States transform through the interlinked processes of migration, transnationalization and globalization. These processes have been altered and accelerated by rapid changes in technology, digital communication, and immigration patterns, particularly over the past few decades. Within such pluralist societies, the media can act as brokers both within and between social groups. Indeed, it is via the media that people learn about the lives of others who are similar to or different from themselves, and through which discursive distinctions between in-groups and out-groups are established. Whilst the study of minority representation in the media has attracted a great deal of academic attention, the study of majority group representation has been largely neglected within extant research. In addressing this gap in the literature, the aim of this project is to reveal similarities and differences in the media portrayal of majority and minority groups by studying them comparatively. This research project will examine changes across time, whilst taking explanatory factors related to minority and majority group coverage into account. Empirically, the news media sample will include data from both newspapers and TV news from Germany, Poland, the UK, and the US over a 20-year period. Crucially, this project shall not only investigate mainstream news sources, but also consider content from regional news platforms and news media produced by and for minority groups. The research will utilise both qualitative and quantitative methods to compare the representation of majority and minority groups in terms of nationality, ethnicity, religion, gender, and sexual orientation. 

Team:

Project lead: Prof. Stefanie Walter, PhD

Researchers: Gwendolyn Mingham; Valeria Ariza Gomez

Former team members: Alice Beazer; Sean Kelly Palicki

Funding: 

German Research Foundation (DFG)

Project Output:

Beazer, A., Walter, S., Eldridge, S. A., & Palicki, S. K. (online-first). On the Margins: Exploring Minority News Media Representations of Women during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Digital Journalism, 1-20.

Beazer, A., Palicki, S., Walter, S., & Eldridge, S. A. (2025). Intersectional solidarity, empathy, or pity? Exploring representations of migrant women in German and British newspapers during the pandemic. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 48(2), 318-345.

Walter, S., & Glas, S. (2025). The political representation of minoritized groups in times of crisis: Covid-19 and beyond. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 48(2), 229-243.

Sean Palicki, K., Walter, S., van Atteveldt, W., Beazer, A., & Bravo, I. (2023). Selecting relevant documents for multilingual content analysis: An evaluation of keyword and semantic similarity search approaches. Computational Communication Research, 5(2), 1.

The ClimateVisions project examines the role of images in climate change discourse. While computational methods have significantly advanced textual analysis in political and social science, images, despite their power to evoke emotions and shape public perception, have received little attention. Even though there is a growing availability of large datasets and the increasing role of social media in disseminating visual content, a critical gap remains in understanding the nuanced interplay between images, social attitudes, and political mobilization on climate change. This project seeks to bridge this gap by analyzing image consumption and social media reception to unravel the complex relationship between climate visuals and their impact on user engagement and sentiment.

As environmental concerns grow and youth-led protest movements like Fridays for Future gain momentum, the role of visual imagery in fostering political participation and collective action is becoming increasingly evident. By identifying which images evoke strong reactions and emotional responses among social media users, this project aims to uncover the mechanisms through which climate visuals influence online discussions. Using a multidisciplinary approach that integrates computational science, social science, political psychology, and media studies, this research provides insights into the communicative power of images to drive discourse, advocacy, and public engagement on climate change.

Team:

Project lead: Prof. Stefanie Walter, PhD; Prof. Dr.-Ing. Margret Keuper

Researchers: Isaac Bravo; Katharina Prasse

Funding: 

Co-financed by the European Union and the Bundesministeriums für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF)

Project output:

Prasse, K.; Bravo, I.; Walter, S. & Keuper, M. (2025) I Spy With My Little Eye: A Minimum Cost Multicut Investigation of Dataset Frames. WACV. 
Download for the paper and the code.

Prasse, K.; Jung, S.; Bravo, I.; Walter, S. & Keuper, M. (2023) Towards Understanding Climate Change Perceptions: A Social Media Dataset. https://www.climatechange.ai/papers/neurips2023/3 
Download for the paper and the data.