Professorship for Communication and Media Research I

The research fields of entertainment and political communication are combined in the third-party funded project „Political  Communication at the Interface of Entertainment and Information“ funded by the German Research Foundation. Other projects in this area deal with the role of empathy in processing socially relevant information and in political deliberation processes.

In the field of health communication, we are involved in various projects with the communicative influence of health-related attitudes, especially with people with problematic attitudes, whether this be from a medical or normative perspective. The professorship is also involved in the Cluster of Excellence "Understanding Obesity" proposed by the University of Leipzig. Its focus on health communication examines the portrayal of people in the media who are overweight, in particular the possible positive contribution of the media to reducing stigma and promoting health-conscious behavior.
 

Another research focus is the perception of depictions of violence in entertainment media. In particular, we are interested in the role of reflected processing against the background of eudaimonic usage motives, for example in the question of whether such processing processes can cushion the negative effects of depictions of violence.