Young researchers vlog: Merel Keijzer on bilingualism

Four members of the University of Groningen’s Young Academy Groningen (YAG) have made a vlog in collaboration with Dagblad van het Noorden newspaper. In these videos, they talk about their research and why it is relevant to society in a way that is both comprehensible and entertaining. The first vlog in this weekly series is by Merel Keijzer, Assistant Professor at the Department of Applied Linguistics.

Merel Keijzer

Merel Keijzer specializes in bilingualism. In her research, she looks not so much at how you learn a second language but at the cognitive effects of bilingualism. She wants to tell the world how important language research is. ‘We were always a bit of a poor relation. The humanities hardly ever participated in research into ageing, but people are beginning to appreciate that language plays an important role’, is how she puts it in science magazine NEMO Kennislink . Keijzer is researching whether speakers of a second language or dialect age more healthily. She answers this question in the vlog.

Young Academy Groningen

Keijzer is one of four YAG members to have made a vlog. YAG is a group of talented young researchers from the University of Groningen. It brings together researchers from different disciplines to promote interdisciplinary research and aims to kindle the public’s enthusiasm for research.

A vlog will appear each Saturday on the Dagblad van het Noorden website. Alongside Merel Keijzer’s vlog, there will be vlogs by Diederik Roest, Michel Vols and Dorina Buda.

More information

• Staff page
• In focus
• Young Academy Groningen