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12In 2018, Mariska Kret received a VIDI grant (number 016.VIDI.185.036) by the Dutch research Council (Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek) to investigate %u201cEmotional contagion in autism and social anxiety%u201d. For the practical implementation of the research, she advertised a PhD position, zooming in on the bodily signature of emotional social exchanges. Especially one part of the project, which involved real interactions with simultaneous physiological recordings of both interactants, caught my interest. Following my successful application, we decided that it should become the focus of my dissertation. Starting as first PhD student on a new, highly complex project typically comes with various challenges. Some of them were expected, like setting up and piloting all tasks in a student population, learning diagnostic procedures, or applying for ethical approval with the Medical Ethics Committee. Some other challenges could not be easily predicted, such as long delays in the application process for ethical approval or changes in supervisors. Yet, the biggest challenge that I, and every other individual at that time, had to face was the Covid-19 pandemic. There is probably no need to go into the details of the detrimental effects that the pandemic had on daily life and well-being. It had, however, also a strong impact on the course of my PhD project. For long time periods, conducting research, particularly real interaction studies and with vulnerable populations, seemed impossible. Fortunately, I had already collected data for the non-interactive parts of the project with student samples, which I could analyze. In addition, I was very lucky to be surrounded by great collaborators and support staff. Together with my fellow PhD student Fabiola Diana and the technical support of Leiden University, we developed procedures to continue data collection and even prepare interactive studies in Leiden when the pandemic was slowly waning. Moreover, in sporadic visits (when possible) and continuous video calls, my fellow PhD student Kristina Nikic and I managed to prepare the data collection at our collaborators%u2019 testing site, at the LVR hospital in Essen (Germany). The great efforts of our German collaborators, under the supervision of Katja Koelkebeck, rendered the inclusion of a dissertation chapter with a clinical sample possible. Although I had to let go of my initial goal to focus on the part of the project including real social interactions, I could still realize my interests within the project. Carried by the flexibility and trust of my promotor Mariska Kret, I zoomed in on the role of the ability and inclination to sense and interpret internal signals (i.e., interoception) in emotion perception. This addition