Sebastiaan Dovis

Name: Sebastiaan Dovis

Position at UvA: researcher, lecturer

 "I’m a clinical psychologist at the department of clinical developmental psychology of the university of Amsterdam. My Ph.D. thesis is about executive functioning (e.g. working memory) and sensitivity to reinforcement in children with ADHD. I develop and investigate clinical assessment tools and training programs to improve executive functioning and reduce behavioral problems in children with ADHD. I also train and give lectures and workshops to healthcare professionals, students, teachers and parents about ADHD in children and in adults."

"My research interests focus on ADHD, executive functioning, motivational processes, clinical assessment, brain training, and computer gaming. Because children with ADHD require high levels of reinforcement to optimize their performance (they, in contrast to typically developing children, seem to show suboptimal performance under normal reinforcement conditions), my research group and I use various game-elements in our assessment tools and training tasks to improve motivation during performance. In collaboration with our partners in the game industry we developed various serious games for children with ADHD (e.g. Brain Game Brian).

 "What I find especially interesting about the Game Studies track, is the multidisciplinary nature of the track and it’s scientific approach to game development. I expect its students to be innovative, creative and critical thinkers with a passion for gaming."

"I have always been interested in computer games (as long as I can remember) and I still love playing computer games in my spare time. Game consoles that I own: Atari 2600, Sega Master System, NES, SNES, Nintendo 64, XBOX, Nintendo DS, Wii, PC, XBOX360."