Aline Duelen

Aline Duelen is a user researcher at imec-SMIT VUB since 2022. She is specifically interested in the human aspect of today’s knowledge- and information-driven society. Working on the European TITAN project, she is contributing to the development of citizen-driven AI ecosystem platforms that empower users to fight disinformation. As digital media are omnipresent in our society, she puts great interest in researching the different consequences of those media. Critical thinking is a must in a democracy, she therefore attaches great importance to finding ways to fight fake news and inform citizens on how to critically assess online content.

Aline received her bachelor’s degree in Communication Sciences at the VUB in 2021. Her bachelor’s paper focused on the topic of “A society of immediacy: FoMO and identity formation”, in which she researched the consequences of social media and FoMO on the identity process of young adults. In 2022, she obtained the degree of Master in Communication Sciences: Media, Strategic communication and Marketing cum laude at the VUB. In her master’s thesis she focused on the topic of “Social media and polarization: the worldview and the role of digital inequalities”, researching online polarization from a different point of view. She concluded that social media usage, age and gender have an influence on polarization and differing worldviews, though more research is needed on the effects of digital inequalities on the construction of a worldview.