On February 16, 2024, the Minister for Science and Health, Clemens Hoch, along with the President of the RPTU, Prof. Dr. Arnd Poetzsch-Heffter, and the President, Prof. Dr. Gabriele E. Schaumann, signed the target agreement for the new research initiative Rhineland-Palatinate, including the potential area SCOPE – Societal Communication in times of PErmacrisis, led by Prof. Dr. Michaela Maier (IKM) and Prof. Dr. Paul Lukowicz (DFKI).
In the potential area SCOPE, the focus is on examining how societal communication evolves concerning long-term crisis topics and the impact this has on social coexistence. Using examples of the climate crisis and migration movements, various subprojects will explore both the communication behavior of political actors and the information behavior of citizens, along with the societal impacts such as polarization or loss of trust. This interdisciplinary project involves scientists from the fields of communication and political science, psychology, sociology, environmental science, and computer science. In addition to the scientific benefits, the interdisciplinary collaboration also aims to enhance the RPTU’s profile by developing expertise in the field of Computational Social Sciences (CSS).