M. (Mariska) Okkinga, MSc.

M. Okkinga (Mariska), MSc.

Room:

Phone:

E-mail:

Cubicus B120

+31 53 489 3597

Educational background

2011- Present	PHD project, Twente University, Enschede (promotor: prof. dr. Sleegers, mentor: dr. A. van Gelderen)
2009-2011	MSc, Research Master Developmental Psychology, Leiden University, Leiden
2005-2008	BSc Psychology, Leiden University, Leiden
2002-2006	BA Humanistics, University of Humanistics, Utrecht

RESEARCH INTERESTS

My research interests lie in different aspects of developmental and educational psychology: self-regulation, metacognitive skills, (reading) strategies, and prevocational education. During my research internship at Cambridge University, I was involved in a study on self-regulation, metacognition and reasoning in five-year olds. In my Masters thesis, I studied the differences in metacognitive skills between prevocational (vmbo-kader) and higher-general education students (havo).

PHD project

In my PhD project, I am studying the effectiveness of a reading comprehension program in prevocational education. With a randomized control trial, first year prevocational students will be followed during two years. The program, ‘Nieuwsbegrip’, is based on three well-known and effective principles: motivating contexts, acquiring reading strategies and self-regulation, and supporting learning. In addition, the roles of personality, background characteristics, metacognitive knowledge and reading attitude in relation to the effectiveness of ‘Nieuwsbegrip’ are examined.