Dr. Joëlle Swart talks about her research on news use and digital literacy with a Twitter takeover

From 23 to 29 November, dr. Joëlle Swart, postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Media Studies and Journalism (CMJS), will take over the Twitter account NL_Wetenschap. By taking over the Twitter account of the VSNU (The Association of Universities in the Netherlands), a different researcher or scientist takes the public along his or her working week every week, to give an idea of ​​what their research is about. Swart will tweet daily this week about her research on changes in how poeple read and use news, media literacy and digital literacy.

About the research
With several different research projects, Swart looks at changes in news consumption and the question of how citizens develop new habits, skills and attitudes about digital media. She often works together with partners, such as news media, schools and libraries.

In 2018 Swart obtained her PhD with a thesis on the socially connecting function of news within the NWO project The New News Consumer, a collaboration between the University of Groningen, VU University Amsterdam and twelve Dutch news organizations, including the NOS, the daily newspapers of De Persgroep and the northern daily newspapers of NDC. Since then, Swart has been working at the CMJS as a postdoc in the VSNU research programme The Digital Society.

This year, Swart received together with prof. dr. Marcel Broersma and dr. Anna Van Cauwenberge an NWO Digital Society grant for the funding of two PhD programs on digital literacy, inclusion and citizenship, aimed at the target groups of 8-12 year old children and low literate adults.

You can also follow the Faculry of Arts Twitter account.