The Methods Lab is excited to announce that the “Data, Archive & Tool Demos” special session will return at the 2026 DGPuK Annual Conference in Dortmund. The event will be co-organized by Methods Lab lead Christian Strippel with Johannes Breuer, Silke Fürst, Erik Koenen, Dimitri Prandner, and Christian Schwarzenegger, in collaboration with the GESIS Methods Hub, a community-oriented network for computational tools and resources.
This year’s session is a continuation of the format introduced at the 2024 DGPuK Conference in Erfurt, in a well-received event. The aim moving forward is to keep the discussion going, and potentially establish this format as a regular feature of the annual conference. Full details of the call for 2026 contributions are available here.
Researchers are invited to submit 200–300 word abstracts (German or English) by January 19, 2026. Eligible contributions must have not already been presented in the previous DGPuK sessions, are required to be available for scholarly reuse and must not be managed commercially. Contributions may also be resubmitted only if they have changed significantly, and this must be stated explicitly.
As digital methods advance rapidly, quantitative empirical research requires greater computing power. This includes complex statistical analyses, model training, and operating generative AI models. The necessary hardware is expensive and challenging to maintain, particularly at the institutional level (e.g., due to high temperatures in HPC clusters). Since not every institution can (or should) set up such hardware independently, resources are shared through collaborations with other institutions.
Against this background, the Weizenbaum Institute is exploring options to enable both low-demand computing tasks (e.g., a virtual machine for background web scraping) and high-demand tasks (e.g., running current large language models) for its researchers. Recently, the following options have been identified (some of which are only available to Berlin scientists):
Community-driven web-based analysis platform for life science research
Free to use batch system with many tools usable by browser, huge data sizes are no problem
Although coming from Bioinformatics, there are many tools for text processing, audio and image analyses, as well as statistics can be put together in pipelines.
Support from the state of Berlin, linked to BUA, e.g. BI-FOLD also calculates there
Provides tailor-made solutions, e.g. can make own instances of HAWKI, LibreChat or similar available with WI licenses
Resources available only by collaboration.
Apart from these external offers, the Weizenbaum Institute itself already provides some services to its researchers:
Virtual machines
Jupyterhub
Gitlab
Researchers who are interested in using any of these services can follow the instructions on the according websites for external services. For internal services, instructions are provided in the internal WI Wiki.
Disclaimer: This list will be updated regularly. If you know of any other resources that are available to members of the Weizenbaum Institute, please let us know.
Every year, the International Communication Association (ICA) organizes a conference where communication scholars from around the globe present and discuss their current research. In June 2025, the conference took place in Denver, USA, and many Weizenbaum Institute researchers contributed to it. Among others, Methods Lab member Roland Toth, together with colleague Jakob Ohme, former fellow Joseph Bayer (Ohio State University), and his team members Razieh Pourafshari and Yifei Lu, organized a conference panel called “Miss the Mobile Methods Turn? Reflecting on the Challenges and Potentials of Mobile Communication Science”.
Roland Toth outlines the issue with mobile methods
Many social scientists use mobile data collection methods, such as the Ecological Momentary Assessment, data donations, or event log data, but there are hardly any standards or guidelines to work with. The panel addressed this lack of standardization and accessibility of mobile methods within and outside of communication science. In the introduction to the panel, the issue was outlined and attendees were asked to complete a short survey about their expertise regarding different mobile methods, problems they recognized, and whether and to what extent they are willing to contribute to future initiatives to improve the situation.
Gabriella Harari presents issues with capturing the context of smartphone use
After the introduction, experienced mobile communication scholars presented examples of empirical research that highlight current practices, challenges, and future perspectives associated with mobile methods. Following these short talks, the presenters, attendees, and organizers discussed possible standards, priorities, and endeavors to strengthen this growing research area, as well as how the community can organize to support the use of mobile methods to the Communication field at-large.
Jakob Ohme moderates the general discussion with the presenters, attendees, and organizers
The panel was received well and paved the way for further steps to gradually tackle these issues. The discussion shed light on the wide interdisciplinary use of mobile methods and their relevance, both in and beyond communication science, that goes along with that. It showed that there currently is potential for all panel presenters, attendees, and organizers, but also other communication researchers, to contribute to the advancement of mobile methods across fields, which the Weizenbaum Institute aims to participate in. Accordingly, based on the results of the survey, future initiatives such as white papers, methods reviews, or workshops addressing the current state and standardization of mobile methods will be planned. Stay tuned for these in the future!
For those interested in strengthening their skills in social research methods, we’re pleased to announce that registration is now open for the DeZIM Summer School 2025 (Deutsches Zentrum für Integrations und Migrationsforschung).
Running from August 12 to 14, the program is free and open to all, offering workshops in both qualitative and quantitative methods. Courses are designed for participants ranging from beginners to advanced, and all are welcome to join multiple sessions. However, space is limited, so we encourage early registration by completing this survey before the deadline on June 30, 2025.
As part of the ongoing collaboration between DeZIM and the Weizenbaum Institute, both institutions share access to each other’s workshops. Through this partnership, we aim to create more opportunities for researchers to develop and strengthen their methodological expertise.
To learn more about additional upcoming workshops, check out our Methods Ticker!
In the first part of the event, participants discuss their experiences with networking strategies in a speed-dating format. Each conversation was documented by a member of the organizing team. Participants were rotated every few minutes to create different pairings. Each conversation was documented by a member of the organizing team. Participants highlighted the importance of networking within their own institutions, attending regularly organized events to formalize informal connections, pooling resources, and implementing cross-institutional research projects.
Melanie Althage (IZ D2MCM) guides participants through the new calendar system
In the second part of the event, colleagues from IZ D2MCM presented participants with a calendar system they developed. Its purpose is to consolidate events occurring at the network institutions into a single platform, making them accessible to all members. The system was then discussed in two groups. In one group, participants exchanged ideas on the design and admission criteria for events, considering aspects such as content, format, and location. In the other group, participants focused on facilitating the technical implementation, which operates through Git and enables network members to submit event metadata in a structured format.
The Methods Lab would like to thank the IZ D2MCM and all participants for their contributions to this successful event. Stay tuned for the next one!
On November 18, 2024, Karsten Wolf and Florian Hohmann from the University of Bremen presented the software OpenQDA at WI. In this Show and Tell, they gave an overview of OpenQDA and its motivations, functions, and limitations.
In the first part of the Show and Tell, Karsten Wolf presented the development and purpose of the software. It is an open-source alternative to the commercial software MaxQDA, which is a popular tool for text annotation (i.e., coding) in qualitative research. The team at the University of Bremen had been working on OpenQDA for quite some time to not only deliver a free and customizable alternative to MaxQDA, but also allow for (simultaneous) collaboration on projects. In addition, OpenQDA has a plug-in framework that will be expanded over time. For example, atrain is already supported and can be used to transcribe audio files to text, and a plug-in that allows for implementing Python scripts is currently in the works. While OpenQDA is still under development and currently in early-access, the first official release is planned for the near future. It runs on servers at the Unversity of Bremen and can be used by anyone for free.
Florian Hohmann presents features and the GitHub repository of OpenQDA
In the second part of the Show and Tell, Florian Hohmann gave a practical introduction to the most recent version of the software. He showed participants how to create an account, set up a new project, and create a team to work on projects collaboratively. Text content can be added manually, from documents, audio files, and soon even remote sources. These texts can then be annotated/coded using separate, color-coded categories, and it is possible to set up sub-categories for further refinement. The results can be exported in CSV format. In addition, users can create a code portrait, which illustrates the distribution of categories across the text, and a word cloud for quick visual analysis.
At the end of the Show and Tell, participants provided feedback and suggestions for future implementation. For example, the automated conversion of scanned documents to plain text using OCR, and functions like counting and automatic coding, were discussed. Some participants were willing to stay and provide further feedback even after the main event ended. Finally, the team from Bremen, the Methods Lab, and the Weizenbaum Institute IT department discussed the installation of OpenQDA on the Institute’s servers in 2025 to provide a local instance to Weizenbaum Institute researchers.
The Methods Lab would like to thank the colleagues from Bremen for their work, and all participants for providing useful feedback!
AI systems rely heavily on workers who face precarious conditions. Data work, clickwork, and crowdwork—essential for validating algorithms and creating datasets to train and refine AI systems—are frequently outsourced by commercial entities and academic institutions. Despite the vast and growing workforce of 435 million data workers enabling machine learning, their working conditions remain largely unaddressed, resulting in exploitative practices. Academic clients, in particular, lack clear guidance on how to outsource data work ethically and responsibly.
Berlin’s academic landscape is rich with diverse research endeavors, particularly in the realms of digital cultural, social, and humanities studies. However, there’s a notable gap in structured and sustained networking among key players in these fields. To address this gap, the Weizenbaum Institute and the Interdisciplinary Center for Digitality and Digital Methods at HU Berlin’s Campus Mitte are organizing a networking meeting.
Scheduled for May 31, 2024, at the Auditorium in the Grimm-Zentrum, HU Berlin, this event is open to institutions, institutionalized teams, and centers actively engaged in digital research within the humanities, social sciences, and cultural studies in Berlin. The aim of the meeting is to strengthen existing connections, identify potential common interests and goals, and spotlight further avenues for collaboration and exchange within Berlin’s vibrant digital research community.
In the first part of the meeting, every team will introduce themselves through short highlighting talks. In the second part, the participants will facilitate a casual, direct exchange for all participants in a World Café format, covering various questions and cross-cutting themes related to digitality and digital methods in the humanities and social sciences.
Event Details:
Date: Friday, May 31, 2024
Time: 13:00–16:00
Location: Auditorium at the Grimm-Zentrum, HU Berlin, Geschwister-Scholl-Str. 1/3
We’re excited to announce our upcoming workshop Introduction to High-Performance Computing (HPC), scheduled for Monday, May 6th at the Weizenbaum Institute. Led by Loris Bennett (FU) from the HPC service at Freie Universität Berlin, the workshop is open to members of the Weizenbaum Institute with an FU account and access to HPC resources at FU. It aims to provide fundamentals on utilizing HPC resources in general by the example of those offered by FU Berlin.
For further details about the workshop, please visit our program page.
Digital and computational data collection and analysis methods such as mobile/internet tracking, experience sampling, web scraping, text mining, machine learning, and image recognition have become more relevant than ever in the social sciences. While these methods enable new avenues of inquiry, they also present many challenges. It is important to share and discuss research, experiences, and challenges surrounding these methods with other researchers to exchange ideas and to learn from experiences.
For this reason, Roland Toth from the Methods Lab and research fellow Douglas Parry organized the Digital Methods Colloquium that took place on December 7 at the Weizenbaum Institute. They invited researchers from all over Germany who had used such methods before. The focus lied on sharing not only successes, but – even more so – the challenges that they had experienced in the research process.
Fenne Große Deters (U of Potsdam) talking about the effects of smartphone use on sleep quality
In the first part of the colloquium, participants presented recent or past research projects for which they had used digital methods. The presentations covered various methods, including experience sampling, mobile logging/tracking, multimodal content classification, network analysis, and large language models. All presentations were received very well and led to high engagement with many questions and exchanges from the participants.
The second part of the colloquium was designed to facilitate interactive discussion and knowledge sharing among the participants. They were assigned to one of two discussion groups that focused on either data collection or data analysis in the context of digital methods. In each group, participants followed prompts and discussed urgent issues and possible solutions, which they then visualized using posters. Finally, both groups sat together and presented the posters to each other, leading to a final discussion. After a short wrap-up, some participants joined the hosts at the Christmas Market for a well-deserved hot beverage.
Patrick Zerrer (U of Bremen) talking about mobile usage patterns of young political activists
The hosts would like to thank all participants for attending and engaging in the Digital Methods Colloquium. Bringing together researchers from different fields demonstrated that there are more commonalities than differences when it comes to the challenging and exciting field of digital methods. We are looking forward to more exchange and, possibly, Part 2 of the Digital Methods Colloquium sometime in the future.
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