Koen Ponnet

• PhD
• Professor at Ghent University

Background Students are increasingly engaging in the nonmedical use of prescription stimulants (NMUPS) to enhance their study performance. However, little research has been conducted on the effectiveness of interventions to reduce NMUPS. This study assessed the effect of a social norms approach (SNA) intervention on NMUPS and the perception of NMUP...

Low abstinence self-efficacy, lack of social support, especially from family and friends, low self-esteem, feeling lonely, and lack of self-control have been considered as risk factors for substance use disorders, but the pathways of these risk factors on drug craving have not yet been determined. Therefore, the present study aimed to evaluate the...

title>ABSTRACT Background: Sexting is now widely acknowledged as a common sexual behavior among adolescents and young adults. However, the occurrence of abusive interactions, such as non-consensual sexting, warrants attention. Prevalence rates of non-consensual sexting vary between countries, influenced by gender and age. The present study examine...

During exams students are prone to disrupted sleep. The present two‐wave longitudinal study examines the interplay between study motivation, test anxiety, academic procrastination, and sleep among 121 university students (78.5% female; M age = 21.69, SD = 1.39). To estimate changes when approaching exams, participants completed surveys in the month...

Background Timely dental care during childhood can effectively prevent many dental issues and their potential long-term complications. Aim To identify factors associated with the selection of clinics providing dental care and services for children from parental perspective. Design method A thematic qualitative study was conducted, involving paren...

Introduction Mental illnesses have a high prevalence among elderly patients. It is estimated that half of the elderly do not utilize the psychiatric care that they need. Paying attention to patient preferences can improve treatment adherence and patient outcomes. This study aims to qualitatively identify the preferences of elderly patients hospital...

Introduction Malaria is a climate-dependent disease influenced by gender, social determination, seasonal patterns, and relapse incidence This study reviews these characteristics of malaria in the Sistan and Baluchistan (S&B) province and another province of Iran. Methods This systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted through systematic and...

Sharenting implies parents sharing personal information of their child online, therefore, making decisions that impact their child’s privacy. This chapter applies the Communication Privacy Management (CPM) theory to parents’ sharenting practices. CPM explains how people regulate revealing or concealing personal information. In the context of sharen...

Given the ubiquitous nature of love, numerous theories have been proposed to explain its existence. One such theory refers to love as a commitment device, suggesting that romantic love evolved to foster commitment between partners and enhance their reproductive success. In the present study, we investigated this hypothesis using a large-scale sampl...

Background The implementation of social innovations for addressing societal challenges, particularly in health, leverages community participation and technology to optimally meet social needs compared to traditional approaches. A key feature of these innovations is their ability to utilize existing capacities for contributing to resolving infectiou...

Existing research indicates that ‘partner phubbing’ is associated with heightened conflict and lower relationship satisfaction. However, previous studies have relied on cross-sectional designs involving subjective self-reports of only one partner. In this study, the main hypothesis entailed that the link between partner phubbing and relationship qu...

Background In 2016, The World Health Organization introduced HIV self-testing (HIVST) as an alternative to traditional HIV testing (1), the present study aims to study the acceptability of HIV self-testing among Iranian women injecting drug users (WIDUs). The results of this study are expected to provide valuable evidence for the proper implementat...

Since heating-related energy consumption is one of the main sources of greenhouse gas emissions and accounts for a large part of domestic energy use in Europe, reducing heating-related energy consumption has great potential to reduce Europe’s greenhouse gas emissions. This study examines which factors determine people's intention to decrease heatin...

Hazardous alcohol use tends to be more prominent among higher education students. The COVID-19 pandemic severely altered student life, raising questions on its impact on students’ alcohol use patterns. The current study examined cross-country variations in drinking behaviors (weekly drinking and binge drinking), and the extent to which these variat...

Background Health tourism is an important component that may influence the direction of development in a region. Mazandarn, Iran, is recognized as a highly sustainable market in the region because of its abundant natural resources, temperate temperature, and strategic geographical location. Therefore, considering the importance of health tourism an...

Background People with substance use disorders (SUDs) have restricted engagement with health-care facilities and describe repeated experiences of stigma, discrimination, and mistreatment when receiving care at health-care and public addiction treatment centers (PATCs). The purpose of the current study is to design practical cultural-based strategie...

This systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of spiritually based interventions on blood pressure (BP) among adults. A systematic search was performed using the PubMed, Scopus, and Cochrane databases to identify studies evaluating spiritual interventions, including meditation, transcendental meditation, mindfulness m...

Background Alcohol consumption is prevalent among students, with a common tendency to overestimate peers' alcohol use, contributing to increased consumption. This misperception is evident among Flemish students. This study aimed to develop and assess a Social Norms Approach (SNA) intervention targeting Flemish students to correct misperceptions and...

Cyber dating abuse (CDA) concerns the use of digital technology to control, monitor, and hurt one’s intimate partner. CDA can have profound detrimental outcomes, such as mental health problems. As such, it is important to identify intrapersonal factors that may explain these behaviors. Previous research suggests that one such factor is the personal...

Elderly pedestrians are among the most vulnerable groups in terms of traffic-related injuries. This study aimed to investigate traffic behaviour and its determinants among elderly pedestrians in Iran. This cross-sectional study examined the traffic behaviour of 600 elderly pedestrians in Zanjan, Northwestern Iran. The participants were selected usi...

Despite the common belief that spending excessive time on social media apps harms adolescents' daily functioning, the impact of screen time is likely to differ depending on how well the use of social media aligns with adolescents' psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Grounded in self-determination theory, the aim of this s...

Adolescents are currently the most digitally connected generation in history. There is an ever-growing need to understand how typical adolescent risk-taking intersects with the vastly criminogenic potential of digital technology. Criminal hacking in older adolescents (16–19-year-olds) was assessed using an adapted Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB)...

Background Chronic diseases and metabolic disorders are prevalent health concerns that often escalate with increasing age and thus affect older individuals. The proportion of the elderly population in Iran increased from 7.22% in 2006 to 12.0% in 2023. The current study aimed to evaluate lifestyle patterns and lifestyle risk factors among patients...

Background The shortage of skilled nurses is a major concern for health systems worldwide. This may be partly due to the hesitancy of some nurses to enter or remain in the nursing career. This shortage consequently reduces the quality of standard patient care, increases patients’ length of stay in a hospital, increases medical costs, and results in...

This study employs the orientation–stimulus–reasoning–orientation–response (O-S-R-O-R) framework to examine how multi-platform news consumption is associated with civic participation during the COVID-19 pandemic (offline and via social media) and how this relation is mediated by civic talk and civic attitudes. A survey was administered to 1500 adul...

Background: Illicit substance use is common at music festivals. One could question whether festival attendees deliberately plan to take drugs at such events or whether their illicit (poly)drug use is provoked by specific circumstances, such as the presence of peers or a general belief that others are using drugs at the festival. Objectives: The pre...

The current study investigates attitudes toward one form of sex for resources: the so-called sugar relationships, which often involve exchanges of resources for sex and/or companionship. The present study examined associations among attitudes toward sugar relationships and relevant variables (e.g., sex, sociosexuality, gender inequality, parasitic...

Introduction Debate about the precise role of social media use (SMU) in the mental health of today's adolescents is still ongoing. The present study adds to the literature by focusing on adolescents' experiences during SMU and in their offline activities through the lens of basic psychological needs, which are central to self‐determination theory....

As romantic relationships in young adulthood (18-25 years) are frequently characterized by experimentation and risk-taking, this could make young adults particularly vulnerable to experience sexual harassment by a dating or committed partner. This study examines young adults' victimization and perpetration experiences of online and in-person sexual...

Various drug-related strategies are being implemented at festivals to reduce drug use or the risks associated with it, including prevention, harm reduction, healthcare, and law enforcement. The effectiveness of some of these strategies has not been consistently demonstrated, whereas others remain unexplored in terms of their impact. As a result, fo...

Love is a phenomenon that occurs across the world and affects many aspects of human life, including the choice of, and process of bonding with, a romantic partner. Thus, developing a reliable and valid measure of love experiences is crucial. One of the most popular tools to quantify love is Sternberg’s 45-item Triangular Love Scale (TLS-45), which...

Background Healthcare workers (HCWs) are essential resources, and their health and wellbeing are key not only for offering constant and useful care facilities to clients, but also for maintaining the safety of the workforce and patients. The risk of severe mental health problems among HCWs may have increased during large outbreaks of COVID-19. To e...

Background We aimed to review the effectiveness of health promotion interventions in the use of helmet and to identify the types of effective health promotion strategies among the examined studies. Methods A systematic search was performed on the PubMed, Scopus, Cochrane, and Embase databases up to 1 Aug 2022 to find the studies evaluated the effe...

Since buildings are responsible for 25% of greenhouse gas emissions globally, energy efficiency renovations (EERs) are key to reduce energy use and greenhouse gas emissions. Therefore, it is necessary to understand the determinants of performing an EER. An extended model of Ajzen's Theory of Planned Behaviour was implemented to examine the impact o...

Sexting concerns the act of sending, receiving, or forwarding sexually explicit messages or photos (i.e., ‘sexts’) through electronic means. When sexts are received or forwarded without the consent of the original sender, this is called non-consensual sexting. Our study set out to increase our understanding as to why individuals engage in non-conse...

Background Lack of protection or improper protection, is one of the most important reasons of child passenger’s death and injury in traffic crashes. Based on what we see on the roads, Iranian children are unrestrained inside the car. The aim of this study was to investigate children restrained system (CRS) use rate, its socio-demographic determinan...

Background A patient-centered approach to the treatment of substance use is helpful in achieving positive treatment outcomes. This study aimed to explore male patients’ preferences for opioid use treatments. Methods A qualitative study was conducted in Isfahan, a city in the center of Iran. The study sample included 64 male participants who had st...

Background Social innovation is one of the strategies for appealing to people and encouraging social cooperation and engagement in interventions during crisis periods. In this regard, community engagement is an operative and innovative community health approach for achieving successful health outcomes. There is limited information about the role an...

Reducing heating-related energy consumption is vital in Europe, where it accounts for a significant portion of domestic energy usage. We studied the factors that influence reduced heating-related consumption by using three theoretical frameworks: the Theory of Planned Behaviour, the Value Belief Norm theory, and the Prototype Willingness Model. Our...

Feelings of dissatisfaction with the political status quo are believed to mobilize citizens into non-institutional political action, such as protest. Still, little is known about whether and how political participation through social media provide an alternative voicing route for discontented citizens. Guided by grievance theory, this article asses...

Background One of the major goals of health systems is providing a financing strategy without inequality; this has a significant impact on people’s access to healthcare. The present study aimed to investigate the inequality in households’ financial contribution (HFC) to health expenditure both before and after the implementation of the Iranian Heal...

EDM event attendees are a high-risk population for substance use and associated adverse effects. The aim of this study was to examine substance use at EDM events, focusing on associations between attendance motives and substance use. Sociodemographic characteristics, event specifics, past-year use, and attendance motives were assessed through an on...

Love is a worldwide known phenomenon that affects many aspects of human life, including considering a romantic partner with whom to bond. Thus, developing a reliable and valid measure of love experiences is crucial. One of the most popular tools to test love levels is Sternberg's 45-item Triangular Love Scale (TLS-45), which measures three love com...

Background The present study aims to investigate one of the major causes of traffic accidents: drivers' unsafe behaviors while driving. Methods In this cross-sectional study, the behaviors of 946 drivers at traffic lights were observed in the morning, at noon, and in the evening using direct in-field observation. The unsafe behaviors of the driver...

This article reports the findings of a multi-method study that explored whether frequency and duration of parental smartphone use in the presence of children is associated with parents’ perceptions of quality time and child restlessness, an indicator of difficult child behavior. Additionally, the study explored whether parental perceptions of techn...

This paper aims to determine the prevalence of the use of online neighborhood networks (ONNs) and explores which socio-demographic, socioeconomic status (SES), social integration, and media use determinants predict ONN membership and uses. Drawing on a stratified random sample (Ghent, Belgium), we found that over a third of the population are ONN m...

In this chapter, we describe the development of the COVID-19 pandemic and its relation with different crime patterns in Belgium. Based on crime statistics, we examined the occurrence of various crime types in 2020 and made comparisons with previous years. Additionally, we paid extra attention to the case of domestic violence during the pandemic usi...

An exponential amount of academic research has been dedicated to the safety culture concept, but still, no consensus has been reached on its definition and content. In general, safety culture research lacks an interdisciplinary approach. Furthermore, although the concept of safety culture is characterised by complexity and multifacetedness, the saf...

The present study investigates to what extent the three key concepts from the Dark Triad Theory can explain individual differences in adult offending. Data were collected through a cross-sectional survey amongst a representative sample of 1587 adults, living in Ghent, Belgium (Mage = 48.06, 51.4% female). Negative binomial regression analyses are r...

Wetenschappelijk onderzoek kan niet meer zonder statistiek. In het gros van de wetenschappelijke artikels en rapporten worden statistische methoden en technieken gebruikt, van zeer eenvoudig tot zeer geavanceerd. Studenten, onderzoekers en professionals uit verschillende disciplines hebben er dan ook alle belang bij statistiek te kunnen toepassen:...

People across the world and throughout history have gone to great lengths to enhance their physical appearance. Evolutionary psychologists and ethologists have largely attempted to explain this phenomenon via mating preferences and strategies. Here, we test one of the most popular evolutionary hypotheses for beauty-enhancing behaviors, drawn from m...

Background and Purpose: COVID-19’s proliferation worldwide remains a significant threat to public health; therefore, the assessment and measurement of people’s intentions concerning the prevention of this threat can contribute to the development of suitable educational messages that promote preventive behaviors. This study aimed to develop a questi...

People across the world and throughout history have gone to great lengths to enhance their physical appearance. Evolutionary psychologists and ethologists have largely attempted to explain this phenomenon via mating preferences and strategies. Here, we test one of the most popular evolutionary hypotheses for beauty-enhancing behaviors, drawn from m...

People across the world and throughout history have gone to great lengths to enhance their physical appearance. Evolutionary psychologists and ethologists have largely attempted to explain this phenomenon via mating preferences and strategies. Here, we test one of the most popular evolutionary hypotheses for beauty-enhancing behaviors, drawn from m...

Partner phubbing (Pphubbing) concerns the act of ignoring a romantic partner during a conversation by paying attention to the mobile phone. In previous research, Pphubbing has been associated with several negative relationship outcomes, such as relationship dissatisfaction. In this study, we propose that another consequence of Pphubbing may be that...

Human resource (HR) professionals who assess job candidates may engage in cybervetting, the collection and analysis of applicants’ personal information available on social network sites (SNS). This raises important questions about the privacy of job applicants. In this study, interviews were conducted with 24 HR professionals from profit and govern...

Schermen: we zijn er helemaal zot van. En wij niet alleen, want ook de jongste generaties kunnen niet meer zonder. Al negen edities lang zoekt het Apestaartjarenonderzoek uit wat kinderen en jongeren tussen 6 en 18 jaar daar juist mee aanvangen. Welke toestellen gebruiken ze? Hoe gedragen ze zich in de online wereld? Wat kunnen ze al goed en waar h...

Background: With the outbreak of Covid-19, migrant workers have faced new and intensified problems. The present qualitative study aims to explore the challenges faced by Kurdish migrant workers during the Covid-19 pandemic. Methods: Applying a qualitative approach, we conducted 29 semi-structured in-depth qualitative interviews with Kurdish migrant...

Background With the outbreak of Covid-19, migrant workers have faced new and intensified problems. The present qualitative study aims to explore the challenges faced by Kurdish migrant workers during the Covid-19 pandemic. Methods Applying a qualitative approach, we conducted 29 semi-structured in-depth qualitative interviews with Kurdish migrant...

The COVID-19 pandemic prompted many countries to issue far-reaching policy measures that may have led to increased substance use. Higher education students may have been disproportionally affected due to the rearrangement of educational life and their susceptibility to psychosocial distress and substance use. The current study examined associations...

The present study examined men’s experiences of intimate partner violence (IPV) and associated mental health problems. Specifically, we investigated men’s (poly)victimization, (poly) perpetration, and victim-perpetrator overlap experiences of physical, sexual, psychological, and cyber IPV, and associations with anxiety and depression. Data were col...

This study focuses on the use of systematic social observations (SSO) to measure crime prevention through environmental design (CPTED) and disorder. To improve knowledge about measurement issues in small area research, SSO is conducted by means of three different methods: in-situ, photographs, and Google Street View (GSV) imagery. By evaluating the...

First-year university students encounter considerable academic stress, possibly resulting in mental health problems. Although studies have illustrated the academic and health benefits of sense of belonging, few studies have focused on its role in the relationship between academic stress and mental health complaints. The current study used structura...

Introduction One of the major goals of health is providing a financing system without inequality; it has a significant impact on people’s access to healthcare. The present study aimed to investigate the inequality in households’ financial contribution to health expenditure before and after implementation of the Iranian Health Transformation Plan(HT...

Objective The misuse of prescription stimulants among students has been identified as a public health problem. To date, most research has focused on individual-level determinants of stimulant misuse, making research on the socio-cultural context of students’ misuse a priority. This study aims to test the applicability of the Theory of Triadic Influ...

To date, few studies have investigated within-group differences in internet use among people with intellectual disabilities (ID). Previous research on internet use among people with disabilities has compared the internet access and use of people with and without disabilities, has investigated general benefits and risks associated with internet use...

Sexting – een digitale vorm van seksuele communicatie

Background: In several countries, contact tracing apps (CTAs) have been introduced to warn users if they have had high-risk contacts that could expose them to SARS-CoV-2 and therefore could develop COVID-19 or further transmit the virus. For CTAs to be effective, sufficient critical mass of users is needed. Until now, adoption of these apps in sev...

Safety climate and safety culture are important research domains in risk and safety science, and various industry and service sectors show significant interest in, and commitment to, applying its concepts, theories, and methods to enhance organizational safety performance. Despite the large body of literature on these topics, there are disagreement...

Welke rol kunnen personeelsleden en studenten zelf opnemen in de beveiliging van hogeschool- en universiteitscampussen? De bijzondere eigenschappen van hogere onderwijsinstrellingen zorgen ervoor dat gesofisticeerde technologische beveiligingsmaatregelen vaak niet haalbaar of wenselijk zijn. Veel potentieel kan daarom toegeschreven worden aan de me...

The Dirty Dozen (Jonason & Webster, 2010) is a frequently used concise version of the Dark Triad to measure three socially aversive personality traits: Machiavellianism, psychopathy and, narcissism. The present study has examined measurement invariance in a sample of Belgian adults. The present study aims to assess measurement invariance of the Dut...

Today, the need to deal with workplace security threats has become an important matter for many organisations. While companies have invested in technological and organization measures, the human processes behind these techniques are often ignored. However, employees’ awareness of security procedures and policy of the organisation may strengthen or...

BACKGROUND Smartwatches with an electrocardiography (ECG)-application, which are able to detect cardiac arrhythmias, can be important tools for healthcare. These devices are easy to use, collect valuable health data and fit inside many people’s daily routines. Although health wearables offer many benefits, adoption rates are lagging. Few studies on...

La présente étude vise à améliorer notre compréhension de la façon dont les festivalier·ères – en particulier, les usager·ères de drogues (UD) – et les parties prenantes (ou stakeholders) perçoivent les interventions liées aux drogues dans les festivals de musique belges, et à produire des connaissances sur le point de vue des UD, dans le but d’amé...

The aim of this study was to obtain insights into the perceptions of prevention, harm reduction, health care and law enforcement strategies and perceptions of substance use (norms) at music festivals in Belgium, through the eyes of festival attendees and festival stakeholders. A mixed-method study was conducted between 2019 and 2021, combining a qu...

De doelstelling van dit onderzoek bestond erin om inzicht te verwerven in, enerzijds de percepties omtrent preventieve-, schadebeperkings-, (gezondheids)zorg-, en repressieve (wetshandhaving) strategieën, en anderzijds in de percepties rond de normen van druggebruik, aanwezig op muziekfestivals in België. Deze percepties werden zowel bestudeerd van...

The aim of this study was to obtain insights into the perceptions of prevention, harm reduction, health care and law enforcement strategies and perceptions of substance use (norms) at music festivals in Belgium, through the eyes of festival attendees and festival stakeholders. A mixed-method study was conducted between 2019 and 2021, combining a qu...

Hoewel bevragingen over ICT-gebruik bij de algemene bevolking interessante evoluties kunnen blootleggen, blijft het een gevaar dat kwetsbare bevolkingsgroepen (bv. armen, alleenstaanden) sterk onder-gerepresenteerd zijn in deze onderzoeken. Bovendien gebeuren bevragingen over ICT-gebruik paradoxaal vaak via online rekrutering en/of online vragenlij...