In 2020 it seems like the whole world has come to a stand-still due to coronavirus. The global spread and severity of the virus has enormous consequences for our society. Not only now, but in the years to come issues like inequality, resilient governance, good care and social participation have grown and became more relevant due to corona. Worldwide, but also at the Faculty of Social Sciences at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam we are committed to seek solutions to deal with these issues. On this page, we would like to share some of the initiatives that are taking place at our faculty in relation to COVID-19.
At a national level, we are making our knowledge available on the SSH – COVID-19, platform, an expertise portal for social sciences and humanities in the Netherlands which aims to provide access to SSH expertise of Dutch universities through a public platform. The portal provides rapid and direct access to academic experts.
Social Sciences for Society
VU Amsterdam’s Faculty of Social Sciences is committed to ‘Social Sciences for Society’. In our activities in teaching, research and valorisation, we engage, work on, and are committed to finding, solutions to the challenging societal problems our world faces today.
Initiatives
04-12-2020 COVID-19 RESEARCH: ENFORCING NORMS
Fear for oneself predicts how people react on enforcing norms to stop the spread of COVID-19
Fear for oneself is predictive of how important norms are and for enforcing them to stop the spread of COVID-19. These are the preliminary results from a research at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam on how people perceive, communicate, and enforce the behavioral norms that are meant to slow the spread of the coronavirus as implemented by governments. Read more
04-12-2020 COVID-19 EDUCATION/RESEARCH: VR Classroom
Communication Science students from the Media Psychology track are taking online education to a whole new level during the coronavirus pandemic – a virtual level. In the course entitled ‘Problematic and Beneficial Effects of Media Use’, they attended their lectures in a virtual reality world, together with Professor Tilo Hartmann and postdoc Miguel Barreda. Read more
27-10-2020 COVID-19 EDUCATION: Policy after the pandemic
The coronavirus crisis is putting us in an unprecedented situation that involves sudden and drastic changes. But what will the world look like after the dust has settled? That is difficult to predict, but at the same time policymakers need to make decisions around that unknown future after the pandemic. Sociology students developed various scenarios for the Amsterdam Metropolitan Ombudsman to help with this challenge. Watch the video here.