Jenny Veldman

• Assistant Professor at Utrecht University

Collective action is a powerful force driving social change but often sparks contention about what actions are acceptable means to effect social change. We investigated double standards in judging collective action—that is, whether observers judge the same protest actions to be more acceptable depending on who the protesters are and what they are p...

Collective action is a powerful force driving social change but often sparks contention about what actions are acceptable means to effect social change. We investigated double standards in judging collective action—that is, whether observers judge the same protest actions to be more acceptable depending on who the protesters are and what they are p...

A clear and stable notion of one's abilities in a field is an important predictor of interest and motivation. The present study examines whether the development of this clear and stable ability self‐concept is undermined for people facing negative stereotyping because of exposure to daily evaluation threats. As such, the present study examines a no...

To foster a more inclusive learning environment, this study implements a quasi-experimental intervention at a university campusof KU Leuvenin Belgium. Targeting first-year engineering students(N=88), the intervention aimedto stimulatestudents’ pro-diversity mindset through a brief explanation and reflective assignment. Our hypothesis was that stud...

Students tend to make educational choices in line with gender stereotypes. An example of such a gendered educational choice is that despite mounting evidence that girls and boys do not significantly differ in math ability (Hyde, 2014), girls are less likely to choose courses such as physics or computer science. On an aggregated level, such choices...

Having a clear and stable sense of how one performs in a field is a key contributor to goal pursuit. Performance feedback is often considered a crucial resource for developing this clear and stable self-knowledge but may be less optimally integrated when feedback is considered inaccurate or dishonest. The current paper investigates how such feedbac...

The shortage of engineering talent leads to a loss in economic output. This shortage-combat has to be fought on several fronts, one of them is attracting and retaining more currently underrepresented students. This paper discusses the need to improve a sense of belonging and to increase professional awareness, or the understanding of the different...

Collective action is a powerful force driving social change but often sparks contention about what actions are acceptable means to effect social change. In five studies (total N = 2,979), we investigated double standards in judging collective action—that is, whether observers will judge the same protest actions as more acceptable if the protesters...

Collective action is a powerful force driving social change but often sparks contention about what actions are acceptable means to effect social change. We investigated double standards in judging collective action—that is, whether observers judge the same protest actions to be more acceptable depending on who the protesters are and what they are p...

Although higher education has become more accessible to people from lower socio-economic backgrounds, the transition to university is more difficult for first- compared to continuing-generation students. Previous research showed that social identity processes are key to understand differences between first- and continuing-generation students’ exper...

In trying to understand women’s underrepresentation in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics), most existing research focuses on one STEM-field or collapses across all STEM-fields. However, these fields differ vastly in female representation: women tend to be most strongly underrepresented in technological and computer science univers...

Despite equal rights, minority groups such as ethnic minorities, LGBTQ + people, and people with mental or physical disabilities face discrimination on a day‐to‐day basis in subtle and hard‐to‐recognize forms. As discrimination slips beneath the surface, it becomes difficult to fight the stigma using collective social identity coping mechanisms. In...

We examine the degree to which women in a male-dominated field cope with daily experiences of social identity threat by distancing themselves from other women. A daily experience-sampling study among female soldiers ( N = 345 data points nested in 61 participants) showed women to self-group distance more on days in which they experienced more ident...

Special Issue description: Despite equal rights, minority groups such as ethnic minorities, LGBTQ + people, and people with mental or physical disabilities face discrimination on a day-to-day basis in subtle and hard-to-recognize forms. As discrimination slips beneath the surface, it becomes difficult to fight the stigma using collective social ide...

Despite changes in their representation and visibility, there are still serious concerns about the inclusion and day-to-day workplace challenges various groups face (e.g., women, ethnic and cultural minorities, LGBTQ+, people as they age, and those dealing with physical or mental disabilities). Men are also underrepresented in specific work fields,...

First-generation students show lower academic performance at university compared to continuing-generation students. Previous research established the value in taking a social identity perspective on this social-class achievement gap, and showed that the gap can partly be explained by lower compatibility between social background and university iden...

The current paper examines antecedents and consequences of perceiving conflict between gender and work identities in male-dominated professions. In a study among 657 employees working in 85 teams in the police force, we investigated the effect of being different from team members in terms of gender on employees’ perception that their team members s...

The current study investigates how descriptive and prescriptive gender norms that communicate work and family identities to be (in)compatible with gender identities limit or enhance young men and women’s family and career aspirations. Results show that young adults (N = 445) perceived gender norms to assign greater compatibility between female and...

This article argues that shielding from death is an important yet malleable motive. In particular, on the basis of conceptual insights into the psychology of Christianity and Islam we propose that shielding from death fulfills a more important psychological function among Christians than among Muslims. In accordance with this line of reasoning four...