 Nygaard was a professor in Aarhus, Denmark (1975–1976) and then became professor emeritus in Oslo (part-time from 1977, full-time 1984–1996).His work in Aarhus and Oslo included research and education in system development and the social impact of computer technology, and became the foundation of the Scandinavian School in System Development, which is closely linked to the field of participatory design.Beginning in 1976, he was engaged in the development and (since 1986) the implementation of the general object-oriented programming language BETA (together with
Bent Bruun Kristensen, Ole Lehrmann Madsen and Birger Moeller-Pedersen).