Dr. Laurence Claes is a Professor at KU Leuven (Belgium) in the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Head of Clinical Psychology, and Member of the KU Leuven Child & Youth Institute. She is a leading expert in self-injury, personality, and eating disorders whose work explores how identity, perfectionism, and emotional processes relate to self-injurious behaviors, with the goal of improving prevention and intervention. She is deeply respected for her precision, generosity in collaboration, and commitment to advancing global understanding of self-injury.