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Researcher

L.A.E.M. (Lisanne) van Houtum, PhD

Postdoctoral researcher

  • Department
  • Child and Adolescent Psychiatry/Psychology (CAPP)
  • Focus area
  • Parent-child relationship, psychopathology, (neuro)development, risk and resilience
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About L.A.E.M. (Lisanne) van Houtum, PhD

Introduction

Current research interests and goals

I am working as a postdoctoral researcher within Prof. dr. Neeltje van Haren’s lab at the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry/Psychology Unit of Erasmus MC Sophia Children’s hospital. Currently, I am involved in multiple projects, i.e., the FAMILY consortium, the PANDA-study, and All in the family? to investigate the risk for and resilience against intergenerational transmission of psychopathology in high-risk offspring from a (perinatal) (neuro)developmental perspective. In the long run, I hope to contribute to a better understanding of how psychopathology develops, how it can be prevented, and how we can support at-risk families over the course of development, ultimately leading to better outcomes for both children and their families.

Previous work

I completed a master's degree in neuroscience and have gained extensive research experience in various labs, focused on the role of the brain in psychopathology in adolescents. As part of my doctoral work, I gained expertise in multimodal family research, where I particularly focused on identifying (dysfunctional) neural mechanisms underlying social evaluations and self-views from a parent-adolescent perspective using ecologically valid functional MRI tasks, which may relate to (daily) parent-adolescent interactions as well as adolescent depression.

Field(s) of expertise

Within the context of the PANDA study, we aim to characterize (aberrant) perinatal brain development in the offspring of parents with severe mental illness, and to relate these brain metrics to parent-child relationship quality and socioemotional development.

In PANDA Co-Create, we conduct a qualitative study to gain insights into how (future) parents with severe mental illness perceive risk and resilience regarding mental illness in their (future) children, as well as their needs for counselling, care, and research. In the All in the Family? project, we focus on the role of life events in the emergence of psychopathology in offspring and siblings at familial high and low risk for mental illness.

Education and career

  • PhD, Clinical Psychology, Leiden University (promotion date: 19 september 2023).
  • Doctoral thesis: Exploring the self in adolescent depression: Neural mechanisms underlying social evaluations and self-views from a parent-adolescent perspective.
  • MSc Biomedical Sciences: Neurobiology track, University of Amsterdam, 2012 - 2014.
  • BSc Psychobiology: Psychology track, University of Amsterdam, 2009 - 2012.

Publications

View my publications on PubMed and ORCID.

Teaching activities

Current: supervision research assistants and PhD students; thesis supervision of medicine and pedagogical master students; co-coordinator graduate school open science course and medicine minor Child- and Adolescent Psychiatry.

Past: Bottom-up Open Science Education project. During doctoral work: (thesis) supervision of >20 clinical psychology master students and research assistants in writing and conducting clinical research.

Scholarships, grants, and awards

  • Stichting Vrienden van het Sophia Fund (€300.000) to hire a PhD conducting the project ‘All in the family? The role of life events in emerging psychopathology in offspring and siblings at familial high- and low-risk for mental illness’ (main applicant, 2025). 
  • EUR / Erasmus MC Open and Responsible Science Award (€2.500) category Open Education, awarded for the BOSE project (co-applicant, 2024).
  • Stichting Erasmus Trustfonds (€10.000) to conduct a qualitative study to get insights into how (future) parents with severe mental illness perceive risk and resilience around mental illness in their (future) children, and their needs for counselling, care and research (main applicant, 2023).
  • Open science fund (€50.000) Bottom-up Open Science Education (BOSE) for PhDs in medical and life sciences across the Netherlands, Dutch Research Council (NWO), (co-applicant, 2023).
  • KNAW Ter Meulen Grant for pediatric medicine (€8.700) to cover a scientific research project abroad, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW), (main applicant, 2021).

Research projects

  • PANDA-study.
  • PANDA co-create.
  • FAMILY consortium.
  • All in the family?

My Groups

  • Van Haren lab, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry/Psychology.

Related

Departments and research centers

specialism

Child and Adolescent Psychiatry/Psychology

Research Projects

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PANDA-study - Prenatal And Neonatal Development: An offspring study of severe mental illness

Young mother with schizoaffective disorder: "As a mother with a psychotic disorder, I find it important to know as early as possible in my daughter’s life if she is at risk. It can make a real difference; I can teach her how to cope with stress. Prevention is better than cure." PANDA aims to investigate if neurodevelopmental deviations occur perinatally and socioemotional development during the first 18 months of life in offspring at high familial risk for psychiatric diagnoses in the mood and psychosis spectrum. By identifying neurobiological and behavioral risk factors well before the diagnosis is given, we offer a window of opportunity to intervene.

Research project default image

Running in the family – Understanding and predicting the intergenerational transmission of mental illness

Mental illness runs in the FAMILY. A family history of mental illness is the most important known risk factor for the development of mental health problems. Up to 50% of children with a mentally-ill parent will develop a mental disorder in their life course, suggesting a transfer of disease risk from affected parents to offspring. Such intergenerational transmission of risk of mental illness is rarely considered in clinical practice, and health care systems do not sufficiently embed family history of mental illness into diagnostics and care, leading to a delay in diagnosing patients and missing the time window for protective actions and resilience strengthening. With 16 partners and funded by the European Commission, the FAMILY consortium aims to systematically integrate the family context in the study of mental disorders. We will identify mechanisms underlying the transmission of disease risk from affected parent to offspring, establish how resilience factors moderate risk factors, take a biomarker and resilience assessment approach to improve risk prediction, and map societal and ethical consequences of risk prediction.