How I got started: from applied social psychology to applied cognitive psychology

The road to where I stand today started in 1984 in a hammock on a beach in the Thai island Koh Samui. I had taken a year out of my 3-year Masters programme in Social Psychology in Amsterdam, and Koh Samui was the last stage of my extensive travelling throughout Asia. One reason for taking this gap year was that I was lacking in motivation and wanted to contemplate what I could do instead. One fact did become crystal clear as I lay in my hammock: I realised I lacked the skills to do anything else! After returning to Amsterdam, I, therefore, walked into the office of the social psychology lecturer I liked the most: Frans Willem Winkel.