News – Archive

Hydrogen is discussed in political discourse as one of the key technologies for the energy transition. Stakeholders from various industry sectors also see it as a means to achieve the goal of climate neutrality. At the same time, politics and industry attribute to hydrogen the potential to address recurrent economic issues in the German economy. But how is hydrogen discussed in social discourse? What potential and challenges are attributed to hydrogen? Who are the voices in this discourse, and how do these stakeholders evaluate hydrogen's sustainability and capacity for innovation?

As concerns of fake news continue to rise in the digital age, more attention has been placed on how this issue might be addressed by actions of the community or the state. In a guest lecture on Wednesday, May 8, Dr Shangyuan Wu from the National University of Singapore evaluates the effectiveness of civic and legislative interventions for decreasing the spread of fake news.

The IfK Münster has recently entered into a new partnership with the University of Stavanger. Stavanger is the fourth largest city in Norway and is located in the south-west of the country. From the coming winter semester 2024/25, IfK Bachelor's and Master's students will have the opportunity to study there for a semester as part of the ERASMUS programme.

The 69th annual conference of the German Society for Journalism and Communication Studies (DGPuK) is currently taking place. From 13 to 15 March, high-ranking researchers from German universities will meet in Erfurt to discuss the social significance of communication science research. Under this year's motto "Visions for a better life – media and communication in tomorrow's society", the focus will be on the future relevance of the subject. Numerous researchers from the Deparment of Communication will also be represented at the conference.

On 1 January 2024, the BMBF-funded project "Sustainability governance, networks and practices at universities – a comparative analysis" was launched at the Department of Communication (IfK). The project is being implemented by Prof. Dr Sigrid Kannengießer and Monika Dzialas M.A. as research assistants. The aim of the project is to analyse current governance, networks and practices at universities that pursue the goal of sustainability.

The Department of Communication (IfK) has recently entered into a new partnership with Oslo Metropolitan University (OsloMet). From the autum semester 2024/25, IfK Master students will have the opportunity to study in the Norwegian capital for a semester as part of the ERASMUS programme.

For a week, texts were read, theories were pondered, codes were written and data was analyzed: Eight scientists from the University of Calgary (Canada) and the King's College London (UK) completed an intensive hackathon together with the team of Prof. Dr. Thorsten Quandt. Their joint research work was focusing on the interplay of foreign information manipulation and the communication of extremist groups.

In cooperation with the English Department at the University of Münster, the Institute of Communication Studies now has a partner university in the UK: Up to 4 Bachelor students can complete their studies abroad at Loughborough University from the winter semester 2024/25. The university is located in the county of Leicestershire in the United Kingdom.

Twenty academics from Stavanger, Oslo and Münster met for an intensive two-day exchange on the premises of the Professional School.

On Thursday, 7th December, Prof. Laura Ahva from Tampere University in Finland will give a guest lecture on “The position and power of data specialists in journalism”. Ahva, Doctor of Social Science, is Associate Professor in journalism studies. Anyone interested is warmly invited to attend the event.

Chronic diseases are among the most common health problems in industrialized countries. One important factor in coping with these diseases is personal management – which can be supported and optimized by digital media. A newly founded research group of the German Research Foundation (DFG) is currently investigating the advantages of digital media for self-management of diseases, but also potential negative consequences. One of the six sub-projects of the research group is headed by Prof. Dr. Julia Metag and is funded by the DFG with around 377,000 euros.

A remarkable achievement for an IfK scholar: Professor Dr. Thorsten Quandt was appointed as an ICA Fellow at the International Communication Association (ICA) conference in Toronto. Only the most distinguished representatives of the field are inducted into communication studies' „Hall of Fame".

This year's International Communication Association (ICA) conference will be held May 25-29 in Toronto, Canada. It is dedicated to the main topic of authenticity – and how honesty and credibility can be reclaimed in the communication of the current age. Now in its 73rd year, this year's conference is themed "Reclaiming Authenticity in Communication." Researchers from the Department of Communication in Münster are represented with a total of 21 contributions.

A recent issue of the open-access journal Media and Communication is dedicated to the topic of science communication in the digital age. The "Thematic Issue" was co-edited by Prof. Dr. Julia Metag, Dr. Florian Wintterlin and Kira Klinger M.A. The issue contains 12 different contributions that deal with potentials and challenges of online communication for science communication.

Dr Shangyuan Wu from the National University of Singapore will begin her visiting fellowship at WWU’s Department of Communication in April 2023. She will work with Professor Thorsten Quandt on a research project on alternative media and teach the Master’s course “Digital Journalism and Society: Mapping Journalistic Trends and Transformations” for the duration of the summer semester.

Miriam Kroman Brems from the Danish University of Aarhus (AU) will be a visiting PhD student at the Department of Communication Studies from February until June. She will collaborate with the research group for online communication led by Prof. Dr. Thorsten Quandt and give a guest lecture on alternative media.

Mariela Bustos-Ortega from the Spanish University of Granada (UGR) will be a visiting researcher at the Institute for Communication Studies (IfK) from June 30. She will support the research group for online communication led by Prof. Dr. Thorsten Quandt for three months.

This year's 72nd annual conference of the International Communication Association (ICA) focuses on "One World, One Network‽" and will take place from 26.-30. May for the first time after the corona pandemic in presence in Paris. Researchers from the Institute for Communication Science are represented with 35 contributions there.

For the guest lectures in his master's seminar "Post-journalism: The reconstruction and deconstruction of journalism" Thorsten Quandt could recruit six international journalism researchers in the 2022 summer semester to discuss the current transformation processes in journalism.

In collaboration with Bruno Takahashi (Michigan State University, USA), Suzannah Evans Comfort (Indiana University, USA) and Jagadish Thaker (University of Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand), Prof. Dr. Julia Metag edited “the Handbook of International Trends in Environmental Communication”, which has now been published.

The pandemic is not only a crisis for global health and social systems, but also a critical moment for journalism. The latest issue of the journal "Digital Journalism" takes up this topical issue and gathers a dozen contributions on Covid-19. The 'Special Issue' is edited by IfK professor Thorsten Quandt with his colleague Karin Wahl-Jorgensen, and it is just the prelude to further publications.

Disinformation campaigns on the net were a major social media topic during the election campaign and are also during the coronavirus period. Central questions are still unresolved: Who is behind them, how do such campaigns work, how can they be identified, distinguished from 'real' news and perhaps combated? These questions are being addressed by a new joint project of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), in which IfK is also playing a major role.

This year's 71st Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA) with the main topic "Engaging the essential work of care: Communication, connectedness, and social justice" will take place from 27-31 May as a virtual conference. Researchers* from the Münster Department of Communication will be represented with 21 contributions.

This semester, Prof. Dr. Thorsten Quandt was able to invite eight international journalism researchers, as well as a journalist of a major news agency, to give guest lectures in his Master's seminar "Global journalism: News systems, organizations and actors across the world".

Social media and online communities are plagued by hate communication and trolling these days, and even moderated journalistic forums seem to degrade into toxic environments. This ‚reversed‘, dark form of online participation has become an area of heightened scientific interest, in communication studies and related fields. The latest thematic issue of open access journal Media and Communication contains more than a dozen papers focusing on dark participation, including the work of IfK scholars.

Wer im Wintersemester 2021/22 oder Sommersemester 2022 in Frankreich, Norwegen, Spanien oder weiteren europäischen Ländern Kommunikationswissenschaft studieren möchte, kann sich für das ERASMUS-Programm des Instituts für Kommunikationswissenschaft anmelden. Die jährliche Bewerbungsfrist endet am 26. Februar 2021 und gilt einheitlich für das Winter- sowie Sommersemester, deshalb frühzeitig planen und bewerben!

This semester, Prof. Thorsten Quandt was able to attract six of the most sought-after international journalism researchers* and two journalists from Spiegel Online and Süddeutsche Zeitung for guest lectures in his master's seminar "Dark Participation: The Rise and Fall of the "Participation" Concept in Journalism and (New) Media".

This year's 70th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA) with the main topic "Open Communication" will take place from 20-26 May as a virtual conference. Researchers* from the Münster Department of Communication will be represented with 14 contributions.

From 10 to 12 March, the 65th annual conference of the German Society for Journalism and Communication Studies (DGPuK) will take place on the topic "#Mensch #Medien #Gesellschaft - Fragen und Antworten der Kommunikations- und Medienwissenschaft in Zeiten rapiden Medienwandels" (#People #Media #Society - Questions and Answers of Communication and Media Studies in Times of Rapid Media Change). About 400 communication scientists will participate, among them also employees of the Münster Department of Communication (IfK).

From February 5th to February 7th, the Department of Communication organizes the joint annual conference of the DGPuK (German Communication Association) divisions Science Communication and Communication History.

Last Friday, the Münster Department of Communication (IfK) celebrated 61 graduations. Four doctorate, 29 master graduates and 28 bachelor graduates received the congratulations of Prof. Volker Gehrau, managing director of the IfK.

Wer im Wintersemester 2020/21 oder Sommersemester 2021 in der Schweiz, Spanien oder weiteren europäischen Ländern Kommunikationswissenschaft studieren möchte, kann sich für das ERASMUS-Programm des Instituts für Kommunikationswissenschaft anmelden. Die jährliche Bewerbungsfrist endet am 28. Februar 2020 und gilt einheitlich für das Winter- sowie Sommersemester, deshalb frühzeitig planen und bewerben!

Journalism is currently experiencing numerous transformations. The new DFG Project "The century of journalism – the history of journalism in Germany from WW I to Digitalization" explores general developments in media and society in order to gain a deeper understanding of journalisms current challenges.

Last Friday, the Münster Department of Communication (IfK) celebrated 97 graduations. Three doctorate, 29 master graduates and 65 bachelor graduates received the congratulations of Prof. Volker Gehrau, managing director of the IfK.

On Thursday, June 27, Daniela Stoltenberg and Daniel Maier will give a short workshop on how to collect, process, and analyze communication networks from the social media platform Twitter. As more and more public discourse moves online and onto social networking sites in particular, the capability of analyzing such networks is rapidly gaining importance in the social sciences.

On Monday, June 24, the Research Training Group “Trust and Communication in a Digitized World” organizes three public lecturse (of which one will be held in English) adressing current questions concerning research ethics. Subject of discussion will be the tension between good scientific practise, the quesion of reproducibility of scientific findings, and the role of ethics in times of increasingly pubic science.

Flowers, golden balloons and musical accompaniment by the jBM Saxophone Quartet – it felt just like a real birthday. In this manner, the ceremony on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the Department of Communication (IfK) was celebrated on Saturday, May 11th, at the Münster City Castle. Framed by a get-together and a poster exhibition showcasing the department’s history and – of course – a party, about 300 current and past IfK-members, as well as numerous guests jointly remembered the department’s evolution from its beginnings to its current state.

With the theme of “Communication Beyond Boundaries” the 69th annual International Communication Association (ICA) Conference takes place in Washington D.C. from May 24th to May 28th. The Münster Department of Communication (IfK) is represented by some of its researchers with 25 contributions.

On Friday, May 7, Fabian Gülzau will give a short workshop in which he introduces students to the technique of webscraping with R. Participants will learn a general scheme that can be applied to scrape information from the web. First, the workshop provides a brief introduction to the underlying structure of the modern web. Second, after acquiring this knowledge, we will go through the individual steps that are necessary to retrieve information from a website.

On the 15th of May 15, US-American Communication Scholar Jesse Fox will give a public lecture with the title “A sceptic’s guide to Virtual Reality research. Challenging assumptions, debunking myths & improving practices”.

Online social networks and online news offer the opportunity to access large text corpora. Automated text analysis makes it possible to analyze large amounts of data efficiently. In a guest workshop on the 7th and 9th of May, Professor Vicente Fenoll (University of Valencia, Spain) will give an introduction to automated methods of content analysis.

On 1 April the research project “Is health communication successful?”, headed by Prof. Dr Bernd Blöbaum and Prof. Dr. Volker Gehrau, was launched at the Department of Communication. The three-year project revolves around the question of how scientific results and expert knowledge on health prevention can be communicated effectively.

As of September 1. 2019, Julia Metag will fill the vacant Professorship for Communication Studies and thereby succeed Prof. Frank Marcinkowski, who followed a call to the University of Düsseldorf in the Winter Semester 2017. With her expertise, especially in the fields of political and science communication and media effects, Julia Metag will strengthen both research and teaching at the IfK in these crucial areas.The Department of Communication at the University of Münster has been shaped by a lot of different people over the last 100 years. We would like to revive and tell the history of the deparment for the anniversary year 2019 with more than 100 heads and objects.

In the summer semester 2019, PD Dr. Christoph Kuhlmann, currently working at the Department of Empirical Media Research and Political Communication (Technical University of Ilmenau) will teach at the Münster Department of Communication. He substitutes a W3 professorship that is vacant since October 2017 and that will be filled again in the Winter Semester 2019/20.

Last Friday, the Münster Department of Communication (IfK) celebrated 66 graduations. Two doctorate, 30 master graduates and 34 bachelor graduates received the congratulations of Prof. Volker Gehrau, managing director of the IfK.

The Department of Communication at the University of Münster has been shaped by a lot of different people over the last 100 years. We would like to revive and tell the history of the deparment for the anniversary year 2019 with more than 100 heads and objects.

Over the next three years, the German Research Association (DFG) is funding a scientific network on the topic “Media Trust in the Digital World” with 50,000 Euros. The applicant is Dr. Nayla Fawzi of the LMU München. From the Department of Communication, Prof. Bernd Blöbaum and Dr. Katherine M. Engelke are involved. Both have already conducted research on media trust in the DFG Research Training Group “Trust and Communication in a Digitized World” and other research projects.

At this year’s “summa cum laude” ceremony at the Münster City Castle, Katherine M. Engelke won this year’s dissertation award for her dissertation “The Depiction of Trust, Distrust, and Trust Problems within the Context of Digitalization in the Media”. The dissertation award is endowed with 3500 Euros.

As part of this year’s Late Autumn School, organised by the interdisciplinary DFG Research Training Group “Trust and Communication in a Digitized World”, two public lectures by international researchers will be held on Friday, November 16.8.

In this year’s 7. European Communication Conference, organized by the European Communication and Research and Education Association (ECREA) will be held in Lugano, Switzerland from 31 October to 3 November. Researchers from the Münster Department of Communication (IfK) are taking part with 15 contributions. Amongst these are four contributions presenting the results of studies carried out by master’s students in the context of two research seminars in the summer and winter semester of 2017 and 2018.

For her master’s thesis with the title “Text-Classification Using Machine Learning”, IfK-Graduate Anke Stoll receives the Paul Lazarsfeld-Prize.

On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Münster Department of Communication (IfK), the next annual DGPuK (The German Communication Association) conference will take place in Münster from May 9th till May 11th, 2019. The conference with the title “Integration through Communication in digitized public spheres“ will bring together around 500 participants.

Last Friday, the Münster Department of Communication (IfK) celebrated 101 graduations. Two doctorate, 17 master graduates and 82 bachelor graduates received the congratulations of Prof. Volker Gehrau, managing director of the IfK.

In his master’s thesis, Christian Wengert investigates the question of explanatory factors for the willingness to express opinions on controversial political topics on public situations – and answers it a more comprehensive and differentiated manner than many previous studies, explains the jury.

Customer: Career Service. Order: Revision of its communication concept. Students of the media practice seminar led by Magdalena Bollmann M.A. met the challenge in the winter semester 2017/18. First results of their work were now implemented, amongst which the new cover on the current semester program (WS 2018/2019), published every semester by the Career Service.

As part of the lecture “Introduction into Communication Studies”, hosted by Jun.-Prof. Dr. Annie Waldherr, two guest speakers will give insights into their working life on the *26th of June* and the *3rd of July*.

Faculty members Daniela Stoltenberg and Jun. Prof. Annie Waldherr have received a best paper award by the Computational Methods interest group at the annual convention of the International Communication Association (ICA) in the end of May 2018 in Prague. Together with their colleague Daniel Maier (Freie Universität Berlin) they were honored for their paper “Community Detection in Online Networks of Civil Society: Theoretical Guide and Empirical Assessment”.

From May 30th to June 2nd, 2018 nine public lectures by renowned international communication scholars will take during the 4th international Summer School „Trust in mediated communication“.

In this year’s 68th annual conference of the International Communication Association (ICA,) takes place from May 24th to May 28th 2018 in Praque/Czech Republic. Researchers from the Münster Department of Communication (IfK) are taking part with 21 contributions.

At this year’s 63th DGPuK (German Communication Association) conference, Annie Waldherr received the 1st award for the best journal article in 2017 for her article “Öffentlichkeit als komplexes System. Theoretischer Entwurf und methodische Konsequenzen" (“Public Sphere as a complex system. A theoretical draft and methodological consequences”), published in the autumn edition of the German journal “Medien & Kommunikationswissenschaft“.

On Monday, May 14th, Carsten Linnhoff will be guest speaker in the seminar “News Agencies between Public Service and Economic Profit” of Dr. Hannah Lorenz.

This year’s 63th. annual conference of the German Communication Association (DGPuK) will take place from May 9th to May 11th. About 400 communication researchers are participating in the conference on the topic “Self-Determination in the Digital World”. Amongst the participants are numerous researchers of the Münster Department of Communication (IfK).

On Monday, May 07, 2018, Dr. Geeske Scholz will be guest speaker in the seminar „Complexity Theory and the Public Sphere“ of Jun.-Prof. Dr. Annie Waldherr.

After a career of 31 years at the University of Münster of which she was working 25 years at the Department of Communication (IfK), Dr. Marianne Ravenstein was bid farewell on her retirement on Tuesday, 10 April 2018 in an official ceremony in the Münster City Castle.

Since April 1st 2018, the beginning of the summer semester, the Department of Communication has a new managing director. Prof. Volker Gehrau succeeds Prof. Quandt after his two-year term of office.

Accompanying the featured theme "Digitalisation at Münster University", the Press office published expert interviews featuring Prof. Bernd Blöbaum und Katie M. Grosser, as well as a guest article by Felix Brinkschulte und Dr. Lena Frischlich. The video interview with Prof. Bernd Blöbaum started off the 6-month period in which WWU features "Digitalisation".

From March till July 2018, Prof. Thorsten Quandt, director of the Münster Department of Communication will be guest professor at the Universities of Oxford and Stanford.

The Center for Advanced Internet Studies (CAIS) will fund Stefanie Geise’s and Annie Waldherr’s working group «Computational Social Science», which has been applied for in cooperation with Uwe Engel, Professor of Sociology and Head of the Social Science Methods Centre at the University of Bremen. With the funding CAIS provides financial and structural resources to facilitate cooperation among national and international experts joining together in workshops. The aim of the working group is to reflect the consequences of an increasing usage of computational methods for the further development of the empirical social sciences.

Led by Prof. Ulrike Röttger and Dr. Christian Wiencierz, the new research project „External Interfaces of Communication Management” aims to develop this new research field from a communication science perspective.

Cooperation project of PD. Dr. Stephanie Geise (WWU Münster) in association with political scientists Prof. Diana Panke (University of Freiburg) and Dr. Axel Heck (University of Kiel) .Since October 2017, the Friede-Springer-Foundation has sponsored the research project «Still Images – Moving People», situation at the WWU. The inter-disciplinarian project-team will now commence with a pre-study. Lead by PD Dr. Stephanie Geise and in cooperation with two colleagues from political sciences, Prof. Dr. Diana Panke (University of Freiburg) and Dr. Axel Heck (University of Kiel) the project team will examine the (inter-)relationship between perception, typification and processing of positively and negatively framed media images of selective protest movement and their protest-issues with regards to the political participation willingness of citizens.

On February 2 nd, 2018, the Münster Department of Communication (IfK) celebrated 72 graduations. One doctorate, 10 master graduates and 67 bachelor graduates have been congratulated by Prof. Dr. Thorsten Quandt, managing director of the Department of Communication.

On January 30, 2018, Dr. Neta Kligler-Vilenchik will be guest speaker in the seminar „Media Hypes“ of Jun.-Prof. Dr. Annie Waldherr. Neta Kligler-Vilenchik is Assistant Professor for Communication and Journalism at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Her research focuses on civic and political engagement in the context of the changing media environment, particularly among young people. In her talk she will present current findings of a study on „Youth Political Expression in the Context of the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election“, where she analyzes how young people creatively expressed themselves online and discussed with their peers about the last U.S. presidential election results.

A new research project, led by Jun.-Prof. Dr. Annie Waldherr (University of Münster) and Prof. Dr. Barbara Pfetsch (FU Berlin), is investigating digital urban public spheres. Starting in January 2018, the four-year project at the Department of Communication will focus on the Twitterspheres of Berlin and Jerusalem. The research will be conducted in cooperation with Dr. Neta Kligler-Vilenchik (Hebrew University of Jerusalem) and received roughly 500,000 Euros in funding from the German Research Foundation (DFG).

How do Online Propaganda and related phenomena spread, which effects do they have and how can media users be assisted, in order to resist manipulation attempts online? Starting January 2018, the interdisciplinary junior research group “Democratic Resilience in Times of Online-Propaganda, Fake News, Fear- and Hate speech” led by Dr. Lena Frischlich will investigate these questions. With nearly one million euros, the project is funded by the Land of North Rhine Westphalia (NRW), NRW, through the funding line “Democracy’s Protection and Reinforcement in the Digitized Society”.

Entitled “Silversurfer 70plus. Qualitative Fallstudien zur Aneignung des Internets in der Rentenphase“, Prof. Jutta Röser and the Students from her research seminar at the Department of Communication (IfK) published their findings.

How can collaboration of municipal communication in the different departments of a city become organized future-oriented, while its duties and responsibilities are increasingly extensive? The project „Interfaces and Collaboration in Municipal Communication“ which is conducted in cooperation with the city of Münster, is aiming to answer this question. The project starts at December 1st and will be led by Prof. Dr. Ulrike Röttger and Dominik Czeppel.

Led by Dr. Thomas Birkner (WWU) and Dr. Benjamin Krämer (LMU), the new DFG-project “Media Biographies of German Chancellors” aims to explore the significance of the media in the chancellors’ biographies. Sebastian Mallek (IfK Muenster) and Katharina Schmidt (IfKW Muenchen) will be research assistants in the two-year project, funded with 250.000 Euro from the DFG.

How does Trust arise? Three public lectures of international scientists at the Late Autumn School 2017 of the DFG Research Training Group “Trust and Communication in a Digitized World”

On July 28th, 2017, the Münster Department of Communication (IfK) celebrated the 78 graduations. One doctorate, 10 master graduates and 67 bachelor graduates received the congratulations Prof. Dr. Thorsten Quandt, managing director of the Department of Communication.

 In this year’s 67th annual conference of the International Communication Association (ICA,) which takes place from May 25th to May 29th 2017 in San Diego/USA, researchers from the Department of Communication of the University of Münster (IfK) take part with 26 contributions. This conference’s title is “Interventions: Communication Research and Practice”.

The media sector and journalism in particular are subject to a massive change. This also affects the work conditions and the job market for comm studies alumni. Many newcomers, but also established journalists turn to innovative and flexible start ups instead of the traditional media companies. Canadian professor Mary-Lynn Young from the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, will discuss the challenges of launching a journalistic start up. She will draw from her own practical experiences in the world of start-ups and ‚slightly different’ journalism.