Wout Vandycke
I graduated as a clinical orthopedagogue from KU Leuven in 2024. Motivated by both clinical practice and academic research, I have now joined the Learn2TrustLab. Within the ADLAs project, I am investigating attachment development in individuals with ADHD, aiming to gain deeper insights into this relationship. This research is conducted through collaboration between the Learn2Trust Lab and the ADHD research group led by Prof. Dr. Saskia van der Oord. While our research is fundamentally theoretical in nature, it is directly oriented toward clinical applications.
Amelie Verschueren
In 2024, I graduated as a theoretical and experimental psychologist at UGent. Within the Learn2Trust lab, I am working on a project focusing on attachment in children with ADHD and the possible role of dopamine in this. Within this project, in which I work closely with Wout and Axel, I am responsible for the experimental part that focuses mainly on learning psychology and the development of attachment-related learning tasks.
Axel Van de Weyer
I graduated as a clinical psychologist from Ghent University in 2023. Driven by (clinical) research, I found my place in the Learn2Trust Lab. In our project, we aim to gain a better understanding of the biological mechanisms that explain attachment development throughout life. Specifically, our research focuses on the effect of dopamine on (cognitive) attachment-related processes in elementary school children. This research is part of a collaboration between the Learn2Trust Lab and the ADHD research group led by Saskia Van der Oord. Our research has a fundamental theoretical character but with an eye towards clinical applications.
Samuël Budniok
I graduated from KU Leuven as a theoretical psychologist. Currently, I am pursuing a PhD focused on examining the role of oxytocin in attachment development.
To investigate our research questions, we employ both rodent (mouse) and human studies in which we administer oxytocin. The rodent studies allow us to study oxytocin’s effects on a pharmacologically detailed level whereas in the human studies, we employ innovative methods such as Virtual Reality (VR) to examine oxytocin’s effects on attachment development within a realistic setting. Through our comprehensive research, we aim to contribute to a deeper understanding of oxytocin’s function and its role in attachment development.
Sien Verelst
I graduated as a clinical psychologist. My PhD focusses on the transmission of resilience within families with children in middle childhood (10-12 years old). Resilience is the ability to positively adapt to adversity and stress. It's a protector against disease and psychological problems. We believe resilience generally originates at home. Daily family life requires constant adjusting, and we want to know how children and parents help each other during difficult times. The study I work on is part of the TRIAD Project, a big project dedicated to uncovering family resilience and all of its aspects. We will investigate the biobehavioral dynamics between family members and see how resilience is related to various factors (e.g. attachment, biomarkers, epigenetics, physiology...). I focus mainly on discovering the influence of certain biomarkers on resilience; like BDNF, oxytocin, cortisol, DHEA, testosterone and progesterone. The aim of the project is to provide more insight into the development of resilience in order to develop interventions to make children more resilient more quickly in the future.
Marlies Wintmolders
In 2015, I graduated as a clinical child psychologist. I did my internship in special youth services and went to work there after graduation. There I was introduced to the topic of attachment and the impact of ruptures in the attachment relationship between parent and child.
My PhD focuses on how attachment research can be integrated into this digital world, both at the fundamental level and in terms of clinical applications. In the fundamental part, I investigate how attachment develops in middle childhood using a Virtual Reality game. For the clinical application, FamilieLink was developed, a blended tool for parents with children aged 0 - 18 years with the aim of improving and strengthening the parent-child attachment relationship.
Kexin Li
My research interests are mainly about the role of parental mentalisation in child attachment development, and I'm also interested in the relation between child attachment and early maladaptive schemas.
Nadischa Dierdorp
As a clinical psychologist, my primary focus centers around resilience in families, which refers to the ability of both children and parents to withstand and recover from stressful and adverse events. Given that everyday family life involves continually adapting to challenging circumstances, our research delves into the transmission of stress resilience among fathers, mothers, and children (during middle childhood). We aim to uncover the biobehavioral dynamics that contribute to the transfer of resilience within families. Specifically, my personal objective is to deepen our understanding of the individual variations in attachment development within family systems by examining factors such as support-seeking and rejection behaviors exhibited by both parents and children, their psychophysiological stress response, biomarkers (including hormones), and epigenetics.
Nele Bergers
In 2020, I graduated as a clinical psychologist at KU Leuven. Subsequently, I obtained my diploma in Sexology at the same university. I am currently doing a PhD about the (cost)effectiveness of Attachment Based Family Therapy (ABFT) in suicidal young adults (18 – 25 years old). 13 institutions in the Netherlands and Belgium are participating in this study. During my PhD, I work together with the PhD student in the Netherlands.
Ilse Devacht
Ilse currently works as a clinical psychologist, therapist, trainer and researcher at Asster Hospital, Sint-Truiden. She is a CBT therapist, trainer and supervisor and an accredited Attachment Based Family Therapy (ABFT) therapist, trainer and supervisor (Drexel University Philadelphia). In collaboration with her team, prof Bosmans, dr Levy and prof Diamond, she has adopted the ABFT principles into a guidance framework for interdisciplinary teams. It can be implemented in in- and outpatient settings with the aim of supporting family work in restoring attachment ruptures between caregivers and kids. The program, Attachment Based Care for Teams, consists of training, team supervision and organisational change in order to create a secure learning environment for vulnerable youth to restore trust in help and care.
Ilse is piloting clinical research on the impact ABFT family therapy and the milieu program has on psychological health and identity formation in young adults with severe psychiatric disturbances, admitted in a psychiatric unit.
