Principal Investigator
Prof. Floris Roelofsen is the founding director of the SignLab at the University of Amsterdam (https://www.signlab-amsterdam.nl/) and of Language Sciences for Social Good (https://language-science.nl/), a research program comprising more than 100 researchers across multiple faculties at the University of Amsterdam. Besides conducting empirical and theoretical research on sign languages and co-speech gesture, Roelofsen also collaborates with industry and societal partner organisations to develop applications to support sign language users and learners. He also coordinates the development of digital research infrastructure for sign language research in the Netherlands, including lexical resources and a motion capture studio to enable fine-grained measurements of the movements of signers.
About
University Amsterdam
Selected Publications
Virtual agents as a scalable tool for diverse, robust gesture recognition. Lisa Loy, James P Trujillo, & Floris Roelofsen. Behavior Research Methods, 58: 41. 2026.
Iconicity and transparency in Dutch Sign Language. Annika Schiefner, Floris Roelofsen, & Beyza Sümer. Behavior Research Methods, 58: 87. 2026.
Navigating sign language learning: insights from hearing parents of deaf and hard-of-hearing children. Jos Ritmeester, Beyza Sümer, Marije Boonstra, Maartje Meulder, Belinda Aa, & Floris Roelofsen. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, 34: 85–103. 2026.
Designing a Marker Based Motion Capture Setup for Sign Language Research. Jari Ivar Andersen, Gomer Otterspeer, Robert Belleman, & Floris Roelofsen. In Adjunct Proceedings of the 25th ACM International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents, pages 1–9, 2025.
User Acceptance of Augmented Remote Sign Language Interpreting. Zheng Dan Xia, Maartje Meulder, Gomèr Otterspeer, & Floris Roelofsen. In Adjunct Proceedings of the 25th ACM International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents, pages 1–9, 2025.
The indefinite-interrogative affinity in Catalan Sign Language (LSC). Raquel Veiga Busto, Marco Degano, & Floris Roelofsen. Sign Language & Linguistics, 28(1): 49–103. 2025.