PhD Position in Social Sciences

Faculty: Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences
Department: Social Sciences
Hours per week: 36 to 40
Application deadline: 23 August 2026

Why do word meanings appear or vanish over centuries?

In this position, you will develop, evaluate, and fine-tune cutting-edge AI methods—LLMs, word embeddings, and clustering—to track how word meanings evolve across multilingual historical corpora. You will test whether these patterns are universal and build a robust open-source pipeline, and join an interdisciplinary team combining semantic representation, multilingual NLP, and computational historical linguistics. You will study generalization across languages and domains, with applications to Social and Behavioural Sciences.

Your job

The Department of Methodology & Statistics at the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences has a job opening for PhD candidate. In the position of PhD candidate, you are responsible for conducting original research on computational models of semantic change and synonymy evolution across historical corpora, structured around three lines of work: (1) modelling semantic relationships across time; (2) interpretability of semantic change models; and (3) generalization across languages and domains. You will carry out activities like developing, benchmarking, and refining NLP pipelines, analysing multilingual historical datasets, and disseminating your findings through publications and presentations.

Your main tasks and responsibilities include:

• Designing, implementing, and evaluating computational models using contextualized word embeddings and LLMs to track semantic change and synonymy evolution across time.
• developing hierarchical clustering architectures to identify and track polysemous senses in historical corpora.
• applying the framework to English (COCA/COHA), Dutch (Delpher), and Spanish (RAE) data to automatically detect synonyms and measure semantic trajectories.
• building and maintaining an open-source pipeline for the broader language change research community.
• investigating whether observed evolutionary tendencies are universal or language specific.
• contributing to the intersection of computational linguistics and the Social and Behavioural Sciences through interdisciplinary collaboration.
• writing and publishing scientific articles in international journals and presenting at conferences.
• participating in the academic community of the Department and the research group, including seminars and workshops.
• contributing to teaching or departmental tasks for up to 10% of your appointment.

Your qualities

We are looking for a computationally skilled researcher with a passion for language and an interdisciplinary and open-science mentality.

We are looking for you, if you have:

• a (research) master’s degree in Artificial Intelligence, Computational Linguistics, NLP, Computer Science, Data Science, or a related field, with a strong affinity for language data;
• solid programming skills (e.g., Python) and experience with machine learning or NLP, ideally including transformer-based models and word embeddings;
• excellent English communication skills; and
• ability to work in interdisciplinary teams.

Furthermore, your suitability is ideally exemplified by:

• prior experience with multilingual or historical corpora, multilingual language modelling, explainable NLP, or familiarity with diachronic linguistic data;
• hands-on experience with version control, open-source development, and reproducible research workflows; and/or
• knowledge of or genuine interest in cognitive, social, or behavioural science perspectives on language and meaning.

Our offer

• a job for 1 year with an extension to a total of four years upon successful assessment;
• a working week of 36 - 40 hours and a gross monthly salary between €3,204 in the first year and €4,051 in the fourth year of and €3.881 in the case of full-time employment (salary scale P under the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities (CAO NU);
• 8% holiday pay and 8.3% year-end bonus;
• a pension scheme, partially paid parental leave and flexible terms of employment based on the CAO NU.

In addition to the terms of employment laid down in the CAO NU, Utrecht University also offers a range of its own schemes for employees. This includes arrangements for professional development, various types of leave, and options for sports and cultural activities. You can also tailor your employment conditions through our Terms of Employment Options Model. In this way, we encourage you to keep investing in your personal and professional development. For more information, please visit Working at Utrecht University.

About us

A better future for everyone. This ambition motivates our scientists in executing their leading research and inspiring teaching. At Utrecht University, the various disciplines collaborate intensively towards major strategic themes. Our focus is on Dynamics of Youth, Institutions for Open Societies, Life Sciences and Pathways to Sustainability. Sharing science, shaping tomorrow.

The Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences is one of the leading faculties in Europe providing research and academic teaching in cultural anthropology, educational sciences, interdisciplinary social science, pedagogical sciences, psychology, and sociology. Almost 7,000 students are enrolled in a broad range of undergraduate and graduate programmes. The Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences has some 1,100 faculty and staff members, all providing their individual contribution to the training and education of young talent and to the research into and finding solutions for scientific and societal issues.

The faculty is located at Utrecht Science Park near the historical city centre of Utrecht.

More information

For more information, please contact Pablo Mosteiro by p.mosteiro@uu.nl.

Candidates for this vacancy will be recruited by Utrecht University.

Apply now

As Utrecht University, we want to be a home for everyone. We value staff with diverse backgrounds, perspectives and identities, including cultural, religious or ethnic background, gender, sexual orientation, disability or age. We strive to create a safe and inclusive environment in which everyone can flourish and contribute.

Knowledge security screening can be part of the selection procedures of academic staff. We do this, among other things, to prevent the unwanted transfer of sensitive knowledge and technology.

To apply, please send your curriculum vitae, including a letter of motivation, via the ‘apply now’ button.

Invitations for interviews will be sent between the application deadline and early September.

The first round of interviews takes place in September 2026. Our preferred start date is 1 October 2026.

The application deadline is 24 August 2026.