Friendly reminder! We already have a lot of participants (thanks to everyone who did!) but every single one strengthens our findings, so if you haven't participated yet please consider 😊

I’d especially like to encourage women to apply. We’re a fantastic department with excellent scholars, in beautiful Vienna. Data shows that women are less likely to apply for positions than equally qualified men (Muriel Niederle & Lise Vesterlund 2011), so if you’re considering it, please go for it!

BLOG: Who gets emotional about politics? Fear of migrants, national pride, and anger at elites are just some examples of the ways in which emotions play an important part in today’s political culture. It is a long standing assumption that em...

New blog post ✒️

Who gets emotional about politics and what impact do knowledge, interest, and confidence-in-knowledge have?

Find out more about the sophistication-emotion link in our latest blogpost:

Are you a policymaker, teacher, practitioner, academic in political science, psychology, education or related field? We’re inviting experts to complete a short survey on youth political participation: tinyurl.com/ywnseae3

For every completion, we’ll donate €1.20 to UNICEF. Please share!

Im Rahmen eines repräsentativen Surveys im Vorfeld der Wahl in Baden-Württemberg haben wir u.a. danach gefragt, ob die Partei mit den meisten Wählerstimmen den Ministerpräsidenten stellen sollte. Dieser Aussage stimmten rund drei Viertel der CDU-Wählerinnen und -Wähler „voll“ oder „eher“ zu /1

🚨 Job Alert!

We are looking for a Senior Scientist (40h/week) to develop, establish, and organize the research network “Democracy and Human Rights”.

Start: March 1, 2026
Application deadline: February 2, 2026

Find out more👇

jobs.univie.ac.at/job/Senior-S...

Just political science things: Trying to write an opening paragraph for a paper that says "authoritarian populism is on the rise and this can be very harmful for democracy" in a way that it hasn't already been phrased in one of the other gazillion opening paragraphs on this topic 🥲

How do adolescents form their political views, and are they really so different from adults?

Next Friday (Nov 7), the IP-PAD Doctoral Network and @hotpoliticslab.bsky.social host a conference in Amsterdam on adolescents and politics (attached program).

DM or email j.kasper@uva.nl to join.

Open Letter by scientists to the Council:
"Climate Neutrality Is Europe’s Greatest Economic Opportunity”.
Ahead of the European Council meeting on 23.10.2025,
2,178 scientists urge EU Heads of States & Governments to take ambitious decisions for the 2040 targets.
zenodo.org/records/1739...

It does not necessarily mean you have lower anti-elite attitudes unless you have a politician in your close circle. But it does seem to be correlated with higher efficacy!

Please read the article for the full story ☝🏻

This is a small UK-focused extension of my main PhD question: what happens to citizens’ attitudes about democracy when they have contact with politicians? In the UK, this seems to be a relatively rare phenomenon with only 50% even having seen a politician in person.

Better politics starts with conversations only few are having — Public First - Data When asked about their views on politicians, the British public does not hold back. Eight in ten Britons agree that the gap between ordinary people and politicians is wider than the differences among ...

I wrote a short article this summer while working with the brilliant people at Public First in London, who kindly allowed me to ask some questions in their UK omnibus survey. 🧵

pfdatablog.com/blog/lsd7usd...

Facing a dark future: Young people’s future anxiety and political attitudes in the UK and Greece Study finds future anxiety linked to more conservative views among young men, but not young women, in the UK and Greece.

🔍How does young people's anxiety about the future relate to their political attitudes?

Find out in my first PhD paper, just published in the special issue "The Psychology of Pushback" at advances.in/psychology/1...

Jule Kegel on her secondment experience at Public First Finding common ground: Scientific standards across sectorsMy name is Jule Kegel, and I am currently an IP-PAD doctoral candidate at the University of Vienna. Over the past three months, I was the seco...

I spent the past few months in London on secondment at a non-academic company as part of my MSCA doctoral training, which was a wonderful and eye-opening experience. Here is a blog post reflecting on one of the main things I learned: www.ippad.eu/post/jule-ke...

Ah yes… my finest work: “,”

Two award recipients stand smiling in front of an ÖGPW banner. Both hold rolled certificates. The banner reads “Österreichische Gesellschaft für Politikwissenschaft – Das Netzwerk für Politikwissenschaft in Österreich. Vernetzen. Fördern.”

Slide projected on a screen with the heading “PhD Awards 2025.” On the left, text reads: Christina Gahn, Universität Wien. Supervisor: Thomas Meyer. Title: Debunking the Myth of Targeted and Tailored Political Advertising. On the right, a portrait of Christina Gahn smiling, wearing a dark blue top.

A large screen displays a slide titled “Master Awards 2025.” The slide shows a portrait of Benjamin Riesch smiling, with text: Benjamin Riesch, Universität Wien. Supervisor: Laurenz Ennser-Jedenastik. Title: Negative Campaigning in the Austrian National Election. In the foreground, three people stand at a lectern in a lecture hall, with empty chairs and glasses on the table.

A large screen shows a slide titled “Bachelor Awards 2025.” The slide includes a portrait of Luca Conte smiling with arms crossed, and text: Luca Conte, Universität Wien. Supervisor: Katharina Pfaff. Title: How Experiencing Climate Change Affects Climate Change Attitudes in Austria. In the foreground, three presenters stand at a lectern in a lecture hall with chairs and glasses on a table.

Awards, awards, awards! 🏆✨

At the 11th Annual @oegpw.bsky.social Conference, three members of the Department of Government @univie.ac.at were among the awardees:

🎓 Best PhD – @christinagahn.bsky.social
📘 Best MA – Benjamin Riesch
📗 Best BA – Luca Conte

👏 Huge congrats to all! 🎉

#PoliSky 🧪

Ah yes, my finest work "PaperTitle"

Petition unterschreiben Keine WiSo ohne PoWi! Für eine starke Politikwissenschaft im Bachelor & Master

The University of Cologne plans drastic cuts to its Political Science department, potentially abolishing the MSc in Political Science and eliminating the professorships in IR and Comparative Politics. This would severely weaken the social sciences at @unicologne.bsky.social.
Petition (de/en) ⤵️

Congrats! Such an interesting topic ☺️

Since I have made this post I have gathered a bunch of observational studies with null results since then. Here is a quick thread:

We are happy to announce that PhD student Belén Abdala successfully defended her thesis "From Voting to Candidacy: An Analysis of Individuals’ Motivations to Participate in Politics" on 12th of March!

Congratulations, Belén! Wishing you all the best in your future endeavors!

#PhDone

Wir haben ein neues Sharepic :-)

@friedrichbohn.bsky.social macht aber sicherlich auch noch gerne Sharepics für 10.000, ... 🙂

www.bayceer.uni-bayreuth.de/s4f/de/top/o...

Btw it never made it. I’m trying to channel my inner Downs and telling myself my vote doesn’t matter anyway. Not sure it’s working very well

Just Auslandsdeutsche things: explicitly sent my ballot back with a tracking option just to see that it hasn’t moved at all in 4 days

list of banned keywords

🚨BREAKING. From a program officer at the National Science Foundation, a list of keywords that can cause a grant to be pulled. I will be sharing screenshots of these keywords along with a decision tree. Please share widely. This is a crisis for academic freedom & science.

Reminder that these protests work:

- Evidence from Greece:
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

- Evidence from Italy: academic.oup.com/poq/article-...

- Evidence from France: academic.oup.com/ej/advance-a...

Der Forschungsstand ist klar: Wenn demokratische Parteien rechtspopulistische Erzählungen/Politik übernehmen/nachzuahmen versuchen, hilft das nur rechtspopulistischen Parteien. Expert*innen warnen deswegen seit JAHREN. Niemand kann sagen, man hätte es ja nicht gewusst.

Hi everyone 😊 good to see a lot of my old Twitter (will never call it X) network is on here as well