PhD Position: Cognitive Neuroscience of Curiosity at the Donders Centre for Cognition

Curiosity is a powerful driver of learning, yet we still know relatively little about the neurocognitive mechanisms that support curiosity in children. In this PhD project, you will investigate curiosity in 10- to 12-year-old children from a behavioural, neural and computational perspective.

The project combines behavioural experiments, fMRI and computational modelling to better understand how children become curious, how they decide to seek information and how curiosity supports learning and memory. You will design and conduct experimental studies, review the scientific literature, recruit and test participants, analyse behavioural and neuroimaging data and write scientific articles that will form the basis of your dissertation.

You will work closely with your supervisors, another PhD candidate in Educational Sciences and a broader interdisciplinary team at the Donders Centre for Cognition. The position also involves communicating with children, parents and schools, presenting your work to national and international audiences, and contributing to teaching for approximately 10% of your time.

Would you like to learn more about what it’s like to pursue a PhD at Radboud University? Visit the page about working as a PhD candidate.

PhD Position: From Ecological Violence to Ecologies of Care in Latin America and the Caribbean

The Department of Anthropology and Development Studies at Radboud University invites applications for a fully funded PhD position, starting November 2026. We are looking for a PhD candidate who wants to develop an independent research project at the intersection of slow violence, decolonial ecologies and gender.

We are particularly interested in projects that explore how violence against nature is simultaneously violence against people, with women and other minoritised bodies often most affected by it. We welcome proposals that ask about the perpetual, colonial and cumulative violences that are perpetrated against the more-than-human world and, from a power-sensitive and eco-feminist perspective, address how both nature and people are affected by and respond to it. We are interested in questions such as “What forms of ecological violence exist?”, “How does this violence affect women and/or other minoritised bodies?”, “How do the affected people resist violence with everyday practices of mutual care and repair?” and “In what creative ways do they shape alternative futures for themselves and their more-than-human environment?”

Your project should engage with these themes in Latin America and/ or the Caribbean. We are interested in proposals that show a sensitivity to intersectionality and a focus on gender, and engage with colonial histories and their enduring effect on present social and ecological contexts. Proposals should ask a research question that can explore ecological violences and how people respond to them using qualitative, ethnographic and co-creative approaches, including arts-based approaches, as the latter are sensitive to local artful strategies of resistance and repair and particularly suitable to explore the hidden aspects of violent experiences. We also would like you to engage with societal partners in your research, where possible.

Do you have a clear and innovative research idea that examines ecological violence, while exploring how it affects women and marginalised communities in Latin America and/or the Caribbean? Do you have an affinity for feminist epistemology and ethnography? Do you think that your research project can speak meaningfully to today’s urgent challenges of violence, threats to entangled more-than-human life worlds, imaginations of less exploitative futures and change making? If so, we encourage you to apply.

We are committed to welcoming applicants from a wide range of backgrounds (anthropology, development studies, geography) and particularly encourage applications from people of the Global Majority and from minoritised communities. Regional experience and language skills relevant to your chosen research area are essential!

You will be based in the Nijmegen area, except where research activities such as fieldwork require travel.

Your duties and responsibilities include:

• Setting up and carrying out in-depth and independent qualitative ethnographic and co-creative fieldwork.
• Setting up and completing a PhD thesis within four years.
• Authoring and co-authoring publications with your supervisors.
• Participating in conferences, workshops, seminars and other scholarly activities.
• Being an active member of the Department of Anthropology and Development Studies.
• Teaching courses within the Department of Anthropology and Development Studies.
• Follow courses to support your PhD trajectory.

Your supervisors will be Dr Catrien Notermans, Dr Sonja Marzi, Dr Elke Linders.

Would you like to learn more about what it’s like to pursue a PhD at Radboud University? Visit the page about working as a PhD candidate.

PhD Position: Cognitive Neuroscience of Curiosity at the Donders Centre for Cognition

Curiosity is a powerful driver of learning, yet we still know relatively little about the neurocognitive mechanisms that support curiosity in children. In this PhD project, you will investigate curiosity in 10- to 12-year-old children from a behavioural, neural and computational perspective.

The project combines behavioural experiments, fMRI and computational modelling to better understand how children become curious, how they decide to seek information and how curiosity supports learning and memory. You will design and conduct experimental studies, review the scientific literature, recruit and test participants, analyse behavioural and neuroimaging data and write scientific articles that will form the basis of your dissertation.

You will work closely with your supervisors, another PhD candidate in Educational Sciences and a broader interdisciplinary team at the Donders Centre for Cognition. The position also involves communicating with children, parents and schools, presenting your work to national and international audiences, and contributing to teaching for approximately 10% of your time.

Would you like to learn more about what it’s like to pursue a PhD at Radboud University? Visit the page about working as a PhD candidate.

PhD Position: Cognitive Neuroscience of Curiosity at the Donders Centre for Cognition

Curiosity is a powerful driver of learning, yet we still know relatively little about the neurocognitive mechanisms that support curiosity in children. In this PhD project, you will investigate curiosity in 10- to 12-year-old children from a behavioural, neural and computational perspective.

The project combines behavioural experiments, fMRI and computational modelling to better understand how children become curious, how they decide to seek information and how curiosity supports learning and memory. You will design and conduct experimental studies, review the scientific literature, recruit and test participants, analyse behavioural and neuroimaging data and write scientific articles that will form the basis of your dissertation.

You will work closely with your supervisors, another PhD candidate in Educational Sciences and a broader interdisciplinary team at the Donders Centre for Cognition. The position also involves communicating with children, parents and schools, presenting your work to national and international audiences, and contributing to teaching for approximately 10% of your time.

Would you like to learn more about what it’s like to pursue a PhD at Radboud University? Visit the page about working as a PhD candidate.

PhD Position: From Ecological Violence to Ecologies of Care in Latin America and the Caribbean

The Department of Anthropology and Development Studies at Radboud University invites applications for a fully funded PhD position, starting November 2026. We are looking for a PhD candidate who wants to develop an independent research project at the intersection of slow violence, decolonial ecologies and gender.

We are particularly interested in projects that explore how violence against nature is simultaneously violence against people, with women and other minoritised bodies often most affected by it. We welcome proposals that ask about the perpetual, colonial and cumulative violences that are perpetrated against the more-than-human world and, from a power-sensitive and eco-feminist perspective, address how both nature and people are affected by and respond to it. We are interested in questions such as “What forms of ecological violence exist?”, “How does this violence affect women and/or other minoritised bodies?”, “How do the affected people resist violence with everyday practices of mutual care and repair?” and “In what creative ways do they shape alternative futures for themselves and their more-than-human environment?”

Your project should engage with these themes in Latin America and/ or the Caribbean. We are interested in proposals that show a sensitivity to intersectionality and a focus on gender, and engage with colonial histories and their enduring effect on present social and ecological contexts. Proposals should ask a research question that can explore ecological violences and how people respond to them using qualitative, ethnographic and co-creative approaches, including arts-based approaches, as the latter are sensitive to local artful strategies of resistance and repair and particularly suitable to explore the hidden aspects of violent experiences. We also would like you to engage with societal partners in your research, where possible.

Do you have a clear and innovative research idea that examines ecological violence, while exploring how it affects women and marginalised communities in Latin America and/or the Caribbean? Do you have an affinity for feminist epistemology and ethnography? Do you think that your research project can speak meaningfully to today’s urgent challenges of violence, threats to entangled more-than-human life worlds, imaginations of less exploitative futures and change making? If so, we encourage you to apply.

We are committed to welcoming applicants from a wide range of backgrounds (anthropology, development studies, geography) and particularly encourage applications from people of the Global Majority and from minoritised communities. Regional experience and language skills relevant to your chosen research area are essential!

You will be based in the Nijmegen area, except where research activities such as fieldwork require travel.

Your duties and responsibilities include:

• Setting up and carrying out in-depth and independent qualitative ethnographic and co-creative fieldwork.
• Setting up and completing a PhD thesis within four years.
• Authoring and co-authoring publications with your supervisors.
• Participating in conferences, workshops, seminars and other scholarly activities.
• Being an active member of the Department of Anthropology and Development Studies.
• Teaching courses within the Department of Anthropology and Development Studies.
• Follow courses to support your PhD trajectory.

Your supervisors will be Dr Catrien Notermans, Dr Sonja Marzi, Dr Elke Linders.

Would you like to learn more about what it’s like to pursue a PhD at Radboud University? Visit the page about working as a PhD candidate.