Decentering the Discourse on Journalistic Competence in the Digital Age
Dissertation project, Pauline Gidget Estella
Decentering the Discourse on Journalistic Competence in the DigitalAge: Toward a Global Conceptual Framework
Short description
This doctoral thesis critically examines the canon on journalistic norms and competencies through a global approach guided by the de-Westernization lens. The idea is to develop a conceptual-analytical framework for journalist competence based on literature, and to critique the framework through a qualitative approach. Another objective is to create a typology of competence constructs in relation to the different environments across the globe. Last, the study attempts to flesh out predictions or ‘forecasts’ on the future of journalistic practice and competence in the perspective of experts.
The Governance of Crisis Communication in ASEAN
Dissertation Project, Ngoc Son Le.
The Governance of Crisis Communication in ASEAN - A Comparative Analysis of Government Communication to Mitigate the Impact of Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines and Vietnam.
Short Description
The purpose of this research is to examine the practiced government crisis communication, to investigate and evaluate the influence of social, cultural and political factors on structural and practical crisis communication governance, and to develop a strategic framework for policy response at the selected national level in terms of crisis communication governance in the two selected nations.
Mis- and disinformation in the digital age
Dissertation Project, Johanna Radechovsky
Mis- and Disinformation in the Digital Age: Perception, Consequences, Countermeasures
Short Description
Digital and social media have become a central infrastructure of public and political discourse, but at the same time they are a driving force behind the growing spread of mis- and disinformation. Just as journalistic and governmental actors, research is also working on the resulting and persistent problems only with a significant delay. The aim of this dissertation is to shed light on the dynamic and complex field of misinformation, communicators and recipients and its interdependencies from a theoretical, empirical and practice-oriented perspective and to provide a relevant and sustainable analysis for research as well as for the journalistic profession.
Public war communication: research traditions, status quo, and trends.
Dissertation Project, Kathrin Schleicher.
Public war communication: research traditions, status quo and trends. A secondary analysis of scholarly research in the field of war communication.
Short Description
The research field of war communication is dominated by an enormous number of case studies on individual conflicts, which rarely refer to each other and make the research field unmanageable - despite insightful individual findings, research is far from a systematic development of the research field. This is where the planned dissertation wants to start and open up the research field of war communication, which is relevant for communication and media studies: By means of a differentiated secondary analysis, the approaches, questions, procedures, and findings used in the research field will be traced, evaluated, and correlated.
The use of virtual reality in journalism
Dissertation Project, Irina Tribusean
The use of virtual reality in journalism
Short Description
More and more media institutions are using virtual reality (VR) in news production (mostly 360° video, but also computer generated images - CGI). Journalists use VR to help audiences reach places otherwise inaccessible, increase transparency and thus credibility, eliminate bias, and let audiences come to their own conclusions. Nevertheless, there is a lack of empirical studies that focus on the reception and impact of VR journalism on audiences. Moreover, there seems to be no systematic study linking the production and reception of immersive journalism (or any other form of journalism, for that matter), so the ultimate goal of the current doctoral project is to find out whether the expectations of journalists producing VR (CGI) stories are met on the audience side.
Multimodal frames and effects on people's perceptions.
Dissertation Project, Yi Xu.
Multimodal frames and effects on people's perceptions: Comparing national images of Germany, China, and the U.S. through international events.
Short Description
The rise of visuality in social media is a feature of the multimodal turn in digital communication. The novel multimodal framing research aims at integrative analysis of text, image and their relationships. This dissertation aims to analyze the national image presented in multimodal news and examine their framing effect on the perception of a foreign country.
The media construction of scientific expertise during coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic
Dissertation project, Francis Alpers
The media construction of scientific expertise during coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic
Short description
In their daily work, journalists are dependent on scientific expert sources, especially for multi-layered and complex topics such as the COVID-19 pandemic, since they lack the necessary expertise in the respective fields themselves. However, in addition to shaping the content, scientific expert sources also fulfill stylistic functions – they convey seriousness, credibility and objectivity and thus not least increase the perceived professionalism of the journalistic media offering. Thus, they play a crucial role in determining the extent to which news coverage shapes perceptions of health-related risks and countermeasures in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. The dissertation addresses this issue by examining in more detail how (or if at all) the expertise of the scientists cited is legitimized and constructed. For this purpose, news articles from online daily media from a total of seven U.S. and European countries are compared.