PhD Position on measuring and intervening on stress in daily life

• Hours40 hr.

• Salary indication€ 2,541 - € 3,247

• Deadline24 Feb 2023

The Interaction Design group at the University of Twente has a vacancy for a PhD -candidate within the ambitious Stress-in-Action project. For this position we will collaborate with University Medical Centre Groningen and the department of Psychology, Health and technology of the University of Twente.

Stress-in-Action project

In this project, 25 multidisciplinary scientists from six Dutch Universities collaborate around the theme ‘stress in daily life’. Divided over three Research Themes and three Support Cores, the Stress-in-Action consortium, we will validate daily-life stress assessments, examine which contextual factors contribute to the experience of daily-life stress, and examine how daily-life stress leads to the development of both mental and cardiometabolic diseases. The project is funded through the Dutch Scientific Organization under the Gravitation program. More details can be found here.

What will you be doing?

As the PhD-candidate, your main mission is to provide the Stress-in-Action community with standards for responsible design so that user diversity, values, and acceptance are broadly considered in working with and in designing apps and wearables for the continuous (and reliable) recording of the physiological stress response in daily life.

You will start out by reviewing current practices and experiences of measuring stress and understanding / intervening on stress. Followed by a review on current practices in value sensitive design and identification of the ethically salient aspects, you will define three cases (with user groups from the SiA network) for user involvement (variety in cases: health care workers / patient groups) and define their relevant value networks.

Using these insights, you will follow a research through design approach and (re-)design promising stress monitoring wearables and/or their interaction. During the design process you will work with user groups and other stakeholders. Subsequently, you will work on connecting the learnings from the value sensitive design process to standards for responsible design of stress monitoring and intervention.

For more information about these vacancy, you can contact prof. dr. ir. Geke Ludden (g.d.s.ludden@utwente.nl) or dr. Armagan Karahanoglu (a.karahanoglu@utwente.nl).

Submit your motivation letter and a recent curriculum vitae until February 24, 2023 using the link below.

A first round of job interviews is planned for March 6, 2023.

The Faculty of Engineering Technology (ET) engages in education and research of Mechanical Engineering, Civil Engineering and Industrial Design Engineering. We enable society and industry to innovate and create value using efficient, solid and sustainable technology. We are part of a ‘people-first' university of technology, taking our place as an internationally leading center for smart production, processes and devices in five domains: Health Technology, Maintenance, Smart Regions, Smart Industry and Sustainable Resources. Our faculty is home to about 2,900 Bachelor's and Master's students, 550 employees and 150 PhD candidates. Our educational and research programmes are closely connected with UT research institutes Mesa+ Institute, TechMed Center and Digital Society Institute.