M.A. (Marieke) Helmich, MSc

I completed my BA in Liberal Arts & Science at University College Utrecht in 2013, with a Major in Psychology and Minors in Philosophy and Methods & Statistics. During the final year of my bachelor, I also spent a semester abroad in Singapore, where I picked up a passion for cooking.

I continued my academic journey with a Research Master in Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience at Maastricht University, with a specialisation in Psychopathology. In the second year, I went to London for my research internship, where I wrote my thesis about the relationship between schizophrenia, theory of mind and social engagement in daily life. I graduated my MScRes in 2015, and stayed in London for another year (testing video games, it was fun), until I moved to Groningen to start my PhD position in November 2016. My primary focus was on examining symptom improvement in depression from a complex dynamical systems point of view.

I finalized my PhD thesis "What's in a mood? Looking for dynamic predictors of individual improvement in depression" in August 2021. I successfully defended my dissertation on 2 February 2022 and was awarded the title of doctor (cum laude).

Since January 2022, I work as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Oslo (UiO) with the COPE Research team, where I continue my studies of individual change trajectories during psychological treatment.