It is with great sadness that I write in P&H, the official journal of EHPS, about the death of Stan Maes, the founder of EHPS.
Stan will be remembered in many spheres of professional life – for his science and practice in health psychology, for his success in developing health psychology in the Netherlands, for his contributions to health and social care, for his active representation of European health psychology in the wider international context – but let me briefly outline his career before writing about his enormous gifts to health psychologists in Europe and beyond.
Stan Maes: his academic career
Stan was born in 1947 in Ixelles (Brussels) and started his career as a scientific assistant at the laboratory of Experimental and Psychological Pedagogics at the University of Ghent. After his PhD in cognitive psychology, he worked at the University of Antwerp and obtained his clinical qualifications. In 1981, he moved to the Netherlands to work at Tilburg University, and in 1986, he became professor of Health Psychology, the first professor in this field outside the United States. In 1990, he became professor of Health Psychology at the University of Leiden.
In addition to being founding President of EHPS, Stan also chaired several other international organisations in the field of health psychology including the International Association of Applied Psychology (Division 8, Health Psychology) and the International Society of Health Psychology Research. He was guest professor at some 20 foreign universities and received several prizes for his scientific work.
He became Emeritus in 2013 and then in 2016 he gave his inaugural address http://www.vub.ac.be/pers/persberichten/2016/04/14/van-de-verlichting-tot-religieus-terrorisme as holder of the Willy Calewaert 2016 Chair at the Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences at the Free University, Brussels. He continued to be active until his death in October 2018. But these bare facts tell us little of his enormous contributions to the careers of virtually every other health psychologist in Europe.
Stan Maes as the founder of EHPS
Members of EHPS owe Stan a great deal as this society would not exist without Stan’s phenomenal initial work. In the early 1980s, several of us were working in health psychology, often as lonely but enthusiastic isolates within our own country and watching developments in the USA. Stan gathered us together – from Finland, Switzerland, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Italy, Germany, Belgium, Spain, the UK and the Netherlands – giving us an identity as European health psychologists and a shared focus for our professional and scientific endeavours. In 1986, he held an outstanding conference in Tilburg bringing together health psychologists from many parts of Europe and the USA and the EHPS emerged from that first meeting. Over the following years and many meetings in Tilburg, several of us worked with Stan to turn this embryonic gathering into the society we know today. With Stan as President we held annual meetings in Trier (1988), Utrecht (1989), Oxford (1990), Lausanne (1991) and Leipzig (1992) and published proceedings from these meetings. Meanwhile, we worked to develop the rules, articles and legal status of EHPS with an amusing lack of skill. In 1992, I was honoured and flattered that Stan supported me in becoming the second President. He continued as an active member of the EC until 1996 and a keen attender at conferences until limited by poor health. He delivered many papers at our conferences including his most recent invited keynote in Bordeaux in 2013.
Stan succeeded in developing EHPS because of his outstanding vision, scholarship and energy. He was generous and sociable, fluent in many European languages and able to enthuse those around him. His leadership was fundamental not only to the existence of EHPS but also to its ethos of sharing and inclusiveness, supporting young careers and enabling health psychology to thrive within and between the countries of Europe.
Stan Maes as the supporter of young international careers
From the very beginning, Stan was keen that EHPS would not only be a vehicle for those already established in their careers but that it would be active in developing early career researchers. At a very early stage, we held a workshop in Rome and continued to run annual postgraduate training workshops for several years. Following these Erasmus funded programmes, Stan obtained funding to run advanced workshops in Greece for graduates of the previous workshops and they in turn went on to create the EHPS network of early career researchers, CREATE (Collaborative Research And Training in the EHPS).
The workshops had a spirit and character that owed everything to Stan. They lasted up to 2 weeks, involved intensive 9 to 5 working, were delivered and attended by the founders and senior members of EHPS and closed with presentations by each attending participant. But it was not only hard work. We had evenings of entertaining performances by students including flamenco from Spain, a performing ‘haggis’ from Scotland and an international rendering of ’singing in the rain’. We had our own version of ‘Blind Date’ and were astonished to discover that the theme tune was known to all Europeans. We had local outings, splendid meals and beach bonfires. All of these diverse experiences resulted in a wonderful cadre of young health psychologists, with lasting collaborations and friendships who constitute a large tranche of current members, attenders and leaders of EHPS.
Stan’s emphasis on young careers was exceptionally far-sighted as it not only ensured the future membership, it built relationships between the younger and more senior members. The spirit of work, fun and conviviality contributed to the friendly cooperative atmosphere that continues to characterise EHPS meetings.
Stan Maes and international representation in EHPS
Right from the start Stan involved health psychologists from many different nations of Europe. He personally visited many countries, giving talks, supporting postgraduates and enabling the development of national societies. He was particularly keen to facilitate members from Eastern European countries and created financial systems that allowed them to participate in EHPS activities. From very early days, we had national delegates and our newsletter had regular items on the health psychology developments within these countries. He encouraged the emergence and welcoming of delegates from each country. However, in several countries delegates did not know other delegates from their own country and on occasions we had more than one national delegate from a country. Starting with these unsystematic but enthusiastic beginnings we now have a very successful, active representation of the nations of Europe.
As with all the early developments of EHPS, national representation was ensured by Stan’s foresight, organisation, social skills, goodwill and persuasiveness – and in no small way by his facility with languages, his understanding and appreciation of different cultures and his charismatic character.
Stan Maes in Leiden and the Netherlands
Stan had a major impact on health psychology in the Netherlands. At a national level, until 2014, he was a member of the CER1, a committee of 12 members that directly advises the Dutch government on necessary legislative changes regarding health and health care (in connection with donorship, euthanasia, abortion, medical and pharmaceutical research, in vitro fertilisation and the like).
In Leiden, he introduced courses including a Masters course in Health Psychology. He supervised more than 40 PhD students, including several students from other countries that were attracted to work with him through the European postgraduate workshops. Many of these graduates are active in Health Psychology research today. He founded, and for many years chaired, the graduate school of Psychology & Health (P&H) which ran from 1994 until 2010. In addition, he was Dean of the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences from 2000 to 2003.
His colleagues in Leiden describe Stan as ‘a passionate man, with a strong personality and unbridled energy …. a quick thinker and a free spirit … a gifted speaker and inspirer’. They were lucky to work with him over so many years and are now leading in research and practice in health psychology built on his legacy.
Stan Maes: his scientific contribution
Stan’s great leadership was built on a firm foundation of good scientific research and scholarship in the field of Health Psychology. He was (co) author of more than 250 scientific publications in the field of health promotion and the development and evaluation of psychological interventions for chronically ill patients. In addition, he co-edited several influential volumes on Health Psychology, books which were particularly valuable in the early days when the Health Psychology literature was fragmented and difficult for students to access.
Stan conducted a wide range of research starting with work on the psychological problems of patients of general practitioners before focussing on the psychological consequences of chronic physical illnesses. Throughout his career, Stan developed and evaluated psychological interventions, beginning with patients in cardiac rehabilitation and even last year (2017) he published on interventions developed for children and adolescents with epilepsy. He investigated work stress in health professionals, teachers and others and published very influential reviews of theories of work stress. In addition, he contributed to theoretical thinking especially on goals in the context of self-regulation.
More recently, Stan has written books on subjects close to his heart with thought-provoking titles like ‘Nothing Is Impossible’ (about life goals of famous people) while the title of his 2016 inaugural address was ‘From the Enlightenment to Religious Terrorism, a psycho-educational vision’ demonstrating how he could apply his psychological thinking to modern societal problems.
In all of his research and leadership, Stan was entirely consistent in his insistence on research of high quality but also that research should go beyond observation and explanation to develop interventions that would to enhance health and quality of life.
Finally …. Thank you Stan
Stan has meant an enormous amount to European and international health psychology but he has also meant a great deal personally and professionally to many members of EHPS. For me personally, he has been an outstanding influence on my career, enabling me to be part of something I could never have anticipated. But beyond that he has been the most generous, delightful friend in ways too important and numerous to mention. We all owe him so much in so many ways for so many things within and beyond EHPS. Thank you Stan.
Note
Notes
1 Commissie Evaluatie Regelgeving van ZON/MW: The Netherland Organsiation for Health and Research Development (ZonMw) program for the evaluation of legislation and regulations https://www.zonmw.nl/nl/onderzoek-resultaten/kwaliteit-van-zorg/programmas/programma-detail/evaluatie-regelgeving/