Dr. Christina Sondermann
Head of the Early-Career Research Group
Supporting Early-Career Researchers
Early-career research groups are a key element of the DIE’s support for early-career researchers. Qualified PhD graduates are given the opportunity to take on responsibility as leaders of an early-career research group, thereby enabling them to develop their own individual research profiles.
Since 2018, early-career research groups have been established on an ongoing basis at the DIE, with their doctoral candidates conducting research into current issues in adult and continuing education.
Video-based learning for adults – an investigation into innovative video design to optimise learning processes in adult and continuing education
The early-career research group focuses on the field of video-based learning for adults and is based in the ‘Teaching and Learning’ department’, where it is expanding research into learning processes related to digitalisation. This is because videos enable learning independent of time and place and thus offer great potential in both formal and informal learning contexts within adult and continuing education. The research of the Early-Career Research Group centres on the question of how educational videos can be optimally designed to promote not only learning itself but also the satisfaction of adult learners. One key area of the group’s research examines the extent to which video design can be optimised, with particular attention to social processes. A second research focus examines the extent to which video-based learning can benefit from incorporating elements designed to generate suspense or curiosity – elements previously used predominantly in the entertainment sector – into educational videos, with the aim of arousing and sustaining learners’ interest. To answer these research questions, the Early-Career Research Group employs experimental research designs.
Recruiting participants in adult and continuing education as a coordination task involving various actors within a multi-level system
Given the specific characteristics of the adult and continuing education sector, recruiting participants for educational programmes is one of the key challenges in continuing education practice and represents a traditional task for staff. In the Junior Research Group of the ‘Organisation and Programme Planning’ Department, participant recruitment in adult and continuing education is examined from the perspective of educational governance research as a coordination task involving various actors, using both qualitative and quantitative methods. This involves both intra- and inter-organisational coordination of action in selected programme areas. A primary focus is on investigating participant recruitment in literacy and basic education from a network analysis perspective. This examines the relationship structures of programme planners. To analyse these network relationships, a qualitative approach using guided interviews in combination with network maps has been adopted. A second focus is on access to financial education for vulnerable target groups (Zufin project).
The Significance of Implementation Contexts for the Effectiveness of Education Policy Interventions in the Multi-level System of Continuing Education
The Junior Research Group ‘The Significance of Implementation Contexts for the Effectiveness of Education Policy Interventions in the Multi-level System of Continuing Education’, with research priorities aligned with the ‘System and Policy’ Department, is dedicated to educational governance research. The focus is on the framework conditions in the field of adult and continuing education, which stem from education policy decisions and interventions (e.g. continuing education legislation or the public funding and support of continuing education). In their research, the early-career researchers investigate how these framework conditions affect providers and the provision of continuing education, participation in continuing education, and the funding of continuing education. The underlying assumption is that the potential effects of these framework conditions are heterogeneous in relation to organisations as providers of continuing education, regions and federal states, as well as participants. In their projects, the early-career research group relies on the analysis of secondary data from educational and social research, applying quasi-experimental research designs.
Completed Early-Career Research Groups
Professional beliefs of continuing education teachers and their promotion in professional learning communities
Professional beliefs of continuing education teachers and their promotion in professional learning communities
Herbrechter Junior Research Group
Principal Investigator: Prof. Dr Josef Schrader (acting), until October 2020: Dr Dörthe Herbrechter
PhD students: Eva Hahnrath and Xenia Kuhn
Findings from existing educational research show that teachers’ beliefs and values are also relevant to their professional competence. Building on this, this early-career research group is focusing on the beliefs of teachers in adult and continuing education – an area that has received little research attention to date – with the aim of examining their development and promotion in greater detail through an intervention study. Using qualitative and quantitative methods, the research will focus, on the one hand, on the mental foundations of professional competence and, on the other, on forms of in-service professional development through peer counselling within professional learning communities. Against this background, the Early-Career Research Group is thematically affiliated with the Department ‘Organisation and Programme Planning’.
Dr Dörthe Herbrechter has been employed as a junior lecturer at the University of Heidelberg since October 2020. Since then, the early-career research group has been led on an interim basis by Prof. Dr Josef Schrader. For enquiries regarding the research agenda of the early-career research group, please contact Jun.-Prof. Dörthe Herbrechter (herbrechter@ibw.uni-heidelberg.de).
Audiovisual knowledge and information media
Audiovisual knowledge and information media
Merkt Early-Career Research Group
Principal Investigator: Dr Martin Merkt
PhD students: Daniela Decker and Christina Sondermann
The early-career research group Audiovisual Knowledge and Information Media is affiliated with the ‘Teaching and Learning’ department. It investigates how the use of dynamic (audio-)visual media (e.g. videos and virtual reality) can be optimised in adult learning and educational processes. A first research focus concerns the cognitive and affective effects of various design features of videos (e.g. the visibility of teachers, pauses). In this context, increasing attention is also being paid to learners’ individual circumstances. In a second research focus, the early-career research group examines how orientation in virtual reality can be supported. To answer its research questions, the early-career research group primarily relies on experimental research designs.
Investigation of the interrelationships between institutional frameworks and the structure of continuing education provision in an international comparison using contrastive case studies
Investigation of the interrelationships between institutional frameworks and the structure of continuing education provision in an international comparison using contrastive case studies
Kaufmann-Kuchta Early-Career Research Group
Principal Investigator: Dr Katrin Kaufmann-Kuchta
PhD student: Anna Caroline Bernhardt
In the early-career research group of the ‘System and Politics’Department, the relationships between legal and financial regulations and the institutional provision structures of continuing education are being investigated in three exemplary countries (England, Spain, Sweden) using contrastive case studies. The focus is on public educational institutions as continuing education providers that are at least partially publicly funded and are (in)directly influenced by state-regulated institutional frameworks. The aim is to identify indicators at the macro level that influence continuing education provision and providers and should therefore be taken into account in international comparisons of continuing education (system) structures. To this end, documents are analysed and interviews are conducted with experts at various levels of decision-making. The results are intended to form a basis for further research aimed at specifying the interrelationships within the multi-level system of continuing education.
Professional Competencies of Continuing Education Staff
Professional Competencies of Continuing Education Staff
Goeze Early Career Research Group
Principal Investigator: Dr Annika Goeze
PhD students: Christian Marx and Dorett Schneider
Postdoctoral researcher: Dr Petra Hetfleisch
The Junior Research Group (2013–2019) focused on the competencies of teaching staff, whilst also examining personnel assessment competencies used by adult and continuing education institutions in the selection of teachers and counsellors. In addition, the four researchers worked on developing a tool to assess the pedagogical and psychological knowledge of teachers, on the effects of video-case-based learning on teachers’ competences, and on the conditions for the successful implementation of evidence-based concepts by practitioners, using the concept ‘Teachers learn with video cases’ as an example.
Effects and Outcomes of Education Policy Interventions in the Field of Continuing Education
Effects and Outcomes of Education Policy Interventions in the Field of Continuing Education
Martin’s Early-Career Research Group
Principal Investigator: Prof. Dr Andreas Martin
PhD students: Julia Granderath and Fabian Rüter
Aligned with the research priorities of the ‘System and Policy’ Division, this junior research group uses quantitative secondary analyses to investigate the effects and outcomes of education policy interventions within the multi-level system of continuing education. The focus is on the effects of interventions by supranational and national education policy actors on provision and participation structures, and their monetary and non-monetary consequences at various levels of aggregation.
