Katharina Schöppl, M.A.

Katharina Schöppl has been working as a research assistant at the chair of Prof. Dr. Matthias Kohring since February 2025 and is responsible for the two exercises on R Statistics. In her cumulative dissertation project, she investigates the role of alternative media as emotional comfort zones in social polarization dynamics. Previously, she was a research assistant and project coordinator in the DFG long-term panel study “Alternative Media – Alternative Public Spheres – Alternative Realities? Users and usage patterns of system-critical alternative media and their significance in the media repertoire over time” under the direction of Prof. Dr. Christian Schwarzenegger. In addition to working on the project, first at the University of Augsburg at the Institute for Media, Knowledge and Communication (IMWK) and then at the University of Bremen at the Center for Media, Communication and Information (ZeMKI), she was also active in teaching. Prior to this, she completed a master's degree in communication science and a master's degree in political science at the University of Salzburg. In her research and teaching, Katharina Schöppl focuses on alternative media and counter-publics, gender, science communication, political communication & visual communication, using a wide range of qualitative and quantitative methods.