Hybrid work in focus: help or hindrance to equity in employment outcomes
dr. L.S. Fruhen (V), Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen
This project examines how hybrid work affects women’s careers compared to men’s careers. It is the first attempt to capture hybrid work practices’ impact on men’s and women’s employment outcomes in the post COVID Netherlands. Using large national datasets, it tracks how working from home affects men and women’s income, promotions, job satisfaction, and leadership over time. The goal is to examine hybrid work ‘s contribution to gender (in)equality in the Netherlands.
Building better Bayesian models to improve statistical robustness
dr. M. Hinne (M), Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen
Bayesian statistical models are common in psychometric analyses, but making models requires that researchers make countless choices. Often, it is difficult to understand what their consequences are, but each choice can have substantial impact on the results of a study. One solution is to try them all at once, a multiverse analysis. However, a multiverse analysis for Bayesian models is computationally challenging. We therefore develop efficient new software to help researchers perform Bayesian multiverse analyses, and to make informed choices about which model to select. Ultimately, this helps avoid making arbitrary modeling decisions, which leads to more trustworthy statistical results.
In the spotlight: towards a neurocognitive understanding of language disfluencies in social anxiety
dr. S.B.J. Koch (V), Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen
Being in the spotlight, e.g. when delivering a public speech, is a major challenge for individuals with social anxiety, as shown by disfluencies in their speech. However, our mechanistic understanding of speech disfluencies is limited due to several conceptual and methodological challenges. To overcome these challenges, we will 1) validate a novel public speaking paradigm, where participants give a speech to an in-person audience while lying in an MRI-scanner and 2) investigate the neural correlates of speech disfluencies in individuals with varying levels of social anxiety symptoms. Together, these studies will improve our understanding of speech disfluencies in social anxiety.
Make sure students don’t become canaries in a coal mine: developing and testing strategies to support responsible AI-use in students.
dr. A. Oude Groote Beverborg (M), Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen
Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools are readily available for Higher Education students, potentially supporting the learning process. However, there is also scientific consensus that inappropriate AI-use results in cognitive offloading and deskilling. Thus, novel strategies to help students make more responsible decisions about their AI-use are urgently needed, making sure students keep an academic attitude while being prepared to handle AI-technologies responsibly. In a two-step approach, the current project will develop and test such strategies that aim to strengthen students focus on their learning process. Results of this interdisciplinary project will inform educational professionals about how to foster responsible AI-use.
"Sorry, what?" How people resolve unexpected topic shifts in conversation, and what we can learn from computational cognitive modelling
dr. M.S. Woensdregt (V), Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen
Human conversations are remarkably flexible. To make that possible, people do a lot of visible ‘work’ to keep conversations on track and quickly resolve breakdowns in communication. For example, by asking for clarification when your conversation partner unexpectedly changes topic. However, there is a lot we do not yet understand about the invisible work that people do, inside their minds, to resolve such communicative breakdowns. This project aims to explore this gap, by investigating the cognitive capacities that underlie this ability, using computational models.
About the SSH XS Grant
The SSH Open Competition XS Call for proposals is specifically intended to encourage curiosity-driven and innovative research that involves the relatively rapid exploration of a promising idea within the Social Sciences and Humanities.
The third round of the SGW Open Competition XS 2026 is now open for applications.