The Elgar Encyclopedia of Political Communication is out & we (w/ Michael Brüggemann) contributed an entry on 💥 "Discursive #Polarization" 🗯️ Many thanks to the editors @alessandronai.bsky.social, Max Grömping & @dominiquewirz.bsky.social! 🛜 #OpenAccess accepted preprint: osf.io/preprints/os...

Proposed methods teaching material regarding network analysis: could there be a nicer way of teaching students what nodes and edges in a network are?

New mixed-methods study out in Media International Australia! We compare 🇦🇺 & 🇩🇪 news framing of climate movements — revealing media polarisation: right-leaning outlets often frame activists as threats, while centre/left ones portray them less negatively. 👉 doi.org/10.1177/1329...

Excited to share our new #OpenAccess article in Information, Communication & Society: “Beyond anti-elitism and out-group attacks: How concerns shape the AfD’s #populist representation on German #TikTok during the 2024 #EU #elections” /w @julialenz.bsky.social, L. Rodeck & @drfell.bsky.social (⬇️ 🧵)

📢 Happy to see this #OpenAccess paper out in #Journalism! "From disruptive protests to disrupted news frames: Comparing German news on climate protests" with @mikefarjam.bsky.social, Helena Rauxloh & Michael Brüggemann

A Practical Guide and Case Study on How to Instruct #LLMs for Automated Coding During #ContentAnalysis |@mikefarjam.bsky.social, ‪@hendrikmeyer.bsky.social‬, Meike Lohkamp journals.sagepub.com...#LLMs#ContentAnalysis#GenerativeAI

New publication out in Social Science Computer Review, with @mikefarjam.bsky.social (lead) and Meike Lohkamp: “A Practical Guide and Case Study on How to Instruct LLMs for Automated Coding During Content Analysis.” journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/... A thread 🧵:

My favorite part of #ica25 thus far

Looking forward to attending #ICA2025 in Denver! I’ll be in panels from Friday to Monday and am excited to share/attend presentations of our recent work on #LLMs, (populist) #PoliticalCommunication on #TikTok, and #ClimateProtest movements in the media. Here’s where you can find me:

FYI #ICA25 if you want to get in on the national day of action on Saturday but will be away from your home, here is the Denver event

#ICA25 In case you're interested in attending a special non-academic event during your stay in Denver...

Two groups, one protest strategy Yet we find that 🇩🇪 respondents are more supportive of stripping away fundamental democratic rights for Green activists compared to Farmers ⚠️This goes as far as shifting their willingness to sign a petition requesting immediate jailing without trial Results 👇👇

Kicked off our #Fuel2Fire 🔥 project in Hamburg! In this cross-country collaboration, we're studying polarization across Europe — from meta discourse to polarizing topics & practices — with partners from Spain, Sweden, Poland & @netzwerkrecherche.org. #Polarization #Journalism

New in Social Media + Society: How do (non-)disruptive #climate #protests shape social media debates? We analyzed ~5M Twitter/X posts on #FFF & #LetzteGeneration: Disruptive protests generate more engagement—but also more polarization, driven by right-wing/conservative users: doi.org/10.1177/2056...

@pzerrer.bsky.social did a great job at #DGPUK2025 presenting initial findings from our #trackingdata research investigating how #climatechange topic consumption is linked to political participation & mobilization! With Vasilisa Kuznetsova, @cbpuschmann.bsky.social, @lisamerten.bsky.social

Das erste Mal dabei — danke an alle die dabei waren (und mich unterstützend angeschaut haben @kudusch.de) & besonders an mein unschlagbares Team @hendrikmeyer.bsky.social @MichaelBrüggemann @mikefarjam.bsky.social :-) #dgpuk25

Inspiring study showing how LLMs can be leveraged to combine large-scale #NLP research with deeper (qualitative) perspectives on social media, #CommSky, and #polcomm!

This pledge for a European and/or transnational, non-commercial social media platform, which I originally posted on a now-defunct platform in 2023, has aged like fine wine ... So I decided to repost it here.

As part of ongoing research projects on #polarization and #depolarization in times of inevitable societal transformation, we have launched a website presenting our collective work -- feel free to check it out or follow @transform-comm.bsky.social for updates! www.transformativecommunication.net/en/

A DDOS attack on our minds.

🚨In Nature🚨 Meta is dropping fact-checking to avoid anti-conservative bias- but is there actually evidence of bias? We this test empirically & find that conservatives * ARE suspended more * BUT share more misinfo So suspension isn't necessarily evidence of bias www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Last week we held our workshop on #Polarization –Conceptualization and Methodological Approaches. It was a blast, bringing together brilliant and highly motivated minds! 🤓

Virtual Torches, Real Fires?🔥 In an interdisciplinary collaboration, we explore the spatial and temporal linkages between protest mobilization on Telegram and politically motivated crime offline across German districts from 2020 to 2022. 👉 doi.org/10.31219/osf...

With rightwing populism rising and German elections coming earlier, feels like the perfect time to share our working paper: 'Beyond Anti-Elitism & Out-Group Attacks: How Concerns Shape the AfD’s Populist Representation on TikTok During 2024 EU Elections' w/@julialenz.bsky.social @drfell.bsky.social

What is Discursive Polarization and how does it relate to established #polarization concepts within (political) communication studies? Michael Brüggemann and I illustrated this in an entry for Elgar Encyclopedia of Political Communication. Accepted OSF preprint: osf.io/preprints/os...

Want to learn about the current literature on definitions, methods of measurement, predictors, effects, and the ethical challenges surrounding #ConspiracyTheories? Check out @lenafrescamente.bsky.social and my preprint from the Elgar Encyclopedia of Political Communication! osf.io/preprints/os...

In the next panel, Henrik Meyer from the University of Hamburg addresses challenges to societal cohesion, looking at discursive polarization (polarized framing if issues, polarized issue networks, polarized group-related communication and polarized group-related networks). #SMO24

Interested in computational methods for text analysis and looking for a good place to start? We have a new position open in our BMBF-project "FLACA - Few shot learning in automated content analysis for communication science"! www.uni-hamburg.de/stellenangeb... (1/3)

Are you looking for a (Post-)PhD position to conduct research at the intersection of trust & AI, supervised by an amazing soon-to-be professor? @hheuer.bsky.social is hiring!👇

As we (all, always) await peer-review, you can now access our two pre-prints on OSF. We're exploring the polarization in German media debates about (non-)disruptive climate movements, specifically comparing 'Letzte Generation' with 'Fridays for Future':

"Even when Republicans agree that content is false, they are half as likely as Democrats to say that the content should be removed and more than twice as likely to consider removal as censorship"

The 2023 state of the climate report: it's fucked academic.oup.com/bioscience/a...

"Some people might see the use of ChatGPT in writing grant proposals as cheating, but it actually highlights a much bigger problem: what is the point of asking scientists to write documents that can be easily created with AI? What value are we adding?" www.nature.com/articles/d41...

The DSA is here to protect both freedom of expression & our democracies — including in times of crisis. We have sent X a formal request for information, a first step in our investigation to determine compliance with the DSA. ec.europa.eu/commission/p...

Following the terrorist attacks by Hamas against 🇮🇱, we have indications of X/Twitter being used to disseminate illegal content & disinformation in the EU. Urgent letter to Elon Musk on DSA obligations ⤵️

Okay, Bluesky, here we go: We published a policy paper on #DSA40 today, with 20 points for successful researcher access to platform data #DigitalServicesAct: It must be fair, free, and accessible. commsky DE: doi.org/10.34669/wi.... EN: doi.org/10.34669/wi.... Support it: forms.gle/BbrpeFb4BTFy...

Since Musk bashed sea rescues and endorsed the AfD, Google searches for #bluesky have skyrocketed in Germany

Schaut so aus, als würde #BlueSky das jetzt wirklich gewinnen und #Mastodon klar abschütteln. #GoogleTrends

Wie angekündigt hier mal ein bisschen was zur Geschichte der Bluesky Community. Dies ist ein Screenshot der verschiedenen Cluster dieses Netzwerks aus dem Juli diesen Jahres. Die Größe des Trans + Shitposters Cluster sollte sofort ins Auge fallen.