Let’s write about sex and gender

Why and how do you measure sex or gender in your research participants? Are you still using a single binary question (male/female), or do you still add the option “other”? Are you aware of the differences between sex and gender? This blog post provides some hands-on best practices tips for including sex and/or gender in your research and for writing about them in an inclusive way.

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Psychological research in the UMCG: what is out there?

When you hear about students doing a Research Master in the University Medical Center Groningen (UMCG) after a Bachelor in Psychology, you probably would infer that these students totally changed their sides. But research at the hospital is not purely medical. Studying the psychological aspects of certain diseases is surprisingly commonplace and the expertise and […]

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CPE: A combination of psychology and medicine

“Which specialization should I take within the broad discipline called Psychology?” Numerous Psychology Bachelor students struggle with this issue and are doubtful about which Master’s degree they should pursue. Student Carl-Peter Van Erpecum discusses the option of joining a research master program at the UMCG, called Clinical and Psychosocial Epidemiology (CPE).

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An Example of Blurry Boundaries

In a recent literature review my co-authors and I compared the symptoms and causes of schizophrenia spectrum disorders and dissociative disorders. The results show the limitations of categorical models of psychopathology (e.g. DSM-5) compared to models that view symptoms as extremes of normal behavior, and models emphasizing that symptoms can cause other symptoms.

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