Team

Team DISCONNECT consists of five members with diverse, multi-disciplinary backgrounds. What unites team DISCONNECT however, is a shared passion for doing research on digital well-being, collegiality, and a keen sense of humor.

Prof. dr. Mariek Vanden Abeele

PI | Communication Scientist | Super Power: Academic Writing and Theory Formation

Mariek Vanden Abeele (PhD) is associate professor in Digital Culture at Ghent University, and the Principal Investigator of project DISCONNECT.

Mariek developed the central theoretical framework supporting the DISCONNECT project. This framework was published in Communication Theory, and received a top paper award from the ICA Mobile Communication Division and the Denis McQuail award of the Amsterdam School of Communication Research.

As the PI of the project, Mariek plays a crucial role in the development of the research designs, the data analysis, manuscript development, and theory formation. She brings essential knowledge of theory and the literature to the project. Mariek also supervises the PhD trajectories of Sara, Kyle and David. Mariek’s super power is academic writing.

Mariek also serves as the project manager who oversees the work and activities performed in the various work packages, and is responsible for data management, ethics, finances, and – albeit reluctantly – all other administrative affairs. She is also good at networking.

Read more about Mariek, her career and her accomplishments here: https://www.ugent.be/mict/en/team/professors/mariek_vanden_abeele

Dr. Stephen Murphy

Postdoctoral Researcher | (Health) Psychologist | Super Power: Breaking Complex Problems Down into Manageable Tasks

Stephen Murphy (PhD) is postdoctoral researcher at Ghent University. He works mostly on the third work package of the project, the intensive longitudinal measurement burst study.

Stephen’s background in the psychology of hedonic consumption, and his experience with longitudinal intensive data, make him the ideal person to supervise the research activities of WP3. From developing the data collection instruments to performing state-of-the-art statistical modelling on the data, Stephen can take on every challenge.

Stephen co-supervises the PhD projects of David and Kyle, assisting with both theoretical and methodological issues, and offering feedback on the deliverables.

Stephen’s academic super power is that he is capable of understanding complex problems, and breaking them down into manageable tasks. Stephen uses this super power among others to help team members preregister their work (i.e., thinking upfront about how a research question breaks down into variables, models, …), and to think through how complex questions can be operationalized into empirically testable models.

A major achievement of Stephen on the DISCONNECT project has been the development of an automated procedure for building personalized reports for participants.

Read more about Stephen, his career and his accomplishments here: https://www.ugent.be/mict/en/team/senior_researchers/stephenmurphy

David de Segovia Vicente

PhD Candidate | Psychologist | Super Power: Statistical Genius and Sounding Board

David de Segovia Vicente (Research Master Behavioral Science) is PhD candidate at Ghent University. He works mostly on the third work package of the project, the intensive longitudinal measurement burst study.

David has a background in psychology, which he develops further within the DISCONNECT project by examining the interplay between digital well-being, emotions and mental health. With his PhD project, David aspires to lift the veil over how digital media use shapes emotions and vice versa; and how these processes may impact longer-term mental health outcomes.

David’s academic super power is that he excels at statistical modelling. He understands complex analyses and strives for the highest possible academic standards in doing research; A second super power of David is therefore also that he is a great sounding board to bounce off ideas for research questions or analysis plans.

Read more about David, his career and his accomplishments here: https://www.ugent.be/mict/en/team/junior_researchers/david-de-segovia

Kyle Van Gaeveren

PhD Candidate | Sociologist | Super Power: Data Scientist and Zen Master

Kyle Van Gaeveren (MA in Sociology) is PhD Candidate at Ghent University. He works mostly on the third work package of the project, the intensive longitudinal measurement burst study.

Kyle has a background in both sociology and informatics. His expertise is essential to the project. In his PhD work, Kyle uses his data science skills to explore how well behavioral measures perform in predicting digital well-being experiences; he layers his expertise in sociology on top of this, to explore how the former behaviors and experiences are part of the 24/7 lifestyle that is characteristic for our contemporary society. By exploring links with fatigue, stress and perceptions of the pace-of-life, Kyle’s work helps understand how digitization affects the social organization of our world.

A super power of Kyle is his capacity for wrangling data: Kyle’s work has been essential to make sense of the smartphone and laptop log data. Kyle is also the person who builds and manages the core research infrastructure for the project, including this website and the database used for participant management. Despite the complexity of his work, and the crucial nature of it to the project, Kyle also manages to keep his cool, and spreads this Zen mentality to the other team members.

Read more about Kyle, his career and his accomplishments here: https://www.ugent.be/mict/en/team/junior_researchers/kylevangaeveren.htm

Sara Van Bruyssel

PhD Candidate | Conflict & Development Studies | Super Power: Participatory Research and Social Change Maker

Sara Van Bruyssel (Master in Conflict & Development Studies) is PhD Candidate at Ghent University. She works mostly on the first and second work packages of the project, the digital ethnography (WP1) and the participatory observations (WP2).

As a humanities scholar, Sara is well-versed in qualitative research methodology. In the project, Sara uses her skills to explore the meanings and interpretations of digital well-being and digital disconnection, both in the everyday life of individuals and in (online) discourse on these two phenomena. Sara performed a discourse analysis, which revealed that digital disconnection is often framed as an individual responsibility, and that the burden of this responsibility is unevenly distributed in society. In the ethnography, Sara follows adult participants as they perform their daily activities. This research approach helps to observe the diversity of people’s digital well-being experiences and how these experiences unfold in reality, thereby lifting the veil over the individual, technological and social-contextual obstacles on the way to digital well-being.

Sara’s super power is her talent for participatory research: She observes individuals in the intimacy of their homes and social lives, which is no easy feat. Her capacity to build trust and rapport with participants, founded on a genuine desire to keep participants’ best interests at heart, allows for a collaborative setting in which participants are open and honest about the opportunities and challenges of digital media in their lives. Sara is also a social change maker: She is acutely aware of social inequality in society, and is not afraid to address it in the research, but also in the workplace and in life in general, driven by the hope that knowledge can empower individuals to effectuate change in their life and society.

Read more about Sara, her career and her accomplishments here: https://www.ugent.be/mict/en/team/junior_researchers/sara-van-bruyssel