In this new podcast series, Stress Navigation, various APH researchers such as Christiaan Vinkers, Brenda Penninx, and Meike Bartels are interviewed by hosts Marcos Ross and Myrte Schoenmakers, also affiliated with APH. The podcast is part of the large-scale research project Stress in Action. Experiences and knowledge surrounding the theme of stress are shared with a broad audience.

New episode with Meike Bartels

Today, the third episode is released, featuring Meike Bartels, who discusses wellbeing and a "no-size-fits-all" approach to the life course. She emphasizes that wellbeing should be a starting point, not an endpoint. Meike Bartels, a full professor in genetics and wellbeing at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, centers her research on the question, "Why don’t we study why people feel well?"

In the episode Meike Bartels on Wellbeing and No-Size-Fits-All, we explore individual differences in relation to wellbeing and stress. People’s differences are influenced by genetics but also by the environment. Bartels aims for individuals to embrace their genetic differences, bringing society closer to accepting individual diversity. In terms of stress, her research shows that people have unique stress responses and individual balances of happiness and wellbeing.

Bartels introduces her idea of a paradigm shift toward a society based on wellbeing. "We should build a society based on wellbeing”. Starting with human beings and how they feel. She explains that life should not be one-size-fits-all. Individual differences should be celebrated and valued, with each person able to explore their own balance of happiness and wellbeing. With the three elemental questions: ‘How do you feel?’, ‘What is keeping you busy?”, and ‘What are you doing about it?”.

Previous episode with Christiaan Vinkers

Christiaan Vinkers discusses stress and resilience in the new Stress Navigation podcast. Research into stress and resilience is not as generic as it may seem—everyone has a unique stress profile. Christiaan Vinkers, a professor of stress and resilience at Amsterdam UMC, conducts research on stress, trauma, resilience, and burnout, and is a psychiatrist at GGZ inGeest. He explains, "If you want to understand stress, you can't look through just one lens; you have to consider many different aspects." To understand individual responses to stress and personal resilience, we must ask: How are you as a person? What does your environment look like? There are no "10 golden tips for stress.". This episode is in Dutch.

Previous episode with Brenda Penninx

Brenda Penninx shares her research on the intersection of mental and physical health, with a new focus on stress in daily life, in the Stress Navigation podcast. Brenda Penninx, a professor of psychiatric epidemiology at Amsterdam UMC, has years of experience researching depression and anxiety disorders. She explains how these complex mental disorders have a biopsychosocial origin and expresses her enthusiasm for multidisciplinary research. Stress in Action is one such multidisciplinary project that focuses on stress in daily life. What does stress in everyday life do to you? And how can we better map, measure, understand, and intervene in stress?

The Stress Navigation podcast is available on multiple platforms: