Dr. Mark Assink is assistant professor at the research group Forensic Child & Youth Care of the University of Amsterdam, which serves as a home for scholarship devoted to studying serious developmental problems in children, adolescents, and young adults that warrant judicial interference because of severe externalizing problems (e.g., juvenile delinquency) or severe family problems that pose a threat to a juvenile's safety (e.g., child abuse).

Mark's clinically driven and broad research examines the nature of serious developmental problems and is strongly directed towards improving clinical practice. Mark studies risk factors and their impact for different negative developmental outcomes, develops and validates different types of measures including instruments for risk and needs ssessment, and is committed to determining and improving the effectiveness of interventions delivered by professionals in (forensic) clinical practice. A considerable part of his work is based on meta-analytic techniques in which he has substantial expertise that he has shared in a tutorial on three-level meta-analysis (Assink & Wibbelink, 2016) and a recent accompanying paper (Assink & Wibbelink, 2024).

Another line of research investigates health disparities experienced by sexual minority persons. Mark is particularly interested in how intraminority stress is experienced by LGBT+ persons, and how this unique type of stress contributes to health disparities of LGBT+ populations over and above stressors that are related to their sexual orientation and come from the heterosexual majority.

Mark has published 65+ scholarly articles in peer-reviewed journals such as Clinical Psychology Review, Child Abuse & Neglect, Trauma, Violence, & Abuse, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, and Psychological Bulletin. He regularly shares knowledge in professional articles for clinical practitioners and policy makers in the Netherlands, and has (co-)authored 20+ professional publications. Mark has also served as a member of multiple supervisory committees for research projects commissioned by the research department (WODC) of the Dutch Ministry of Justice and Security.

A full list of publications can be found on Google Scholar. Some key publications:

• Assink, M., & Bos, H. M. W. (2023). Gay community stress in sexual minority men and women: A validation study in the Netherlands. Journal of Homosexuality. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1080/00918369.2023.2231119;
• Assink, M., van der Put, C. E., Meeuwsen, M. W. C. M., de Jong, N. M., Oort, F. J., Stams, G. J. J. M., & Hoeve, M. (2019). Risk factors for child sexual abuse victimization: A meta-analytic review. Psychological Bulletin, 145(5), 459-489. https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000188;
• Gubbels, J., van der Put, C. E., & Assink, M. (2019). Risk Factors for School Absenteeism and Dropout: A Meta-Analytic Review. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 48(9), 1637-1667. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-019-01072-5;
• Van der Put, C. E., Assink, M., Gubbels, J., & Boekhout van Solinge, N. F. (2018). Identifying effective components of child maltreatment interventions: A meta-analysis. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 21(2), 171-202. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10567-017-0250-5;
• Assink, M., & Wibbelink, C. J. M. (2016). Fitting three-level meta-analytic models in R: A step-by-step tutorial. The Quantitative Methods for Psychology, 12(3), 154-174. https://doi.org/10.20982/tqmp.12.3.p154;
• Assink, M., & Wibbelink, C. J. M. (2024). Addressing dependency in meta-analysis: A companion to Assink and Wibbelink (2016). The Quantitative Methods for Psychology, 20(1), 1-16. https://doi.org/10.20982/tqmp.20.1.p001;
• Assink, M., van der Put, C. E., Oort, F. J., & Stams, G. J. J. M. (2015). The development and validation of the Youth Actuarial Care Needs Assessment Tool for Non-Offenders (Y-ACNAT-NO). BMC Psychiatry, 15, [36]. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12888-015-0421-1.

In 2021, Mark was elected into the Works Council of the Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences for a three-year term and he serves as a board member of the council since 2023. From 2018 to 2021, he was a member of the Programme Committee of the Child Development and Education department.

The knowledge we have on explaining and predicting behavior and psychological symptoms is only as good as our ability to assess psychological constructs. I am interested in scale development and validation, and (co-)developed several measures:

• The Dutch-Translated Gay Community Stress Scale for assessing gay community stress (Assink & Bos, 2023) (PI);
• The ARIJ-Safety and ARIJ-Risk for safety and risk assessment in child protection services (Van der Put et al., 2015, 2016; Vial et al., 2018, 2021a, 2021b) (CI);
• The ARIJ-Needs for needs assessment in child protection services (Van der Put et al., 2018) (CI);
• The Y-ARAT-FO for assessing the risk for onset of criminal behavior in juveniles registered in the Dutch police database (Assink et al., 2016) (PI);
• The Y-ACNAT-NO for assessing the risk for child abuse victimization in juveniles registered in the Dutch police database (Assink et al., 2015) (PI).

PI = Principle Investigator;
CI = Co-Investigator.

Mark co-supervised the following PhD projects:

• Annemiek Vial. Safety and risk assessment in child welfare: Moving forward. Defended on 12-01-2021;
• Anne Bijlsma. One size does not fit all: The need for treatment tailoring in youth and family services. Defended on 15-06-2022;
• Jeanne Gubbels. Staying ahead of child abuse: An evaluation of preventive efforts. Defended on 29-06-2022;
• Naomi Koning. The impact of the Covid crisis on the mental health of adolescents. Defense expected in spring 2024.

Mark is actively involved in teaching, and specifically in the master's programme Forensic Child and Youth Care and the bachelor's programme Child Development and Education. He is prinicipal lecturer of the Methods and Statistics course, for which he also serves as course coordinator. Mark has supervised 60+ Master thesis projects and 30+ Bachelor thesis projects, and yearly takes on new students to supervise in research projects on a broad range of topics.

On both bachelor and master level, Mark lectures on topics such as research designs, risk assessment, the prevention of child abuse, the Risk, Need, and Responsivity model and applications of this model in clinical practice, and sexual violence.