Marja Van Vliet works as senior researcher at the Institute for Positive Health, The Netherlands. She obtained a B.Sc. in Human Nutrition at Wageningen University & Research in 2002, gained a M.Sc. in Human Movement Science at the University of Groningen in 2005, and received a Ph.D. from Mid Sweden University in 2017. She is interested in finding new ways to deal with major challenges within the current healthcare system, such as the burden of chronic diseases and the changing role of the patient who asks for an active and autonomic role in the healing process.
Tim Huijts has been a Full Professor of Positive Health at Work at the Research Centre for Education and the Labour Market (ROA) at Maastricht University since September 2022. He obtained an M.Sc. (2006, cum laude) and a Ph.D. (2011, cum laude) in Sociology at the Radboud University Nijmegen. Before joining ROA in April 2018, he worked as an Assistant Professor at Utrecht University (2011–2013), Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Oxford (2013–2014), Lecturer at Queen Mary University of London (2014–2016), and Senior Lecturer at the University of York (2016–2018). He was also a visiting scholar at the Harvard School of Public Health (2009). In his research, Tim Huijts combines three research lines, focusing on (1) monitoring, explaining, and diminishing social inequalities in health; (2) the ability of the concept of positive health to help people fulfill their potential in work and learning; and (3) skills and capabilities.
Sandra van Hogen-Koster is a professor of Positive Health, Lifestyle & Leadership at Saxion University of Applied Sciences and Medisch Spectrum Twente. She earned a Bachelor's degree at Hanze University of Groningen in 1999, obtained a Master's degree at the University of Saxion in 2007, and received a Ph.D. from the University of Twente in 2011. She focuses on practice-oriented research on achieving lifestyle changes in patients from the perspective of positive health.
Dr. Machteld Huber is the founder of the positive health philosophy. In December 2014, she received her PhD for her work in nutrition and health research in Maastricht. She developed, together with the Health Council of the Netherlands and ZonMw, a new, dynamic concept of health based on resilience, functioning, and self-governance. She was a senior researcher in health and nutrition at the Louis Bolk Institute from 1986 to 2015, a medical treatment coordinator at a drug therapy center from 1986 to 1989, and a member of the Scientific Council for Integral Sustainable Agriculture & Nutrition since 2010. In 2015, she left the Louis Bolk Institute and founded the Institute for Positive Health, of which she was director until August 2019. For her work on ‘health’, she received a ZonMw Pearl in 2012.
