Bernard Nijstad professor in Decision Making and Organizational Behavior in Business and Economics

As of 1 April 2009, Dr Bernard Nijstad has been appointed as professor at the Faculty of Economics and Business. He will hold the chair in Decision Making and Organizational Behavior in Business and Economics. Nijstad is a specialist in research into creativity and (group) decision making.

His works connects well with the research themes leadership, diversity, creativity and teams, all carried out at the faculty’s research institute Human Resource Management and Organizational Behavior.

Lab for behavioural experiments
For his research, Nijstad will make use of the new Collaboration Lab in the faculty. This lab for behavioural experiments will make experimental behavioural research under supervised circumstances possible, when ‘fieldwork’ in an organization is not. For example in sensitive research questions, such as ‘does discrimination play a role in teamwork?’, an employee will not easily give his direct reaction when the boss is present.

The lab also makes it possible to test causal connections: systemetically varying the circumstances under which people (or teams) work gives insight in the consequences this has. In a real company situation, it is obviously impossible to change a team in terms of size, composition (for example the number of men and women) and the question whether or not the group members know each other.
The new Collaboration Lab will be equipped with various bigger and smaller video rooms and will be put into use as of September.

Publications
In the last five years, Nijstad has published 21 SOM-articles, a great number of which in top magazines. His work was published in magazines such as European Journal of Social Psychology, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Psychological Bulletin and Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. In addition, he is reviewer for many of these magazines. He is also a member of the editorial board of European Review of Social Psychology and associate editor of Gedrag & Organisatie (Behaviour & Organization). His latest book ‘Group performance’ will appear in June, at Psychology Press.

Curriculum vitae
Dr Bernard Nijstad (1971) studied psychology at the University of Utrecht. In 2000, he obtained his PhD at the same university, cum laude, in the effects of communication in the generation of ideas within groups. His dissertation was awarded many prizes. Nijstad is currently associate professor in organizational psychology at the University of Amsterdam.