Potentials and Challenges of Computational Communication Science Using the Example of Online Protest

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Stephanie Geise
• Subject Area: Communication Sciences
• Term: since 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 464913012

The social sciences are meeting the current challenges of digitization through expanding their range of methods by so-called computational methods. In this process, the subdiscipline Computational Communication Science (CCS) is establishing itself in communication science. CCS seems particularly suitable for investigating complex, multi-causal processes and phenomena from multiple perspectives—as can be observed, for example, in the context of digital media change. This process has led to the emergence of “networked publics.” These allow for a flexible change between the roles of communicator and recipient and expand possibilities for political participation—but also bring with them new dynamics of algorithmization, polarization, radicalization and mobilization.Despite its increasing establishment, CCS faces a number of challenges. In addition to an ongoing reflection on the application of computational methods, a stronger theoretical position is demanded. Because these problems cannot be solved by individuals, a stronger networking of scholars and an increase in the visibility and transparency of CCS research processes seems essential. With the current network proposal, we want to address these challenges. Based on typical characteristics and phenomena of the network public and our previous preliminary work, we use online protest as a field of application and use this example to show how CCS studies contribute to the treatment of complex issues and can be integrated into the existing canon of theory and methods.Our overarching program is the further development and stronger intertwining of theoretical and methodological approaches in communication science with the goal of systematically opening up the distinct opportunities of CCS for the discipline as a whole. The work on 1) the further development of theory-based CCS research and 2) an adequate methodology should also 3) contribute to the further institutionalization of CCS within empirical communication research. We expect decisive impulses from the long-term networking of scientists working on topics of strategic character in the application field of online protest. Our program contributes to the debate on the central desiderata and allows for a phenomenal theoretical and methodological development of CCS. The socially, politically and democratically relevant area of online protest enables us to work out the potential of CCS in the analysis of typical phenomena of networked publics. In doing so, we take into account new dynamics of algorithmization, polarization and emotionalization, networking and mobilization in order to further explore and classify online protests. We see online protest not only as a formative phenomenon of our time, but also as a kind of "looking glass" that allows us to investigate the described phenomena, processes and dynamics in a networked society in a focused way.

• DFG Programme: Scientific Networks