ESRA 2027 sessions by theme
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Survey Results in Media Reports: State of the Art and Methodological Developments |
| Coordinator 1 | Professor Natalja Menold (Dresden University of Technology) |
| Coordinator 2 | Professor Peter Winker (University of Giessen) |
| Coordinator 3 | Professor Philipp Lorenz-Spreen (Dresden University of Technology) |
| Coordinator 4 | Professor Lutz Hagen (Dresden University of Technology) |
Session Details
Social science survey research can be seen as a relevant source of information on public opinion and its dynamics, and the media is a key actor that informs the public about relevant socio-political issues, and vice versa, reflects public opinion. The role of media – mass or social – is relevant in shaping individuals' information and decisions, as well as selecting which parts of public opinion to represent. After all, most of the information about socially relevant phenomena is unobtrusive, i.e., not directly experienceable but provided by media reports.
However, as with any scientific information, basic social science standards should be considered not only by media producers but also by recipients, who should have statistical literacy and scientific competencies to attend to and critically assess the news provided. Collecting and analysing survey data that allows for generalization to populations can be opposed to quick-and-dirty reports of sensational or well-sounding findings, for which the media have increasingly been criticized. Therefore, research on how, why, and with which effect surveys and their results have been used in the mass, and on social media, and which are presuppositions on their credible use, is of relevance. Next, research on media reports has also undergone a renaissance in the social sciences due to the availability of AI and LLM methods for acquiring and analysing large amounts of textual media data. Many new methods and tools are available for such analyses, whereas the questions of data sampling, processing, and quality assurance have been the object of scientific elaboration.
We invite papers that discuss the methodological quality and integrity of media reports, competencies relevant to media producers and recipients, and methodological challenges in the use and analysis of media data by means of AI tools.
