Sina Julia Blassnig
Prof. Dr.
sina.blassnig@unifr.ch
+41 26 300 8393
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7815-0186
-
Professeur·e ordinaire,
Institut de communication numérique et d'innovation des médias
PER 21 bu. A314
Bd de Pérolles 90
1700 Fribourg
Recherche en journalisme : journalisme numérique, journalisme et nouvelles technologies (par exemple, systèmes de recommandation d'actualités, IA), innovation dans les médias, utilisation des actualités, perception des nouvelles technologies par les utilisateurs, logique(s) des médias, rôle du public
Communication politique : communication (numérique) des acteurs politiques, couverture médiatique de l'actualité politique, populisme, discours haineux/incivilités
Recherche comparative internationale sur les médias, comparaison internationale des systèmes médiatiques
(actuellement en congé maternité de mi-octobre 2025 à fin mars 2026)
Recherche et publications
-
Publications
30 publications
Digital media and digital media systems
Laia Castro, Sina Blassnig (2024) | Chapitre de livrePopulism and Social Media
Sina Blassnig (2022) | Chapitre de livrePOPULISM AND SOCIAL MEDIA , dans The Populism Interviews: A Dialogue with Leading Experts
Blassnig, S. (2022), ISBN: 9781000641967 9781032168104 | Chapitre de livrePopulism and Social Media Popularity , dans Power Shift? Political Leadership and Social Media
Sina Blassnig, Nicole Ernst, Sven Engesser, Frank Esser (2019), ISBN: 9780429466007 | Chapitre de livreDimensions, Speakers, and Targets , dans Communicating Populism
Sina Blassnig, Patricia Rodi, Keren Tenenboim-Weinblatt, Kinga Adamczewska, Lilia Raycheva, Sven Engesser, Frank Esser (2019) | Chapitre de livreEvent-, politics-, and audience-driven news: A comparison of populism in European media coverage in 2016 and 2017 , dans Communicating Populism: Comparing Actor Perceptions, Media Coverage, and Effects on Citizens in Europe
Esser, F. and St?pi?ska, A. and Peká?ek, O. and Seddone, A. and Papathanassopoulos, S. and Peicheva, D. and Milojevic, A. and Blassnig, S. and Engesser, S. (2019), ISBN: 9780429687853 9781138392724 | Chapitre de livre -
Projets de recherche
10003942 - Generative Visual AI in Swiss Journalism: Exploring Production and Audience Perspectives Through a Mixed-Methods Design
Statut: En coursDébut 01.06.2026 Fin 31.05.2030 Financement FNS Voir la fiche du projet Generative Artificial intelligence (AI) – technology that produces new content like text, images, audio, or video based on training data in response to written prompts (Arguedas & Simon, 2023) – is increasingly permeating various sectors of society and providing powerful tools for news media production in journalism (e.g., Cools & Diakopoulos, 2024). Rapid advancements in AI technologies, especially in generating visual content from data visualizations to photorealistic images, have generated both excitement and concern. Media professionals, policymakers, and scholars predict that AI-generated visuals will become more prevalent, potentially transforming journalistic practices, audience engagement, and visual communication (Paik et al., 2023; Thomson et al., 2024; Thomson & Thomas, 2023). Yet, empirical research on the use and impact of generative visual AI in journalism remains limited. Industry reports and academic studies emphasize the need for comprehensive research on how these technologies are used, perceived, and their broader implications for visual news production and consumption (Thomson et al., 2024; Thurman et al., 2024). Against this backdrop, this project aims to assess how generative visual AI-technologies are integrated into journalistic news production, characterize AI-generated visual content in journalism, and examine how media professionals and news audiences perceive and evaluate these technologies and visuals. By integrating theoretical perspectives from journalism studies and visual communication, drawing on news media logics and a texto-material understanding of visuals, and combining production and audience perspectives, the project offers a comprehensive exploration of this emerging field. Our multilingual project uses a sequential mixed-methods research design, combining qualitative and quantitative methods with participatory visual techniques. The project has two main work packages. WPI starts with qualitative visual diaries of media professionals from selected Swiss news outlets, identifying types, topics, and contexts of AI-generated visuals in use. Expert interviews follow, exploring opportunities, challenges, and shifts in journalistic practices. WPII involves focus groups with news users from Switzerland’s three major language regions to assess audience perceptions of AI-generated visuals in journalism. Both work packages conclude with a quantitative survey of media professionals and news users respectively across the language regions, providing broader, more representative insights and testing hypotheses deducted in the qualitative parts. This design allows findings from each stage to inform subsequent ones, offering a comprehensive view of generative AI in Swiss visual journalism from production and audience perspectives. The project’s expected results will significantly contribute to the timely yet under-researched field of generative visual AI in journalism and visual communication research, at theoretical, methodological, and empirical levels. Through a multi- and mixed-method approach, we will provide in-depth empirical evidence on the use of generative visual AI in Swiss newsrooms across different organizational types, characteristics of AI-generated content, and both media professionals’ and audiences’ perceptions of such technologies and visuals. This offers a holistic view of how generative visual AI is integrated into contemporary Swiss journalism. Additionally, our findings will guide media professionals, policymakers, and educators on the ethical and effective implementation of generative visual AI, addressing risks and maximizing benefits for both news production and consumption. In addition to scientific contributions, we will prioritize disseminating our findings to the public, including a panel discussion and workshop bringing together media professionals from Switzerland’s three major language regions and leading scholars. Evaluation der Medienförderungsmassnahme ‘Gratis-Abos für Jugendliche’ in den Kantonen Freiburg und Genf
Statut: En coursCrowding Out? Auswirkungen des SRG-Onlineangebots auf die Medienlandschaft
Statut: Terminé