Hans Hoeken (1965) studied Dutch Language & Literature at Radboud University Nijmegen. In 1989, he graduated with distinction specializing in Speech Communication and Psycholinguistics. From 1989 till 1998, he was a lecturer at the Discourse Studies Group at Tilburg University. In 1995, he defended his doctoral dissertation, The Design of Persuasive Texts: The Effects of Content, Structure, and Style on Attitude Formation. 

In 1998, he started working at the Radboud University, first as assistant professor at the Department of Communication Science (Faculty of Social Sciences), and since 1999 as associate professor at the Department of Communication & Information Studies at the Faculty of Arts. He was appointed full professor of Persuasive communication at that Department in 2004. As of September 2015, Hans Hoeken holds the chair of Communication & Information Studies at Utrecht University.