Dr. Rainer Freudenthaler

Academic Staff

University of Mannheim
Institute for Media and Communication Studies
B 6, 30–32 – Room 452
68159 Mannheim

Phone: +49 621 181-3667
Fax: +49 621 181-1399
E-mail: rainer.freudenthaleruni-mannheim.de

Consultation hour(s):
By appointment via E-Mail

Dr. Rainer Freudenthaler is a research associate in Prof. Dr. Geber’s department. After earning a bachelor’s degree in media management from the Stuttgart Media University and a master’s degree in media and communication studies, he received his Ph.D. from the University of Mannheim in 2021 with a dissertation on the public debate regarding German refugee policy in online media.

His research focuses on the prerequisites for a democratic public sphere, the role of counter-public spheres, and ethnicist and racist biases in media coverage. He teaches the application of automated content analysis in a seminar offered by the Department of Business Informatics and Business Mathematics. As part of Prof. Dr. Geber’s project, he is investigating the extent of moral panic frames regarding smartphone use in news coverage. Previously, as part of the project “Implicit and Explicit Racism in News Media and Social Media: Extent and Impact,” in collaboration with Prof. Dr. Wessler, Dr. Müller, Dr. Chan, and Katharina Ludwig, he examined group-based bias in news coverage of ethnic, cultural, and religious minorities. Methodologically, his focus is on automated methods of content analysis.

Müller, P., Ludwig, K. & Freudenthaler, R. (2026). Priming effects of emotion-based group stigmatization in the news : evidence from a multi-stimulus experiment. Journal of Media Psychology, 1–7. https://doi.org/10.1027/1864-1105/a000509
Freudenthaler, R. & Wessler, H. (2025). How alternative are alternative media? Analyzing speaker and topic diversity in mainstream and alternative online outlets. Digital Journalism, 13(2), 288–308. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2022.2117715
Müller, P., Freudenthaler, R., Ludwig, K. & Chung-hong, C. (2025). Associations measured = stereotypes conveyed? A semantic validation of word embedding-based measures of implicit group stereotyping in large text corpora. Computational Communication Research : CCR, 7(1), 1–32. https://doi.org/10.5117/CCR2025.1.14.MULL
Chan, C.-., Freudenthaler, R. & Müller, P. (2024). Developing a synthetic news corpus to validate generic frame detection methods. Studies in Communication and Media : SCM, 13(1), 101–124. https://doi.org/10.5771/2192-4007-2024-1-101
Jakob, J., Dobbrick, T., Freudenthaler, R., Haffner, P. & Wessler, H. (2023). Is constructive engagement online a lost cause? Toxic outrage in online user comments across democratic political systems and discussion arenas. Communication Research, 50(4), 508–531. https://doi.org/10.1177/00936502211062773
Müller, P., Chan, C.-., Ludwig, K., Freudenthaler, R. & Wessler, H. (2023). Differential racism in the news: Using semi-supervised machine learning to distinguish explicit and implicit stigmatization of ethnic and religious groups in journalistic discourse. Political Communication, 40(4: Race and ethnicity as foundational forces in political communication), 396–414. https://doi.org/10.1080/10584609.2023.2193146
Freudenthaler, R. & Wessler, H. (2022). Mapping emerging and legacy outlets online by their democratic functions – agonistic, deliberative, or corrosive? The International Journal of Press/Politics, 27(2), 417–438. https://doi.org/10.1177/19401612211015077
Müller, P. & Freudenthaler, R. (2022). Right-wing, populist, controlled by foreign powers? Topic diversification and partisanship in the content structures of German-language alternative media. Digital Journalism, 10(8), 1363–1386. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2022.2058972
Freudenthaler, R. (2020). Which online counter-publics on Facebook are fostering agonistic respect? An assessment of counter-publics debating Germany’s refugee policy. Javnost – The Public, 27(3), 247–265. https://doi.org/10.1080/13183222.2020.1804121
Mai, L. M., Freudenthaler, R., Schneider, F. M. & Vorderer, P. (2015). “I know you've seen it!” Individual and social factors for users' chatting behavior on Facebook. Computers in Human Behavior, 49, 296–302. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2015.01.074

Ludwig, K., Chan, C.-., Freudenthaler, R., Müller, P. & Wessler, H. (2024). Differenzieller Rassismus in den Nachrichten: Implizite und explizite Stigmatisierungen. In C. Nürnbergk, N. F. Schumacher, J. Haßler & J. Schützeneder (eds.), Politischer Journalismus: Konstellationen, Muster, Dynamiken (S. 113–130). Baden-Baden: Nomos. https://doi.org/10.5771/9783748939702-113
Wessler, H., Freudenthaler, R., Haffner, P. & Jakob, J. (2020). Öffentlichkeitstheorien. In I. Borucki (eds.), Handbuch Politische Kommunikation (S. 1–16). Wiesbaden: Springer VS. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-26242-6_3–1

Jakob, J., Dobbrick, T., Freudenthaler, R., Haffner, P. & Wessler, H. (2021). The end of constructive engagement online? Toxic outrage in user-generated debates across political systems and online discussion arenas. ICA 2021 – 71st Annual International Communication Association Conference, Preconference: Comparative Perspectives on Negativity, Incivility, and Toxic Talk, Online.
Freudenthaler, R. (2020). Assessing the debate on refugee policy within German online publics: Do counter-publics enhance the debate? 70th Annual International Communication Association Conference, Online.
Freudenthaler, R. (2019). Civility & politeness in the online outlets concerning refugee policy. 69th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA), Washington, DC.
Freudenthaler, R. & Wessler, H. (2018). Accomodating pluralistic conflict in online (counter-) publics – a multiperspectival normative assessment approach. The Internet, Policy & Politics Conference IPP2018, Oxford, UK.
Freudenthaler, R. (2017). German refugee policy on facebook – Investigating the role of traditional and alternative media within the online public sphere. ICA Political Communication PhD Student Preconference, San Diego, CA.
Halfmann, A., Winkler, J. R. & Freudenthaler, R. (2017). Backlash-Effekte in Online-Diskussionen: Auswirkungen von (nicht-)geschlechterstereotypem Diskussionsverhalten auf die Bewertung von Überzeugungsfähigkeit und Sympathie. Jahrestagung der Fachgruppe Rezeptions- und Wirkungsforschung in der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Publizistik und Kommunikationswissenschaft (DGPuK), Erfurt, Germany.
Winkler, J. R., Halfmann, A. & Freudenthaler, R. (2017). Backlash effects in online discussions: Effects of gender and counter-stereotypical communication on persuasiveness and likeability. 67th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA), San Diego, CA.
Freudenthaler, R. (2016). Identifying factors influencing user incivility in polarized online debates. 66th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA): Communicating with Power, Fukuoka, Japan.

Wessler, H. & Freudenthaler, R. (2018). Public sphere. In , (S. 1). Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/obo/9780199756841-0030