My research can be positioned at the intersection of sociology, social networks, human geography, and urban geography.

I have many years of experience in social network research, specialising in how contextual opportunities and constraints affect the composition and structure of, and changes in personal networks – and how these network characteristics and contextual factors relate to life chances and behaviours of various actors, including neighbourhood residents, local entrepreneurs, prisoners, and young individuals (both natives and immigrants). I have also built up expertise in collecting large-scale panel survey data with a particular focus on personal networks and changes therein over the years (e.g., The Survey on the Social Networks of the Dutch).

In my PhD research Networks in Contexts, I examined how meeting opportunities affect personal relationships. The social contexts we enter in daily life, such as the workplace, the family, the neighborhood, and associations, provide the ‘pool’ of available others for selecting personal network members. This means that with whom we work and socialize, with whom we become friends, and even whom we marry is not merely an individual decision, but also depends on conditions beyond ourselves. By examining how meeting in various social contexts affects the composition of personal networks, characteristics of relationships, the structure of networks, and changes in personal networks after seven years, I have shown that opportunities for contact affect personal relationships and networks. (send me an email if you are interested in receiving a copy of my dissertation)

I enjoy working together with sociologists, specialized in social networks, family sociology and other research fields, as well as with economic geographers, urban geographers and criminologists. In relation to (urban) social and economic development, I am interested in the mutual influence between local social and physical order and the presence and success of small local firms; the development of local community; and formal and informal networks (local and beyond) of entrepreneurs. In relation to family sociology, I am interested in how family structures and relationships with family members affect the composition and structure of, and changes in personal networks. In relation to criminology, I am interested in, for example, how detention affects personal networks, and how network characteristics relate to personal victimization and fear of crime.

Between 2011 and 2017, I have also been employed as researcher at the department of Sociology at Stockholm University in Sweden, working for the project entitled Individual Life Chances in Social Context - A Longitudinal Multi-Methods Perspective on Social Constraints and Opportunities (initiated and led by Jens Rydgren, Stockholm Universtiy, Sweden, and Christofer Edling, Lund University, Sweden). As part of this project, I studied and compared the (ethnic) composition and structure of, as well as changes in the personal networks of young native Swedes and immigrants in Sweden and examined how these networks affect their life chances, e.g., in terms of psychological well-being and personal victimization.

Supervision of PhD candidates:

Supervisor of Gabriel Otero at Dept. of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Utrecht University (2020-  )
Supervisor of Marianne de Beer at Dept. of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Utrecht University (2014 - 2019)Supervisor of Marianne de Beer at Dept. of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Utrecht University (2014 - 2019)
Daily supervisor of Jesper Rözer at the Department of Sociology, Utrecht University (2011- 2016)
Supervisor of Qin Xiao (visiting PhD student from Nanjing University) at the Department of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Utrecht University (September ’14 – September ‘15)
Supervisor of Ruben de Cuyper, NSCR / VU University, Amsterdam, the Netherlands (May ’13 – May '15)
Member of the doctoral committee of Katrien van Cleemput, Department of Communication Studies, Faculty of Political and Social Sciences, University of Antwerp, Belgium (2010-2012)