The Vienna Doctoral School of Social Sciences promotes innovative, excellent, problem-oriented research that aspires to contribute to societal debates and address key global challenges.

The cohorts trained and supported by the ViDSS are part of a vibrant research environment and international networks. The ViDSS encompasses and fosters connections between a broad range of disciplinary, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary perspectives. The ViDSS embraces the entire range of epistemological, methodological and theoretical approaches that are employed at the Faculty of Social Sciences. Doctoral candidates receive research training and write a doctoral thesis in the fields of communication, demography, development studies, nursing science, political science, science and technology studies, social and cultural anthropology, and sociology. The ViDSS aims for the highest standards in doctoral training and close supervision to ensure a mastery of social scientific debates and relevant theories and methods. As a result, ViDSS graduates are highly employable both within and outside academia.

News
 

We are deeply saddened by the passing of our cherished colleague Cornelia Staritz on 3 July 2025. Professor Staritz was part of ViDSS since its inception and her many contributions to the running of the doctoral school were pivotal in shaping its direction and profile.
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Media articles and press releases
 

Italy’s involvement in WWII is contentious and complex and so are the stories created around it, which have been instrumentalised for various political purposes over time. A study by ViDSS Student Marta Vukovic (co-authored with Susanna Bastaroli and Sylvia Kritzinger) investigates Italians’ perception of Italy’s Fascist past and role in WWII on an individual level.
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Blog
 

(by Birte Leonhardt, Folker Hanusch, Shailendra B. Singh)

The role of journalism in society is shaped not only by professional norms but also by deeply held cultural values. This is particularly evident in the Pacific Islands region, where journalists operate in media environments that are often small, tight-knit and embedded within traditional communities. Our survey of journalists across ...
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Radio and podcast
 

Felix Maile and Dorota Vargová provide insights into their experiences with archives and data bases. Learn about the extraordinary lengths they had to go to chase primary sources, which ethical questions they have to deal with and why they are not using any AI tools for their analyses.
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Media articles and press releases
 

A study conducted by ViDSS Student Rinat Meerson (co-authored with Kevin Koban and Jörg Matthes) examines how exposure to digital hate affects social media users. The findings show that frequent exposure to hate leads to more direct intervention such as commenting or countering but reduces the willingness to rely on moderation.
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Fellowship and award winners
 

Supported by a Marietta Blau Grant, Ali Heuser from the Department of Development Studies has completed research stays in Peru and the UK and will stay at the University of Kassel this summer. Ali's doctoral research project investigates the transformation of gender relations in social protest against large-scale mining extractivism in the southern Andes of Peru.
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Blog
 

(by Wenwen Lyu)

From 14–25 April 2025, states gathered at UN Headquarter in New York for the first meeting of the Preparatory Commission (Prep Com) under the international agreement on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction (BBNJ Agreement). Nearly two years since the Agreement’s historic adoption ...
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Media articles and press releases
 

A recent study by Jeanne Marlier (co-authored with Matthias Kaltenegger and Laurenz Ennser-Jedenastik) investigates why people like technocrats despite their lack of responsiveness and accountability to voters. They show that voters perceive technocracy as a multi-dimensional phenomenon, associating distinct advantages and disadvantages with ministers’ expertise and their (non-)partisanship.

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Fellowship and award winners
 

Aleksandra Fila from the Department of Development Studies was awarded a GO.INVESTIGATIO Fellowship by the Austrian Academy of Sciences for her ethnographic and archival research in the Polish cities of Oleśnica and Warsaw. Aleksandra’s doctoral research project investigates the feminist political economy of creativity in the Polish neoliberal transformation in the 1990s. Congratulations!
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New publications by ViDSS students

Showing entries 1 - 20 out of 43
Multilingual Challenges: Empirical Social Research in Migration Societies, Transnational Spaces, and International Contexts. / Holzinger, Clara; Draxl, Anna-Katharina.
Social Inclusion, 2026.

Publications: Book › Special Issue › Peer Reviewed

Media, modality, and motivation in literary-aesthetic experience: exploring auditory and visual reception of literature. / Kosch, Lukas; Stocker, Günther; Ahrens-Schwabe, Annika et al.
In: Poetics. Journal of Empirical Research on Culture, the Media and the Arts, Vol. 111, 102021, 08.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Coping with greenwashed ads. Greenwashing perceptions, eco-label confusion, and the willingness to pay more. / Matthes, Jörg; Neureiter, Ariadne; Seiffert-Brockmann, Jens.
In: Journal of International Consumer Marketing, 07.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

The state of evidence in digital hate research: An umbrella review. / Matthes, Jörg; Koban, Kevin; Bührer, Stephanie et al.
In: Communication Research, 07.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Framing Multipolar Tourism: Imaginaries, Visualities and Futures. / Sinanan, Jolynna (Corresponding author); Adams, Ria-Maria; Budka, Philipp.
In: Visual Anthropology, 13.06.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Artificial Intelligence and Privacy: The Urgent Need for Children’s Media Literacy. / Sarikakis, Katharine; Chatziefraimidou, Angeliki.
In: Revista Comunicando, Vol. 14, No. 1, 02.06.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Rewriting Femininity: Tradwives, Visual Aesthetics of Class, and Politics of Remembrance. / Beck, Celina; Lakkala, Emma.
In: Femina Politica: Zeitschrift für feministische Politik-Wissenschaft, Vol. 34, No. 1, 06.2025, p. 64-77.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Digital she-nanigans: Social media users’ response toward online hostilities targeting a female science communicator with marginalized identities. / Saumer, Melanie; Koban, Kevin; Matthes, Jörg.
In: New Media & Society, 29.05.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Health-related communication of social media influencers: A scoping review. / Kanková, Jaroslava; Binder, Alice; Matthes, Jörg.
In: Health Communication, Vol. 40, No. 7, 23.05.2025, p. 1300 – 1313.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Discursive consequences of social media hostility: Chilling effects, avoidance, and intervention behaviors of emerging adults in the U.S. and Indonesia. / Matthes, Jörg (Corresponding author); Nguyen, Phung Quynh Giao; Koban, Kevin et al.
In: Computers in Human Behavior, Vol. 171, 108704, 10.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

How healthy and unhealthy food and beverages appear in movies and series for children: A comprehensive content analysis. / Binder, Alice (Corresponding author); Matthes, Jörg; Heiss, Raffael et al.
In: Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, Vol. 57, No. 5, 05.2025, p. 385-394.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Artificial presence, real-life influence? Effects of CGI influencers on young adults’ health behavior intentions. / Saumer, Melanie; Neureiter, Ariadne; Varga, Édua Mária et al.
In: Cyberpsychology : Journal of Psychological Research in Cyberspace, Vol. 19, No. 2, 3, 22.04.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Die Jugend von heute? Malschinger, Paul (Other role). 2025. ORF Ö1.

Publications: Electronic/multimedia output › Radio show

Local journalists and the construction of social identities. A phenomenological approach. / Garusi, Diego (Corresponding author); Juarez Miro, Clara; Hanusch, Folker.
In: Journalism, 14.04.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Geschlecht methodologisch: „Wissen ist Macht!“. / Grenz, Sabine; Gül, Elif.
Geschlechtersoziologie. ed. / Eva Tolasch; Anna Buschmeyer; Sabine Grenz; Carolin Küppers. 1. ed. Paderborn: Brill Ferdinand Schöningh, 2025. (Soziologie im 21. Jahrhundert).

Publications: Contribution to book › Chapter

Scheidung aus Sicht der Kinder. Radio Vorarlberg, Focus. Parisot, Viktoria (Other role). 2025. ORF Radio Vorarlberg.

Publications: Electronic/multimedia output › Radio show

Author Correction: A transdisciplinary, comparative analysis reveals key risks from Arctic permafrost thaw. / Gartler, Susanna (Corresponding author); Scheer, Johanna (Corresponding author); Meyer, Alexandra et al.
In: Communications Earth & Environment, Vol. 6, No. 1, 234, 25.03.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Correction › Peer Reviewed

The Interplay of Poverty and Employment Trajectories in Couples Around the Transition to Parenthood in Germany. / Siegert, Christina.
In: SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research, Vol. 2025, No. 1220, 03.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article

Mainstreaming and transnationalization of anti-gender ideas through social media: the case of CitizenGO. / Righetti, Nicola (Corresponding author); Kulichkina, Aytalina; Paroni, Bruna Almeida et al.
In: Information, Communication & Society, 22.02.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Affective politics and neoliberal subjectivities in ‘left behind’ places: Counter-narrating regional decline within/from Finland’s ‘Capital of Pessimism’. / Gansauer, Grete; Lilius, Johanna; Adams, Ria-Maria.
In: Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space, 19.02.2025.

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Showing entries 1 - 20 out of 43