Katharina Esau, Senior Research Fellow at QUT (Queensland University of Technology), shared a post on LinkedIn:
“I’m very excited and humbled to share that I’ve been awarded an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA26) for my project “Democratic Resilience Online: Strengthening Public Opinion Formation Amid Digital Threats.”
The three-year project ($528,013 + 1 PhD scholarship funded by QUT (Queensland University of Technology)) investigates how people form opinions online by analysing discussions around key flashpoints, such as climate change and immigration, on mainstream digital/social media platforms (Facebook, Reddit & Wikipedia). A core output will be a civic literacy module designed to equip citizens of all ages with critical tools for navigating digital opinion formation.
This project would not have been possible without incredible mentors. The core idea emerged about five years ago with my PhD supervisor Christiane Eilders at University of Düsseldorf and Düsseldorf Institute for Internet and Democracy, who is now part of my stellar academic advisory board (together with Nicole Curato, Karin Wahl-Jorgensen & Fabio Giglietto). I am also deeply grateful to Axel Bruns, who has been the most generous mentor I could have imagined and who guided me through the ARC funding landscape.
There are so many more people in the QUT Digital Media Research Centre village who have supported me along the way. I’m incredibly grateful to be part of this unique community.
I’m very grateful for the trust my Australian colleagues have placed in me. It was so overwhelmingly nice to be able to celebrate this news straight away at AANZCA25 and JERAA25.”
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