Junior Professorship of Sociology with Specialization in Technology
Topic ideas

List with topic ideas

Artificial communication (Andreas Bischof)

  • Analyses of sequences Artificial communication with chatbots (e.g. ChatGPT3)
  • Discourse analyses on the social negotiation of this technology
  • Social implications of its use

  • Technology genesis of LLM

Digitization of work (Andreas Bischof)

  • Case studies on the introduction of software (process analyses)
  • Analyses of forms of digitalized work
  • Ethnographies of digital work
  • Transformation processes in organizations with regard to digitalization
  • Investigation of social consequences

Social robotics (Andreas Bischof)

  • Care robotics (e.g. literature studies on individual robots/effects, explorative studies, ...)
  • Robots in everyday worlds
  • Interaction analyses
  • Discourse analyses
  • Technology genesis analyses
  • Analyses of social consequences

Digitalization and Law (Tanja Lehmann)

  • Artificial intelligence in criminal proceedings
  • Online proctoring
  • Cyberinsurance for individuals and companies
  • Cybercrime & Hacking
  • Darknet

Smart Homes & Datafication (Karola Köpferl, Andreas Bischof, Tanja Lehmann)

  • Social implications of simple sensors in the home
  • Product analyses, discourse analyses
  • Explorative studies on the use of technology by older people (esp. "smart home" and assistance technologies)
  • Genesis and developments of smart home and AAL (pathways, login effects ...milestones)

Older people and digitalization (Karola Köpferl, Andreas Bischof)

  • Case studies on technology use (group discussions, diary methods)
  • Design workshops on scenarios and visions for digital assistance
  • Critical analyses of "Age Tech"
  • Literature and theory studies on technology and age
  • Literature and theory work on the concept of "technology habitus"
  • Research on smart technology in old age, overview of research projects, their funding and their results together with implementation/embedding/penetration

Participation (Mira Freiermuth, Andreas Bischof)

  • Motivation of participants in participative measures in urban development/urban planning
  • Methods and Best Practice
  • Case studies
  • Sociology of science and critique

Network Policy and Open Source (Karola Köpferl)

  • Digital Accessibility and Inclusion
  • Net Policy-Hacking-OpenSource-Linux-Community
  • Security on the net: cybersecurity/digital infrastructure/regulation/data protection as co-careers
  • Digitalization and accessibility/inclusion
  • Digital civil rights movements
  • Making, hacking and activism communities and scenes
  • Open source, FOSS and Linux communities

Methodological focus (Andreas Bischof, Karola Köpferl)

Applications, combinations and further developments of:

  • GTM
  • Group discussions
  • cultural probes
  • web scraping
  • Topic Modeling

...and more

  • Technical/Cultural History of the Television as the Center of the Home (Andreas Bischof)
  • Technology of the GDR: RG28, Veritas and Co., technical developments away from capitalism (Karola Köpferl)
  • Robotron and Erika- Genesis of computer technology in the GDR (Karola Köpferl)

Successful theses

We are currently working on an overview of successful theses at the chair. Until this is online, it is worthwhile to have a look at the working paper series of the chair, which currently contains mainly student theses of the years 2016-2021 (director: Christian Papsdorf).

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