Dr. Zhe Xu
Welcome!
My name is Zhe Xu; I am currently a research associate and Walter Benjamin postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Media and Communication at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, where I affiliated with the Journalism Studies research unit lead by Prof. Dr. Thomas Hanitzsch. I am also a PI in the German Research Foundation project Global Disparities in Journalistic Practices in Mediating Migration Crises (2024-2026). I received my Ph.D. from the University of Cologne in 2023.
My research interests lie at the intersection of crisis communication and computational communication. Using methodologies from social science, computational science, and network science, my research investigates (1) journalistic practices during global crises—focusing on institutional roles, news framing, and the integration of AI and immersive computing technologies—and examines (2) their effects on audiences, including issues like public compassion fatigue and the socio-psychological mechanisms of moral denial. Collectively, these efforts aim to critically interrogate the processes of (de)politicization, platformization, datafication, and algorithmization in the mediation of global humanitarian crises. Please feel free to check the full list of my publications on my Google Scholar.
I have undergone extensive training in computational and data science at the University of Cologne’s CA III Quantitative Modeling of Complex Systems and the NVIDIA Deep Learning Institute.
When I’m not immersed in academia, you’ll likely find me hiking, mountaineering, or bouldering with my wife and our little one in various parts of the world.
Research Interests
- Crisis Communication: global crisis mediation, humanitarian crisis journalism, mechanisms of public passivity
- Computational Communication: immersive computing and AI in newsrooms, NLP/ML/NetSci methodologies
News
- [Aug. 2024] Thrilled to join LMU Munich as a research associate and meet so many wonderful new colleagues!
- [May. 2024] I’m very grateful to the German Research Foundation for awarding me a Walter Benjamin grant (€220,000) to support my new project!
- [Aug. 2023] Successfully defended my Ph.D. at the University of Cologne. My advisor, Prof. Dr. Martin Scott, addressed me as Dr. Xu for the first time!
Selective Publications
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2023
International Communication Gazette, 86(8), 633-654, 2023 -
2022
The Communication Review, 25(3-2), 181-203, 2022. Also in P. Reilly and V Salojärvi (Eds), (De)constructing Societal Threats During Times of Deep Mediatization.
Ongoing Funded Projects as PI
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DFG
Using computational NLP, ML, and network analysis, this 2-year project conducts an extensive, cross-national, and longitudinal analysis of news data to examine how transnational media across diverse countries use framing to portray the global migration crisis and define their journalistic roles.
Papers in Progress
- “The Role Performance of Transnational Journalism in Forced Migration Crises”
- “Transnational Journalistic Framing of Forced Migration Crises”
- “Mapping Online Climate Change Controversies under Authoritarian Censorship”
- “Computational Journalism in Chinese Newsrooms”
- “Political and Media Trust Across Asian Countries”
University Teaching & Supervision
- MA Journalism, Media & Globalisation, LMU Munich, 2024-2025
- MA Chinese Studies & Media Studies, University of Cologne, 2022-2023
Services
Invited Conference, Report & Grant Reviewers
Czech Science Foundation (GACR) European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA) United Nations Network on Migration
Invited Journal Reviewers
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