Specialisation in Culture and Media in Educational Processes

The specialisation Culture and Media in Educational Processes pursues two goals: the substantive examination of issues in cultural and media psychology and the teaching of overarching academic skills and abilities.

Content Issues:

Working on the first objective is based on highly visible societal changes. On the one hand, modern societies are becoming increasingly diverse. In Germany, people with more than 130 citizenships live together who came to Germany at different stages of their lives or were already born in Germany and yet are not perceived as Germans. Society must take this diversity into account in educational processes to ensure that all people - regardless of their origin - can develop their potential. In order to familiarise students with these topics, this specialisation combines comparative cultural approaches with approaches from acculturation research. Acculturation is understood as changes in cultural behaviour and thought patterns that are triggered by contact between people of different cultural origins. On the other hand, media are becoming increasingly important in educational processes. In addition to digital forms of communication, this also includes the reception of films, video material and press products as well as social communication - from classic letters to social media; and last but not least, the ability to assess information conveyed by the media. The specialisation deals with these media and conveys basic knowledge in the area of language and communication as well as the analysis of media. The specialisation Culture and Media in Educational Processes is offered by the Institute of Psychology, which is why all contents are oriented towards psychological research and combine the specific contents relevant to culture and media with psychological basics.

Teaching Overarching Scientific Skills and Abilities:

The specialisation Culture and Media in Educational Processes is strongly influenced by psychological research methods. Since societal changes in the fields of culture and media can take place at very short notice and scientific findings in these fields are very dynamic, students need the tools to independently generate and evaluate findings in order to be able to competently advise and intervene. A second goal of this specialisation is therefore to teach students the basic scientific methods that can help them develop their own questions and answer them with the help of empirical findings. This second goal focuses on the students' competences in research science, which are acquired by working on existing research projects, through intensive cooperation with external institutions or by working on their own research questions. Theoretically derived hypothetical answers to research questions are generated, suitable data for testing these hypotheses is sought, and these data are evaluated and interpreted using suitable procedures. The competences thus imparted should also enable students to recognise the limits of their own work and to read and understand existing research papers and publications constructively, but also critically.

The specialisation Culture and Media in Educational Processes is intended to train students for research and practice alike and aims to shape the boundaries between academic and practice-related work as transitions. From a research perspective, the specialisation is intended to impart competences in language, media and cultural psychology for researching questions that arise from the demands on educational efforts in a society that is fundamentally culturally, linguistically (also multilingually) and medially constituted. For practice, the specialisation is intended to provide professionals involved in counselling, shaping and decision-making in the field of education with competences on how to help people in different developmental stages (from childhood to older adulthood) with different cultural imprints to participate competently, i.e. purposefully, efficiently and "educatedly" in a culturally, linguistically and medially constituted diverse society.

The above-mentioned goals are reflected in the modules of the specialisation Culture and Media in Educational Processes. Educational-psychological basics in educational processes are taught, which reflect the contents of educational psychology (BW KM 1). In the area of cultural psychology, one module will deal with comparative cultural research and acculturation research in a lecture, which will be deepened in terms of content and method by two flanking seminars on a research topic (BW KM 2). Aspects of media and language psychology are covered in the module Language and Communication (BW KM 4), which also combines a basic lecture with two in-depth seminars. These contents are supplemented by a module on media analysis (BW KM 5), which is designed in the form of practical seminars. In addition to these content-related seminars, the module Empirical Work in Cultural and Media Education (BW KM 3) primarily teaches research methodological skills, which are acquired through independent theory-driven empirical work based on current research areas of the institute.