Young people’s mediatised lives and communities in Germany: implications for parenting

Ever more media choices, face-to-face versus digital communication and parent-child conflicts: Andreas Hepp explores the figuration of German parenting in the digital age. Andreas is Professor of Communication and Media Studies at ZeMKI, Centre for Media, Communication and Information Sciences at the University of Bremen, and he is part of the Communicative Figurations¹ research network

Necessary entanglements: reflections on the role of a “materialist phenomenology” in researching deep mediatization and datafication

This article unpacks the deep engagement of media and communication studies with questions of social construction and the material infrastructures on which media’s role in social construction is based. For that reason, for communication scholars, there is no contradiction between constructivism and realism, and the notion of a materialist phenomenology seems necessary and unproblematic. We take materialist phenomenology further as a concept via the notion of entanglements, drawing on Karen Barad. Then we go on to explore two contemporary debates in media and communication studies which illustrate its broader commitment to understanding the materiality of social construction: first, the broad phenomenon of deep mediatization (Couldry & Hepp, 2016) whereby all aspects of social processes now take mediated forms, and second, the particular process of data colonialism (Couldry & Mejias, 2019) whereby life itself is increasingly the object of colonial appropriation in the form of extracted data

Molo.news: Experimentally Developing a Relational Platform for Local Journalism

In this article we present a research project that experimentally develops a local news platform based on empirical research (interviews, group discussions, a survey) and a co-creation approach. What is presented here is not a typical empirical social science research study but the culmination of an entire approach that is oriented toward software development. This article’s aim is to present the project’s conceptual ideas, its interdisciplinary character, its research-based development approach and the concept for a local news platform that grew out of our preliminary work. At each level we focus on the relationality which arises in the figurations of the actors involved and their various perspectives. First, we illustrate how relationality already shaped the objective of our project and how this results in its interdisciplinary structure and research design. We then discuss this idea with reference to our empirical findings, that is, the paradox of the local public sphere: While all the actors we interviewed - those who (professionally) produce content and those who use it - have a high appreciation for the idea of a local public sphere, the mediated connection to this sphere is diminishing at the same time. We understand this as the real challenge for local journalism and the local public sphere at large, and not just for individual media organizations. This is also the reason why we argue for a fundamentally relational approach: from a theoretical point of view, it can be used to grasp the crisis of the local public; from a practical point of view, relationality represents the core characteristic of the platform in development. On this basis, we will then show how the concept of the experimental local news platform evolved through the use of a prototype as a relational boundary object. This development lead to the conceptualization of the platform molo.news which itself is characterized by a fourfold relationality. Our concluding argument is that approaching relationality in a more rigorous way could be the key to exploring the future of local journalism

The continuing lure of the mediated centre in times of deep mediatization: "Media events" and its enduring legacy

Dayan and Katz’s book “Media Events” was so crucial because it challenged the dominance of quantitative communications research focussed on measurable discrete ‘media effects’. But meanwhile new challenges have emerged which we called ‘deep mediatization’ – datafication, deeper fragmentation of the audience, and over the longerterm threats to the underlying economic viability of the large-scale integrated media producers that could put on ‘media events’. This makes it necessary to re-think the original definition of media events

'Doing Nation': journalistische Praktiken der Nationalisierung Europas

Inhaltsanalysen der europäischen Zeitungsberichterstattung zeigen, dass sich eine zunehmende Transnationalisierung der Öffentlichkeiten europäischer Länder vor allem in Form eines geteilten Beobachtens der EU-Politik in Brüssel ausmachen lässt. Gleichwohl bleibt eine solche europäische Öffentlichkeit 'mehrfachsegmentiert'. Erstens besteht eine nationale Segmentierung, indem Brüssel vor allem aus nationalstaatlicher Perspektive verfolgt wird, und zweitens haben wir eine transnationale Segmentierung unterschiedlichen Typen von Zeitungen der Qualitäts-, Boulevard- und Regionalberichterstattung. Ziel des vorliegenden Arbeitspapiers ist die Erklärung der nationalen Segmentierung europäischen Öffentlichkeit mittels einer Untersuchung journalistischer Produktionsmuster. Wir argumentieren, dass nationale politische Diskurskulturen als 'sozio-kulturelle' Unterbauten von Öffentlichkeit zu national unterschiedlichen Mustern der Artikulation von EU- und Auslandsnachrichten führen. Wenn Journalisten also über Auslands- und Europathemen berichten, dann tun sie dies aus einer nationalen Perspektive. Im journalistischen Arbeitsalltag geht es darum, Anknüpfungspunkte für die Erfahrungs- und Sinnhorizonte der nationalen Leserschaft herzustellen und so das auswärtige Geschehen im nationalen Kontext zu verorten. Das Arbeitspapier befasst sich mit solchen Praktiken der Nationalisierung Europas in transkulturell vergleichender Perspektive auf Basis qualitativer Redaktionsstudien bei 23 Qualitäts-, Boulevard- und Regionalzeitungen in sechs EU-Ländern (Dänemark, Deutschland, Frankreich, Großbritannien, Österreich, Polen). Hauptbefund ist, dass unabhängig davon, um welche Zeitung in welchem Land es sich handelt, über Europa mittels spezifischer Nationalisierungspraktiken berichtet wird. 'Doing Nation' bezeichnet dabei sowohl ein länderübergreifendes Gesamt von Handlungsmustern, das die Journalisten aller Länder realisieren; allerdings segmentiert entlang länderspezifischer Ausprägungen bzw. nationaler politischer Diskurskulturen.Content analyses of newspaper debates on European issues reveal a process of multi-segmented transnationalization of public spheres: While the critical discussion of EU politics is intensified within each country, the resulting European public sphere remains nationally and transnationally segmented: First, reporting on Europe occurs from a national perspective, and second, different types of quality, tabloid or regional newspapers report differently on European issues. The aim of this working paper is to explain the national segmentation of the European public sphere. Therefore, we had a close look at the practices of journalists producing newspaper media coverage. We argue that national political discourse cultures, conceived of as 'socio-cultural' foundations of public spheres, result in different patterns of articulating European and foreign issues in journalistic practice. Journalists report on Europe and foreign countries from their respective national perspectives. In their everyday 'doing nation' journalists articulate news content in a way that a reader living in a given country will be able to relate it to his own national experiences. Nationalization thus refers to the journalistic practices of embedding foreign issues in the context of one's own nation. The working paper presents the results from qualitative newsroom studies conducted within 23 quality, tabloid and regional papers in six EU-countries (Austria, Denmark, Germany, France, Great Britain, Poland) aiming at the description of cultural patterns in the production of EU and European foreign news. Our findings indicate that journalists in all countries report on EU- and foreign issues by employing specific nationalization practices. However, there are national differences in the specific way of their articulation which relate to the national political discourse cultures

An update on statistical boosting in biomedicine

Statistical boosting algorithms have triggered a lot of research during the last decade. They combine a powerful machine-learning approach with classical statistical modelling, offering various practical advantages like automated variable selection and implicit regularization of effect estimates. They are extremely flexible, as the underlying base-learners (regression functions defining the type of effect for the explanatory variables) can be combined with any kind of loss function (target function to be optimized, defining the type of regression setting). In this review article, we highlight the most recent methodological developments on statistical boosting regarding variable selection, functional regression and advanced time-to-event modelling. Additionally, we provide a short overview on relevant applications of statistical boosting in biomedicine

Investigating communication networks contextually: Qualitative network analysis as cross-media research

This article introduces the approach of contextualised communication network analysis as a qualitative procedure for researching communicative relationships realised through the media. It combines qualitative interviews on media appropriation, egocentric network maps, and media diaries. Through the triangulation of these methods of data collection, it is possible to gain a differentiated insight into the specific meanings, structures and processes of communication networks across a variety of media. The approach is illustrated using a recent study dealing with the mediatisation of community building among young people. In this context, the qualitative communication network analysis has been applied to distinguish “localists” from “centrists”, “multilocalists”, and “pluralists”. These different “horizons of mediatised communitisation” are connected to distinct communication networks. Since this involves today a variety of different media, the contextual analysis of communication networks necessarily has to imply a cross-media perspective

"Europe is already all around, but no one notices": The Europeanization of public spheres in regional newspaper reporting

So far the news coverage on the EU and on Europe within regional newspapers has not been subject to the research on European public spheres, although regional papers target a broader readership than quality papers and in contrast to TV news also cover regional and local issues along with international and national topics. Therefore, our study aimed at analysing, in how far the European integration process is reflected in the regional press across countries and from a longitudinal perspective. In order to do so, we conducted a standardized content analysis of the political reporting in Danish, German, French, British, Austrian and Polish regional papers from 1982 until 2008. The results show patterns that are already known from the analysis of quality and tabloid reporting: Until the year 2003 the visibility of EU institutions indicate a significant trend of vertical Europeanization, while the references towards other EU member countries point to a slight tendency of horizontal Europeanization, however already starting from a fairly high level. Hardly visible were indicators of processes of identification with Europe: there were only a small number of We-references and the category "the Europeans" even became less important. At the same time, the already strong role of nation states partly gained even more importance as a reference point in the newspaper coverage, especially in between 2003 and 2008.Die EU- und Europa-Berichterstattung in Regionalzeitungen ist ein bislang kaum berücksichtigter Gegenstand der europäischen Öffentlichkeitsforschung, obwohl sie eine breitere Leserschaft als Qualitätszeitungen und im Unterschied zur Fernsehberichterstattung neben internationalen und nationalen Themen auch regionale und lokale Themen berücksichtigen. Ziel unserer Studie war es daher länder- und zeitvergleichend zu untersuchen, in welchem Maße sich der europäische Integrationsprozess in der regionalen Presse widerspiegelt. Hierzu wurde eine standardisierte Inhaltsanalyse politischer Berichterstattung dänischer, deutscher, französischer, britischer, österreichischer und polnischer Regionalzeitungen zwischen 1982 bis 2008 durchgeführt. Die Ergebnisse zeigen Muster wie sie auch aus Analysen der Qualitäts- und Boulevardberichterstattung bekannt sind: Bis zum Jahr 2003 konnte anhand der Sichtbarkeit der EU-Institutionen ein deutlicher Trend vertikaler, und anhand der Referenzen auf andere Mitgliedsstaaten, von einem sichtbaren Einstiegslevel ausgehend, ein leichter Trend horizontaler Europäisierung beobachtet werden. Kaum erkennbar waren hingegen Anzeichen europäischer Identifikationsprozesse: es gab nur wenige europäische Wir-Bezüge; die Kategorie "die Europäer" verlor sogar an Bedeutung. Daneben wurde insbesondere zwischen 2003 und 2008 die immer noch starke, z.T. auch stärker werdende Rolle der Nationalstaaten als Bezugspunkte der Berichterstattung deutlich

Communicative Figurations: Researching Cultures of Mediatization

In this article the author indicates the necessity of application of transmedia perspective in mediatization research. He understands mediatization research as a kind of analysis that investigatesthe interrelation between the change of media and communication on the one hand and culture and society on the other, refl ecting the transforming role of media within this interrelation. The author emphasises that the idea of communicative fi gurations makes a mediatization research in a transmedia perspective possible. Communicative figurations are patterns of processes of communicative interweaving that exist across various media and have a “frame” that orients communicative action and therefore the sense-making practices of this figuration