Prof. An-Sofie Smetcoren

(she/her)

 

BACKGROUND

An-Sofie Smetcoren is a Professor of Adult Educational Sciences at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), where she is responsible for the courses “Participatory Action Research,” “Policy and Practice of Adult Educational Sector,” and “Issues in International Relations.” She also coordinates and supervises the internship program within the program of Adult Educational Sciences.

 

An-Sofie obtained her Master’s degree in Social Pedagogy in 2010 and her Educational Master’s in Teacher Education. She completed her PhD research on ageing and housing in 2016 within the research group Belgian Ageing Studies, under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Dominique Verté and Prof. Dr. Tinie Kardol. This doctoral research was supported by the Foundation for the Promotion of Active Ageing.

 

Her main research interests focus on how urban environments shape the everyday lives of older residents — with a particular emphasis on housing, but also on services and care — and how processes of social inclusion and exclusion take place within local communities. She is particularly committed to understanding and amplifying the experiences and voices of older adults in vulnerable situations, through co-creative and participatory research approaches. As a senior researcher within the Society & Ageing Research Lab, she leads the research line “Older Adults and Housing.”

 

Currently, she serves as VUB principal investigator for the Strategic Basic Research (FWO-SBO) project HOUSE – Innovating Housing for Older Adults and Subjective Wellbeing, and as a partner in the European Marie Sklodowska-Curie Doctoral Training Network HOMeAGE. In the past, she coordinated several national and European research projects such as Care & Living in Community (CALICO), RenoLab-C, and Entour-Age North, among others. She has also contributed as a researcher to various projects on housing and caring neighbourhoods. From 2015 to 2023, she was a lecturer in the Postgraduate Program in Psychosocial Gerontology at Odisee University of Applied Sciences.

 

An-Sofie is also a member of the Board of Directors of Aksent vzw (a local service centre in Brussels) and Samenhuizen vzw.

KEY PPUBLICATIONS

  • Hoens, S., D'Hooghe, S., Kint, O., Quintiens, B., Brosens, D., De Donder, L., & Smetcoren, A.-S. (2025). Capturing the most significant change after a work-training program for community health workers. Evaluation and program planning, 112, 1-9. Artikel 102667. 
  • Mosseray, J., Aernouts, N., & Smetcoren, A. S. (2025). Care and Living in Community: Softening the Redistribution–Recognition Dilemma in Alternative Housing Initiatives? Housing, Theory and Society, 42(4), 410–428. 
  • Stoisser, L., Buffel, T., Petermans, A., & Smetcoren, A. S. (2025). Rethinking community-based housing for older adults: a research agenda for spatial justice. International Journal of Housing Policy, 1–19. 
  • Phlix, M., Vanrie, J., Petermans, A., & Smetcoren, A. S. (2025). The (Im)Material Home: Exploring Older Migrants' Home Experiences Situated within Material and Immaterial Settings of Home. An Exploratory Study in Belgium. Journal of cross-cultural gerontology, 40(1), 1–28.
  • Kint, O., Duppen, D., Vandermeersche, G., Smetcoren, A. S., & De Donder, L. (2024). How ‘co’ can you go? A qualitative inquiry on the key principles of co-creative research and their enactment in real-life practices. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 28(1), 87–103. 
  • Smetcoren, A.-S., De Donder, L., Verté, D. (2020). An applied approach to housing in later life. In A. Petermans, R. Cain (Eds.) Design for wellbeing: an applied approach (pp.194-205). New York: Routledge. 
  • Smetcoren, A.-S, De Donder, L., Duppen D., De Witte, N., Vanmechelen, O. & Verté, D. (2018). Towards an Active Caring Community in Brussels. In T. Buffel, S. Handler, C. Phillipson (Eds.) Age-friendly communities: A Global Perspective (pp.97-118). Bristol: Policy Press. 
  • Smetcoren, A.-S., De Donder, L., Dury, S., De Witte, N., Kardol, T., & Verté, D. (2017). Refining the push and pull framework: identifying inequalities in residential relocation among older adults. Ageing & Society, 37, 90-112. 

 

For a full overview: Pure Databank  

ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4581-4898  

RESEARCH EXPERTISE

  • Housing & the home environment 

  • Caring communities 

  • Qualitative research – Social Design methods 

GET IN TOUCH

Email: An-Sofie.Smetcoren@vub.be