Are you looking for a topic for your Bachelor or Master thesis? Below you will find topics and research questions that can be dealt with in the context of theses at the Department of Public Communication. If you are interested in one of the topics and would like to have your thesis supervised by the Department of Public Communication, please consider a basic research problem from one of the topics and select Priority 1 for Public Communication in the registration procedure for theses. Places for thesis supervision will be allocated according to your thematic fit and priority specifications, as capacity utilization and demand allow. 

For more information on the thesis registration process, please visit the "Studies" section.

 
Public Communication

Public communication, as the name implies, means communication that is generally accessible. This primarily includes journalism, political communication as a result of political public relations and generally accessible communication in online media. Public Communication is always concered about the relevance for societey as well as trhe question on how community is established via media.

1. (Media)Change

Depending on the historical situation and media ensemble, community is produced differently. Research topics regarding media change can explore how new media open up new communication spaces and how on one hand individual lifeworlds, social participation possibilities, but on the other hand, societies as a whole change.

How has the production of media products changed - and with it media institutions and professional fields?

What are the new approaches to media communication, how do different groups deal with new media?

2. Contexts of Public Communication                                                                         

Public communication always takes place under very specific social conditions and power constellations. It also makes a difference at which time and in which cultural space communication takes place.

Context-sensitive research that explores transnational communication processes are desirable topics for a thesis. For example, it can be researched how online media enable communalization across borders, how media products are appropriated in different countries, or how social movements organize themselves across borders through media. All these processes can also be studied for past times.

3. Identity and Diversity                                                                                        

People are characterized by different life experiences, social placements and mentalities. Theses that look at how social gender, generational affiliation, knowledge, milieu and migration background - often in interaction - influence media  are desired.

How do these factors influence the communicator and as well as the recipient role? How are different people portrayed in the media? What patterns (stereotypes) are at work here?

4. Health Communication

Social ideas about illness and health, about sensible preventive measures as well as behavior harmful to health, about justified but also inappropriate medical interventions are shaped by the media. In addition, people specifically search for health information in the media and share experiences of illness on social media. We seek to explore the interplay of media, society, and individuals in the field of health communication.

Concrete Topic Suggestions 

• Digital stress - a women's problem? On the visual construction of digital stress and stress sufferers: A content analysis of ...
• Commemoration on social media: memory creation and identity work using the example of ... (content analysis or survey)
• The public debate about the smartphone as a typical 'new' media debate? A content analysis of ...
• Public debates and individual or collective acceptance of the establishment of new technologies or communication practices in different social domains
• The public approach to media change, e.g., automation processes, the ethics of algorithms and search engines, and the consequences of digital transformation.
• Public debates about algorithms and artificial intelligence on the example of...
• Protest, Entertainment, Obfuscation: Satire in Social Media
• Satire in public discourse: media coverage and debates on satire in times of "post-factual politics"
• Protest, Agitation and Obfuscation: (Right-wing) Satire in Social Media
• Job description of a satirist: agendas, motivations and role models
• Digital health: health action, lifestyle and digital media
• Gender issues in (strategic) health communication
• Everyday communication on health topics: Social relations and (media-mediated) communication about health and illness
• Media at the end of life: Media communication in final phases of life and for coping with grief
• The past of the digital future - imaginaries of life with digital media and technologies from 1980 to 2000. An analysis of product presentations, exhibition catalogs and media coverage 
• Digital transformation in and of media professions
• Digital Transformation of Public Spheres - Alternative Media as Alternative Public Spheres, Actors, Contents, Users
• Personal epistemologies of media and media use in everyday life: Digital or generational change of media repertoires and media practices?
• Against the acceleration of everyday life: digital media and practices of slowing down between ideology (critique) and business model
• The Transformation of the Digital: The history of social media in Germany (cross-platform phenomena or platform histories e.g. StudiVZ, etc.). 
• The effect of conflicting evidence in user comments
• The importance of science blogs for journalistic research and news preparation in the context of science reporting
• Social comparison processes / body design / body perception in the context of practices of self-measurement
• Body staging in social media (as content analysis or for appropriation)
• Subjective reflection of and dealing with personal (body) data
• The portrayal of people with Down syndrome in the public discourse around non-invasive prenatal testing
• Digital stress as a media issue. A content analysis on the representation of digital stress in...
• Artificial intelligence as a media issue. A content analysis on the representation of artificial intelligence in...
• Communicating politics away from classic information reporting (e.g., through fictional media content, satire, info screens in public spaces) (content analysis or survey/experiment)