journal Nature Scientific Reports. ‘If we know in which living environments mosquitoes thrive…

On Thursday 8 June 2017 Melanie Fink, Postdoctoral Researcher at the Europa Institute, participated in the Legal Seminar ‘EU Law and Undocumented Migrants: Defending Rights in the Context of Detention & Deportation’.

In the Netherlands, various local VVD parties are calling for an asylum stop. Other political parties, Ja21, BBB, PVV and FvD, also see an asylum stop as the solution to the continuing asylum problems. Earlier, an opinion poll showed that a majority (69 per cent) of the Dutch population agrees. Is an…

After successfully completing the Media Technology MSc program, Tom Kouwenhoven became a PhD student. He now investigates how humans and Artificial Intelligence can better communicate with each other, to avoid awkward confusion.

Darinka Piqani and Moritz Jesse, both from the Europa Institute Leiden, were invited as speakers at the Centre for Constitutionalism and Human Rights, established at the Faculty of Law of Charles University, Prague.

Naomi Ellemers, Professor of Social Psychology of Organisations, is one of the four winners of the Spinoza Prize for 2010. ‘This is absolutely fantastic – something that as a researcher you hardly dare to dream of!’

It is important for social animals to be able to recognise one another quickly. Humans are able to recognise each other immediately from their faces. Faces are also important for chimpanzees, but a new study by neuropsychologist Mariska Kret in PLOS ONE shows that the animals' buttocks also play a…

The Collective Experience of Empathic Data Systems (CEEDs) consortium developed novel integrated technologies that support experiencing, analysing and understanding of very large datasets.

Day-to-day activities are important in the development of social identities, the establishment of social standing, and the communal understanding of societal rules. This perspective is broadly referred to as practice theory and relates to the power of an overarching social structure and the individual…

PhD defence

From treatment plants to hot showers, emissions from water use in the U.S. are equal to 50 million cars driving around for a year. In The Washington Post, staff writer Tik Root consults different experts to learn about ways to reduce our water consumption. He also speaks with Leiden environmental scientist…

This volume, edited by Erika Kuijpers, Judith Pollmann, Johannes Müller and Jasper van der Steen, discusses practices of memory in early modern Europe.

Archives were a common target during the Second World War, and hundreds suffered damages. Among these archival losses, the losses to medieval manuscript collections stand out.

In the master’s specialisation in Economic and Consumer Psychology, students will study the psychological mechanisms that underlie many of our choices and decisions concerning consumption and other economic behaviours.

On October 14, the first symposium of the university-wide initiative SAILS took place. Scientists from Leiden University and other Dutch universities came together to share their enthusiasm and expertise in the field of Artificial Intelligence in a festive symposium, in the atmospheric Museum of Eth…

The project aims to explore Eurasian elk's role in the ecosystems of the past and its relationship with humans through analysis of its distribution and habitat in the Netherlands.

Atopic dermatitis (AD) is a common inflammatory skin disorder characterised by various epidermal alterations. Filaggrin (FLG) mutations are a major predisposing factor for AD and much research has been focused on the FLG protein.

What evaluative languages (errors, mistakes, vices, etc.) did book reviewers employ? To what extent and on what occasions did they invoke early modern vices? And to what extent did this differ across fields or change over the course of the century?

On 8 March 2023 Helen Duffy, Professor of International Human Rights and Humanitarian Law in Leiden, published a monograph on Global Trends in Counter-terrorism and the Implications for Human Rights in Africa.

Simona Demková, Assistant professor at the Europa Institute of Leiden University, publishes her book ‘Automated Decision-Making and Effective Remedies: The New Dynamics in the Protection of EU Fundamental Rights in the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice’.

Researchers from Leiden University are working with Ouwehands Zoo to improve our understanding of emotions and intelligence in orangutans. Visitors to the zoo can now watch orangutans as they play with computer touch screens.

What is leadership? Can it be taught, and if so, how? The International Leiden Leadership Programme (ILLP) helps students find their own style, say ILLP graduate Marko Simovski and his former coach Annah Neve in an interview: 'It’s about you, discovering you.'

This research master specialisation involves general courses, specialisation-specific courses, electives, research internship and your thesis.

On 4 March 2016, Melanie Fink presented her PhD research on legal accountability for human rights violations occurring during Frontex-coordinated joint border control operations at a workshop for recipients of the DOC scholarship of the Austrian Academy of Sciences.