Three QUT researchers affiliated with the Digital Media Research Centre have been successful in the Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) scheme.
The DECRA scheme provides focused research support for early career researchers with demonstrated capacity for high-quality research and emerging capability for leadership and supervision.
DMRC-affiliated researchers were awarded a combined total of more than $1.5 million. Congratulations to Dr Katharina Esau, Dr Zahra Stardust, and Dr Amy McQuire (based in the QUT Carumba Institute). 
 

Strengthening Public Opinion Formation Amid Digital Threats ($528,013) 
Online public opinion formation is broken, and research on how to fix it is urgently required. This project investigates how people form opinions online by analysing discussions about key flashpoints like climate change and immigration on mainstream social media platforms.
It is the first cross-platform study of opinion formation that uses an innovative mix of relational content analysis, interviews, citizen science workshops and AI/LLM-assisted analysis.
It reclaims the promise of online communication for constructive public conversations and resilient opinion formation by developing, among others, a civic literacy module designed to equip citizens of all ages with critical tools for navigating digital opinion formation.

 
Building a Black Justice Journalism ($522,333)
This project argues for a new form of scholarly journalism, grounded in conceptions of Black Justice, as a critical intervention needed to address the ongoing media misreporting of Indigenous affairs.
Through an innovative methodological approach combining scholarship, journalistic practice and archival research, the research agenda will seek to understand the role of the media in sustaining and entrenching settler colonialism.
It will interrogate the field of journalism ethics, arguing that accepted norms of journalistic practice compound harm and restrict the voices of Black Witnesses. In doing so, it will aim to build an ethics of practice in the form of Black Justice Journalism which will be disseminated to the Indigenous media sector.

Safeguarding sexual and reproductive rights online ($529,573)
Digital platforms can provide generative spaces for sexual expression, sex education and sexual health information, however online spaces are increasing hostile for sexual minorities, who face criminalisation and surveillance.
Bringing together local and global stakeholders, including sexual health organisations, public interest technologists, human rights lawyers and affected communities, the project investigates how digital platforms can better safeguard sexual and reproductive rights online.
Through participatory and creative methods, it advances a novel theoretical and evidence-based approach to sexual content moderation that reconceptualises online safety and improves platform and regulatory approaches to building safer sexual spaces.
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