Personalia

Born in Amsterdam, May 17, 1938.
Married to Elisabeth, C.M. Jacobs, musician, since June 1963.
Three children: Claartje, Philip, Christiaan.

Academic Education

Study of psychology at  Leiden University "Candidate degree" (cum laude),
Five month experimental work under Albert Michotte's supervision at Louvain University, 1958-1959. "Doctorandus" degree in experimental psychology (cum laude) 1962.
Ph.D. at Leiden University (cum laude) 1965. Title of thesis: "On binocular rivalry". Supervisor: John P. van de Geer. 1958.

Professional positions and activities

1962-1965: Staff member of the Institute for Perception, Soesterberg. Research on binocular interaction, music perception, pattern recognition, mathematical psychology.

1965-1966: Research Fellow at the Center for Cognitive Studies, Harvard University (directors: George Miller and Jerome Bruner). Research in psycholinguistics .

1966-1967: Visiting Asst. Professor, University of Illinois, Center for Comparative Psycholinguistics. (director: Charles Osgood).

1967-1968: Associate Professor of Experimental Psychology, Groningen University. Since 1968 Director of the Institute of General Psychology. Research in psycholinguistics, psychophysics, and mathematical psychology.

1967-1970: Visiting Professor of Psycholinguistics, Louvain University.

1969-1970: Full Professor of Experimental Psychology and of Psycholinguistics, Groningen University.

1971-1972: Member of the Institute of Advanced Study, Princeton. Writing on theory of grammar and psycholinguistics.

1971-1979: Full Professor of Experimental Psychology, Nijmegen University. Research in psycholinguistics and psychophysics.

1976-1979: Leader of the newly established Project Group for Psycholinguistics of the Max Planck Society, established in Nijmegen - The Netherlands.

2002-2005: President of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW)

1980- 2006: Director of the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen - The Netherlands.

1980- 2006: Professor of Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen University (special Max Planck Society chair)

1 juni 2006: Director Emeritus

Ph.D. thesis supervisions
58 dissertations since 1972.

Editorial activities

• Editor or editorial consultant of the following journals:
• Psychological Research (Psychologische Forschung)(-1987)
• Cognition, International Journal of Cognitive Studies
• Journal of Psycholinguistic Research
• Cognitive Psychology (-1986)
• Italian Journal of Psychology (-1976)
• Nederlands Tijdschrift voor de Psychologie (-1971)
• Perception & Psychophysics (-1977)
• Interdisciplinair Tijdschrift voor Taal- en Tekstwetenschap (-1988)
• The Linguistic Review
• Language and Cognitive Processes
• Mind and Language
• Journal of Semantics (-1986)
• International Journal of Sign Language
• Spatial Cognition and Computation
• Editor of the Springer Series in Language and Communication. (1978-1990)
• Language Sektion Editor of The new cognitive neurosciences, M.S. Gazzaniga (ed.). MIT Press, 2000.

Academy memberships

• Member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences
• Member of the Holland Society of Sciences
• Member of the Academia Europaea
• Member of the Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina
• Member of the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Sciences and Arts
• Member of the Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
• Foreign Associate of the National Academy of Sciences (USA)
• Member of the Österreichische  Akademie der Wissenschaften
• Honorary Member of  the World Innovation Foundation (WIF)
• Member of the American Philosophical Society

Awards and honors

• Recipient Radboud Stichting award for junior scientists (1968)

• Recipient Hendrik Muller award for the Social and Behavioral Sciences of the Royal  Dutch Academy of Sciences (1993)

• Recipient of the Heymans award of the Dutch Psychology Association (NIP) (1996)
• Honorary member of the Linguistic Society of America (1998)
• Ridder in de Orde van de Nederlandse Leeuw (1998)
• Doctorate honoris causa, Maastricht University (2000)
• Doctorate honoris causa, University of Antwerp (2003)
• Recipient Silver Medal, Nijmegen University (2004)
• Doctorate honoris causa, University of Padua (2004)
• Doctorate honoris causa, Catholic University of Louvain (2005)
• Recipiet Medal of Honour, Netherlands Psychonomic Society. (2006)
• Honorary member of the Young Academy (De Jonge Akademie), Royal Dutch  Academie of Arts and Sciences (2006)
• Fellow of the Cognitive Science Society (2007)

• Member of the Orden pour le mérite (2010)