My research interests are in the field of inequality with a particular focus on ethnic prejudice, ethnic/national identities, discrimination, and interethnic relations. I study how prejudices develop and spread within social networks, how this affects and is affected by people's ethnic/national identities, and how this, in turn, causes changes in the structure of social networks. In my ERC consolidator program, I focus on people's perceptions of others' identities and their social ties. The main argument is that it's not a person's self-reported identification or social relationships that drive other people's behavior toward that person, but how these people perceive the person's ethnic/national belonging and their embedding in a social network.

Though many of my projects are on “basic science,” I’m driven by the potential societal impact of my research. That’s why a large part of my attention has been directed at using my insights to develop intervention programs for (primary) schools that are designed to improve interethnic relations. For instance, I have cooperated with practitioners of the programs Discussieren Kun Je Leren, Welkom in Mijn Wijk, and One Globe Kids.

I integrate my work on interethnic relations with my interest in methodological research. For instance, some of my work concerns the improvement of measures of ethnic/racial attitudes and of methods to measure social networks. Together with Jon Krosnick, I have developed a new graphical interface (GENSI) to collect data on egocentric social networks in online surveys. Together with Tom Nijs and Zsofia Boda, I'm have developed the new graphical software VINA to collect whole network data and cognitive social structures with smartphone surveys.