Steve van de Weijer endowed professor ‘Family Dynamics and Criminal Behaviour’ at FPN
Steve van de Weijer has been appointed endowed professor of ‘Family Dynamics and Criminal Behaviour’ as of 1 September. The chair, within the Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience (FPN), has been established by the Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement (NSCR). Van de Weijer focuses on promoting research into the development of criminal behaviour across the lifespan, with a particular emphasis on the role of family factors.
The chair contributes to the scientific knowledge base regarding the causes and consequences of criminal behaviour, with a particular focus on the role of families. Two lines of research are central to this: family-related risk factors and the family-related consequences of imprisonment.
“Families play a crucial role in the development of criminal behaviour. Intergenerational factors such as parents with a criminal history, parental divorce and teenage parenthood are linked to child delinquency. Children of parents in prison are also more likely to experience problems, such as poorer academic performance, health issues and delinquent behaviour. These links arise from a complex interplay of genetic and environmental factors and call for a multidisciplinary approach. With this chair at Maastricht University, I aim to take the next steps in research into family dynamics within the development of criminal behaviour,” said Van de Weijer.
About Steve van de Weijer
Van de Weijer has a background in sociology and criminology and has been affiliated with the NSCR since 2014. He has carried out extensive research into, amongst other things, criminal behaviour across the life course. In 2023, he was awarded an NWO VIDI grant for the research project ‘Behind Foreign Bars’, through which he is investigating Dutch nationals imprisoned in foreign prisons. He is also an active member of the Dutch Society for Criminology (NVC), where he served on the board between 2018 and 2021 and is currently chair of the Biosocial Division. In 2019, he also co-founded the Intergenerational Criminology working group within the European Society of Criminology (ESC). He remains co-chair of this working group.