Eefje Elinel van Gelder

Eefje van Gelder obtained a Master's degree in Communication Studies: Digital Media in Europe from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), and a Bachelor's degree in Communication and Information Sciences from Utrecht University. During her Master's, she did an internship at imec-SMIT, where she worked on a project for the Flemish Government examining regulatory approaches to digital inclusion across European countries. This experience further sparked her interest in research, particularly in questions of social inclusion and the role of policy in addressing societal challenges. She later contributed to the Horizon Europe project GENeCITY, gaining further experience in citizen science and inclusive innovation.

Her research interests centre on citizen science, particularly who gets the opportunity to participate, who is left out, and whose knowledge and perspectives are taken into account. She is especially interested in the barriers that socially vulnerable and underrepresented groups may face and how participatory processes can be designed to support their involvement and give them a meaningful voice in decisions that affect them. Alongside this, she has a broader interest in the relationship between society and digitalisation, particularly digital inclusion and the societal implications of technological developments.

She started her PhD at imec-SMIT as part of the Horizon Europe project EUROASIS, which aims to strengthen the resilience of European cities to extreme heat. Within EUROASIS, VUB leads the work on societal engagement, including justice and social vulnerability in urban heat policies, the development of inclusive Community Labs and the evaluation of citizen participation. As part of this work, Eefje is particularly interested in how citizen science and other participatory approaches can better involve heat-vulnerable and underrepresented groups. Her research explores how their knowledge, needs and experiences can be taken into account when developing local strategies for inclusive urban heat resilience.