PhD The health impact of obesogenic environments in Europe

Obesity is partly driven by environmental exposures to unhealthy food outlets and lack of options to be physically active, which form barriers to adhering to a healthy lifestyle. Regional studies suggest that obesogenic environments are related to obesity and chronic disease outcomes, but the scale and consequences in Europe has not yet been investigated.

In the OBCT project, a strong multi-disciplinary team will study and address obesogenic environmental exposures, with a focus on socio-economic inequalities. We harness the ever-increasing availability and accuracy of environmental exposure data, and methods to operationalize and analyze them. In the upcoming years we accelerate this work, which also encompass the enrichment of large cohort studies and health surveys with data on obesogenic exposures, to study its impact on lifestyle behaviours, obesity and chronic disease outcomes within and across all countries and regions of Europe.

Your project will have an epidemiological/health science focus. You will contribute to the development of the EU-wide obesogenic neighbourhood index and analyze its associations with health outcomes within and across EU countries, using large cohort studies and administrative data.

You bring a high level of energy and perseverance to our team, along with strong social skills.

Your role involves obtaining (secondary) data from various sources and international teams, so the ability to connect with people and navigate different environments is essential.

You have:

• A research master’s degree in health sciences, public health, epidemiology or similar;
• Experience with doing epidemiological analyses and publishing scientific articles;
• Skills in advanced quantitative statistical methods, using software such as R;
• A communicative, persistent and meticulous character;
• Excellent command of written and spoken English.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Demonstrated affinity or experience with built environment studies related to health outcomes;
• Knowledge of ArcGIS or spatial analysis in R.

• A contract for the duration of the PhD-project. We offer an initial contract for 12 months, that can be extended (for another 36 months after evaluation).
• Salary scale researcher in training (in Dutch: OIO): € 3.017- € 3.824 gross, based on 36 hours/week (accordant with the UMC salary scale). The monthly wage will increase yearly to the maximum wage in the fourth year.

In addition we offer:

• A 8.3% end-of-year bonus and 8% holiday pay. Bereken hier jouw netto salaris.
• Free and unlimited access to our online learning environment: GoodHabitz.
• Pension is accrued at the ABP. Amsterdam UMC contributes 70% of the premium.
• We reimburse 75% of your public transport commuting costs.
• Would you rather bike? We have a good bike arrangement in place.You can choose to participate in the active staff association, as well as the Young Amsterdam UMC association, which both organize fun activities and events.

At the Department of Epidemiology and Data Science, you will become part of the Upstream Team, a young, vibrant and multidisciplinary team of diligent researchers studying the influences of environmental characteristics on lifestyle behaviours and chronic disease risk.

Your project is embedded in the Horizon Europe project OBCT, where you will collaborate with renowned researchers and stakeholder organizations from the Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, the UK, Poland, Spain and Finland.