Hilmar Zech
© Hilmar Zech
Researcher
NameHilmar Zech
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Research Interests
I’m interested in app-based behavioral tasks. Specifically, I’m interested in developing and validating behavioral tasks and making those tasks openly available to other researchers. I’m further interested in longitudinal analyses of task data to understand how task measures fluctuate with time and in different contexts and how these fluctuations relate to real-life outcomes, such as unhealthy consumption of food and alcohol.
Main Project
Collaborative Research Center TRR 265: Losing and Regaining Control over Drug Intake
Longitudinal monitoring of cognitive control as a modifying factor of drinking behavior
(TRR 265, Project A02)
Employment
| since 2020 | Research Fellow at Technische Universität Dresden |
| 2015 - 2020 | PhD Student at Lotte van Dillen’s and prof. Wilco van Dijk’s lab |
|
2014 – 2015 |
App Developer |
| 2012 |
Research Assistant |
| 2011 |
Research Intern |
|
2011 |
Research Intern |
| 2010 |
Research Intern |
Education and Qualifications
| 2015 - present | PhD Student in Psychology, Leiden University, Leiden, the Netherlands |
| 2010 - 2015 | Research Master in Psychology (cum laude; GPA: 8.1), Leiden University, Leiden, the Netherlands |
| 2007 - 2010 | Bachelors in Psychology (honours Bachelors; GPA: 7.9), Leiden University, Leiden, the Netherlands |
Funding and Honors
| 2017 | Best poster award Association for Researchers in Psychology and Health |
| 2015 | Best thesis award of the Leiden Psychology Institute |
| Applications | |
|---|---|
| Mobile AAT |
A mobile version of the approach-avoidance task (AAT). During the mobile AAT, stimuli are presented on a smartphone screen and participants pull or push the phone to approach or avoid stimuli. The phone measures the movement’s acceleration from which reaction times and response forces are parsed. From these measures, behavioural tendencies to approach or avoid stimuli are calculated. |
Zech, H., Waltmann, M., Lee, Y. et al. Measuring self-regulation in everyday life: Reliability and validity of smartphone-based experiments in alcohol use disorder.Behav Res (2022). https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-022-02019-8
Deeken F, Reichert M, Zech H, et al. Patterns of Alcohol Consumption Among Individuals With Alcohol Use Disorder During the COVID-19 Pandemic and Lockdowns in Germany. JAMA Netw Open. 2022;5(8):e2224641. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.24641
Zech, H.G., Gable, P., van Dijk, W.W. et al. Test-retest reliability of a smartphone-based approach-avoidance task: Effects of retest period, stimulus type, and demographics. Behav Res (2022). https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-022-01920-6
Zech, H. G., Reichert, M., Ebner-Priemer, U. W., Tost, H., Rapp, M. A., Heinz, A., ... & Deserno, L. (2022). Mobile Data Collection of Cognitive-Behavioral Tasks in Substance Use Disorders: Where Are We Now?. Neuropsychobiology, 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1159/000523697
Chen, K., Garbusow, M., Sebold, M., Zech, H. G., Zimmermann, U., & Heinz, A. (2022). Automatic approach behaviors in alcohol dependence: does a cognitive bias modification training affect Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer effects? Neuropsychobiology, 81(5), 386-401. https://doi.org/10.1159/000526805
Belanger, M. J., Chen, H., Hentschel, A., Garbusow, M., Ebrahimi, C., Knorr, F. G., ... & Smolka, M. N. (2022). Development of novel tasks to assess outcome-specific and general Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer in humans. Neuropsychobiology, 81(5), 370-386. https://doi.org/10.1159/000526774
Brouwer, A. M., van Beers, J. J., Sabu, P., Stuldreher, I. V., Zech, H. G., & Kaneko, D. (2021). Measuring Implicit Approach–Avoidance Tendencies towards Food Using a Mobile Phone Outside the Lab. Foods, 10(7), 1440. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods10071440
Zech H, Rotteveel M, w. van Dijk W, Van Dillen LF (2020) A mobile approach-avoidance task. Behav. Res. Methods.
https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-020-01379-3
Colzato LS, Zech H, Hommel B, Verdonschot RG, van den Wildenberg WPM, Hsieh S (2012) Loving-kindness brings loving-kindness: The impact of Buddhism on cognitive self-other integration. Psychon Bull Rev;19(3):541-545.
https://doi.org/10.3758/s13423-012-0241-y