Cretien van Campen


Cretien van Campen is principal investigator older people at the Netherlands Institute for Social Research | SCP (Sociaal en Cultureel Planbureau), and associate lector applied gerontology at Windesheim University of Applied Sciences. He has an academic background in the social sciences and the fine arts.
At the Netherlands Institute for Social Research¦ SCP he has published a series of research reports on the quality of life and participation of frail older people and persons with physical disabilities.
His actual interests are in the field of elderly policy and well-being. He is currently engaged in national and international studies into frailty and policies for the well-being of older people. Secondly, he is developing a research programme focusing on the psychosocial competences of vulnerable persons in the research field of positive psychology.
From the mid-eighties, Cretien van Campen has published a number of articles on the perception of art and a book on pictorial illusions in science and the arts. Besides that, he is studying phenomena of synaesthesia in collaboration with artists and scientists since the mid-nineties. Cretien edits the Leonardo online bibliography "Synesthesia in Science and Art". In 2007 MIT Press (Cambridge, MA) published his book The Hidden Sense: Synesthesia in Art and Science. He contributed on this subject to several international publications (e.g. Art and the Senses. OUP, 2011). His latest book is The Proust Effect: The Senses as Doorways to Lost Memories (OUP 2014). He has been consulted by elderly care institutions and international educational and cultural institutes for lectures and projects on the senses.
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Publications on synesthesia and perception
Publications on health and happiness

photo: Marcia Smilack