Our research interests focus broadly on the motives, practical implementation, and reflection of political participation and democratic engagement among children and young people in various contexts, such as school and extracurricular educational programs. Our work centers on considerations regarding a democratic school culture.
We are also researching current and future practices of digital participation and engagement in the SNF-funded project Political Online Participation and Digital Citizenship among 14- to 19-year-olds in Switzerland. We are interested in how adolescents perceive the digital space, what skills they bring to informed, reflective, and critical participation, and what particular challenges contexts of digital participation with political references hold for young people. Particular attention is paid to the possible existence of a “digital gap,” i.e., systematic differences in media access and digital-analog skills. We also look at factors that contribute to resilient behaviors in dealing with information overload and a lack of orientation. We examine the use of digital information and communication options and individual approaches to tools, including the use of LLM-based text models, and work with school stakeholders and experts to develop a concept proposal for forward-looking “digital citizenship education.”