Research Projects

Fear of Touch

Did you know that non-painful tactile interactions - touching a device, moving a limb, or navigating an interface - can become threat signals that drive avoidance?

This work shows how non-painful interactions become feared, and how we can reduce these fears to get users re-engaged.

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Fear of Pain

This research provides the neuroscientific evidence that pain-related fear is a distinct, measurable neurological state.

By synthesizing neuroimaging data (fMRI) across multiple studies, we have identified a specific "neural signature" for pain anticipation.

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Workshops & Public Speaking

Podcast @ Grünenthal: "Beyond The Ache" (Sep 2026)

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Workshop @IHL: Family life without a village (9/2/2026)

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Workshop @IHL: Journey mapping for life with chronic conditions(6/10/2025)

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Academic Conferences

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Academic Conference Presentations

Pain-related learning and memory processes in disability. Invited oral presentation at the Jeroen Bosch Ziekenhuis, Symposium Specialist in Beweging (September 2023).

Forgetting to be afraid: Neural evidence for behavioral memory updating. Data Blitz presentation at the Society for Pediatric Psychology Pain SIG meeting (March 2023).

Using (f)MRI to understand the mechanisms underlying chronic pain. Invited oral presentation at the Cook Children’s Pediatric Pain Management Conference (September 2022).

The phenomenology of (un)predictability in Complex Regional Pain Syndrome. Symposium at the American Psychosomatic Society (2022). [Speakers: Meulders, A., Biggs, E. E., Noel, M. The role of diagnostic uncertainty, unpredictability and associated overprotective behavior in chronic pain disability].

The third interval response as a physiological index of prediction error. Oral presentation at the Expert Meeting on the Attenuation of Emotional Memories (June 2019).

The reduction of pain-related fear through extinction and exposure. Workshop at the 10th Congress of the European Pain Federation (EFIC, September 2017). [Speakers: Timmers, I., Biggs, E. E., Simons, L. E., Davis, K. Many paths to treating pain: clinical and experimental neuroimaging studies targeting pain-related fear and cognitions].

A neuro-cognitive perspective on pain-related fear. Invited oral presentation at the Seminars on Contextual Psychiatry, KU Leuven (March 2017).

The role of predictability in the acquisition and extinction of pain-related fear: a fear-conditioning paradigm using tactile stimuli. Oral presentation at the Pain Research Meeting (September 2015).