We research automation and AI in journalism, journalists’ routines and attitudes, media reception, and audience behaviour. Methods used include experiments, surveys, content analyses, interviews, and analysis of digital trace data. We collaborate with academic and industry colleagues internationally.
Research Interests:
AI and automation in journalism - The online behaviour of media audiences - Journalists' routines and attitudes
Our unit, led by Prof. Dr. Neil Thurman, researches changes in media work and workers— as well as in media content, distribution, and reception—in the context of digitization, automation and AI, and the platform economy. Foci include automation and AI in news; journalists’ characteristics, routines and attitudes; the reception of textual and video journalism, and audience’s online behaviour. We use qualitative and quantitative methods, including survey and ‘natural’ experiments, online surveys, content analyses, interviews, and analyses of digital trace data. We collaborate with academic colleagues worldwide, including in the Worlds of Journalism Study, for which we are responsible for the UK survey. We also collaborate with industry partners, including news publishers and media measurement organizations. The unit has received several major grants for its work on AI and journalism from the VolkswagenStiftung. We deliver the lecture on Media Change and seminars related to our research as well as on public relations and digital media practice.
This international and interdisciplinary project develops prototypes of responsible AI applications in collaboration with local news media and examines conditions that promote the responsible development and use of AI applications in local journalism.
Further information about the project: AI in Journalism
Duration: 10/2022 - 12/2025
Financial Support: Volkswagen Stiftung
Which criteria do readers use to evaluate data-driven news stories produced with and without the help of automation?
How do readers evaluate news articles produced with and without the help of automation? How do these evaluations affect the news articles’ perceived comprehensibility?
How is automated journalism used in newsrooms internationally?
How can local news media adopt AI responsibly?
Duration: 10/2020 – 09/2023
Leadership: Neil Thurman
Financial Support: Volkswagen Stiftung
The Worlds of Journalism Study is a long-term international comparative research project coordinated by LMU Munich. The study’s objective is to better understand the changes that are taking place in journalism.
Further information about the project: Worlds of Journalism .
Duration: 04/2021 - 09/2025
Leadership: Prof. Dr. Thomas Hanitzsch
Financial support: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
The project addresses challenges for media and democracy in digital media environments by utilizing an interdisciplinary approach to analyze journalism, political economy, media regulation, and media consumption in eight European countries.
Further information about the project: Resilient Media for Democracy in the Digital Age.
Duration: 03/2023 - 02/2026
Leadership: Prof. Dr. Thomas Hanitzsch
Financial Support: Horizon Europe
The project examines socio-economic inequality in journalism and its role in public discourse by comparing the perspectives of a representative sample of professional journalists with those of the general public.
Duration: 10/2024 - 09/2025
Leadership: Dr. Andreas A. Riedl
Financial Support: Otto Brenner Stiftung
Decoding the automated journalism experience: An investigation of the use and effects of automated journalism in textual news reporting
Dissertation by Sina Thäsler-Kordonouri
Financial Support: Volkswagen Stiftung
Professor
AI and automation in journalism • The online behaviour of media audiences • Journalists’ routines and attitudes
Academic Staff
Digital Journalism • Artificial Intelligence • Scandalogy
Academic Staff
AI journalism • automated journalism • computational journalism