The IfK congratulates Henrieke Kotthoff on the forsa / Paul Lazarsfeld Scholarship 2024
(26.09.2024) Henrieke Kotthoff M.A. was awarded this year's forsa / Paul Lazarsfeld scholarship last Friday, 20 September 2024 at the DGPuK specialist group conference ‘Methoden & DigiKomm 2024'. The award recognised the outstanding methodological approach of her master's thesis on ‘Automated extraction and classification of data visualisations in COVID-19 and climate reports’.
In the course of the visualisation of public communication, visual media content is increasingly becoming the focus of communication science research. In her final thesis, Kotthoff examined the extent to which current automated image recognition methods are suitable for investigating socially relevant communication. She compared three different machine learning approaches in terms of how promising they are at extracting and classifying visual data using current technology. In terms of content, she looked at reports on the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change. Within her master's thesis, she produced scientifically relevant and connectable findings and workflows. The thesis was awarded top marks by the reviewers Jun.-Prof. Dr Jakob Jünger and Prof. Dr Volker Gehrau.
Last Friday, Kotthoff was then able to present her Master's thesis to the members of the ‘Methoden & DigiKomm 2024’ specialist group conference in a panel moderated by Prof. Dr Emese Domahidi. ‘Henrieke Kotthoff's Master's thesis is an outstanding piece of work that will hopefully be just the start of a long scientific future,’ was the laudatory speech at the conference. It should be emphasised that the instruments developed in the thesis can be used directly in other research projects.
This year was the first time that a joint conference of the two DGPuK specialist groups ‘Methods in Journalism and Communication Studies’ and ‘Digital Communication’ took place. This year's conference was organised by Dr Julia Niemann-Lenz and Tim Schatto-Eckrodt M.A. from the University of Hamburg.
The forsa / Paul Lazarsfeld Scholarship is awarded annually to a maximum of three prizewinners. It honours students or graduates of communication science for student research projects or theses with a particular focus on challenging or innovative research methods. The scholarship includes prize money totalling 1,000 euros and also enables participation in the specialist group conference.
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