Early Career Award

BAPS sponsors a bi-annual Early Career Award. The award recognizes the scientific excellence of researchers in psychological sciences up to 6 years after their PhD. All types of psychological research have an equal chance of receiving the award regardless of the specific psychological subdiscipline or whether it concerns basic or applied psychology.

The winner will receive 2,000€ and will give a Prize Lecture at the Annual Meeting of BAPS in 2026. The winner is also invited to contribute to a paper for Psychologica Belgica.

Evaluation Procedure

Upon reception of the application, the candidate will receive a confirmation of receipt. The BAPS past president checks candidates’ eligibility. Together with one or two other past presidents, the BAPS past president puts together a proposal for a jury. For each applicant there is at least one jury member who has expertise related to the research of that applicant. One of the jury members is asked to act as chair. The proposal for the jury is then discussed by the BAPS executive committee. The executive committee can approve the proposal or ask for amendments before approving the proposal.

None of the jury members have been affiliated to a Belgian University during the past 5 years before the deadline for applications. All jury members are asked to confirm that they do not have common financial interests or a familial or substantial professional relationship (i.e., supervision of PhD, co-authorship during the past 5 years, family relations, having worked in the same lab during the past 5 years, and ongoing collaborative projects as the candidate or their supervisor[s]) and to disclose any other possible reasons for a conflict of interest. Members of the BAPS executive committee who have a conflict of interest with one or more of the candidates will not take part in the process of composing the jury. If the BAPS past president has a conflict of interest with one or more candidates, her/his role will be taken over by another past president.