Vervloed's research fits into the Behavioural Science institute's tradition of focusing research on people with impairments in seeing, hearing, moving and thinking. Vervloed, who is also assigned to the Educational Sciences Institute, studies the development of children and adolescents with sensory and multiple disabilities. The chair offers him an opportunity to focus on language development in these target groups and the role that Augmentative and Alternative Communication can play in this regard. Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) refers to all possible forms, strategies, methods, techniques and tools for communication.
The research is conducted along three lines. The first line is assessment of communicative competence and underpinning clinical decision-making in counselling. There is also an innovative line of research on learning to read using AAC. The third overarching line investigates how AAC can be used to benefit participation of children with multiple disabilities in society. The three lines of research are carried out within the Milo ecosystem: Stichting Milo for diagnostics and treatment of children with multiple disabilities (KLIN© and ambulatory treatment); the Milo Academy for training professionals and parents; OOK-OC! for practical research and innovation; and the chair group within the Behavioural Science Institute around Vervloed for scientific research.
'For children with communicative multiple disabilities (CMB), language and communication are not self-evident. We investigate causes and explanations as well as ways in which supported communication (OC) helps enable communication and literacy. The ultimate goal is to improve communication between children with CMB and people around them.'
About Mathijs Vervloed
Vervloed (Hilversum, 1964) graduated in Orthopedagogy from Utrecht University in 1988. He obtained his PhD from the University of Groningen, on a thesis entitled 'Learning in preterm infants, habituation, operant conditioning and their associations with motor development'. From 1994 to 1997, Vervloed was the orthopedagogue in the early intervention service for children with visual impairments at Bartiméus in Zeist and Deventer.
From 1997, Vervloed worked at Radboud University. Until 1999, he also worked at an institution for children with visual impairments in Grave (now Visio) and the Institute for the Deaf in Sint Michielsgestel (now Kentalis), working at a diagnostic centre for deaf-blind people until 2003. His appointment at Radboud University gradually expanded to full-time. At Pedagogical Sciences, he is currently responsible for the master's specialisation in Disabilities and Impairments. Since 2016, he has been associate professor, and from 2020 director of the Research Master Behavioural Science.
Vervloed mainly received subsidies from ZONMW and charities for research into children with disabilities. He has conducted research into the target group itself (tactile development in blind children, sleeping problems, viewing behavior, cognitive, language and play development) for the benefit of care providers (diagnosis of tactile development and autism in people with multiple disabilities, vision training) and the position of people with disabilities in society (attitudes towards people with disabilities, friendship, moral reasoning and acceptance of deviant behavior). He has worked abroad in two training projects. First in Croatia and later, over a period of three years, through an EU Tempus grant together with Bert Steenbergen and colleagues from the United Kingdom and Hungary, in Jordan and the West Bank in Israel. Both projects concerned training projects in the field of early guidance for children with visual and multiple disabilities.