In light of societal polarization regarding climate change attitudes, this study investigates the sociostructural and cultural determinants of climate change skepticism in Germany, with a focus on homeownership and local wind energy infrastructure. Drawing on data from the second wave of the FGZ-RISC Regionalpanel, the analysis integrates georeferenced spatial indicators and individual-level survey responses across four large cities in Germany. Climate skepticism is operationalized as a composite index capturing distrust in climate science and questioning of anthropogenic climate change. Linear regression models with clustered standard errors reveal that right-wing populist orientation is a strong predictor of climate skepticism. Moreover, homeownership was associated with higher skepticism, suggesting a mechanism of motivated reasoning triggered by perceived economic burdens. Contrary to widespread concerns, the mere presence of wind energy infrastructure can decrease skepticism. The interaction between political orientation, homeownership, and renewable energy exposure further underscores the role of interpretive frames in shaping attitudes toward climate policy. These findings contribute to sociological debates on the politicization of climate change by highlighting how material conditions, place-based experiences, and identity-protective cognition jointly structure environmental attitudes. The study underscores the need to contextualize climate skepticism with regard to both social inequality and the presence of spatial infrastructures of climate policy implementation.
Summer temperatures will continue to rise in the next decades in all European cities and urban heat will become one of the top priorities with its manifold impacts on different social groups. In the context of climate change, urban design and planning processes, it is therefore crucial to consider individual adaptability and changes in living conditions due to urban heat stress. This paper focuses on the concept of heat-vulnerability and the question of how different people experiencing multiple vulnerabilities perceive, and adapt to heat stress. In our case study in Vienna in 2023, we conducted qualitative interviews and focus groups with heat-vulnerable people. After identifying eleven different factors of heat-vulnerability, the theoretical concept of multiple vulnerabilities provided insights into the intra- and interpersonal overlap of vulnerabilities on different dimensions: individual context, temporal characteristics, social and interpersonal factors, living and working conditions, and spatial factors. For most of the people involved in our sample, more than one factor was evident. Those multiple vulnerabilities demonstrate that factors can be seen both as a starting point of vulnerability and as an outcome of urban heat stress itself. Furthermore, the paper examines coping strategies of people experiencing multiple vulnerabilities, such as adjusting daily routines, utilizing nature-based solutions (NbS), and navigating infrastructural challenges. The study highlights the importance of the social construction of vulnerability, by urging that recognizing multiple vulnerabilities can enhance equity-focused responses to urban heat stress.
This study provides a comprehensive longitudinal description of educational trajectories in Austria, using administrative data for an entire student cohort. This offers new insights into how early social differences translate into divergent pathways. Since education both shapes lifetime outcomes and reproduces persistent inequalities along dimensions of social origin, gender, ethnicity, and geography analysing educational trajectories is central to understanding social mobility. We follow a full cohort of students in Austrian schools who were 13 years old on 1 September 2011 (N = 85,535). School, higher education, labour market, migration, and residence data are combined to map trajectories across stages of education and labour market entry from age six to 23. Sequence analysis is applied to visualise trajectories, identify the most common pathways, and examine variation by sociodemographic and structural characteristics. Results show that social inequalities emerge early and widen across educational stages, with the largest differences observed by parental education: students from highly educated families more often follow academic pathways while those from less educated families are more likely to enter vocational tracks. Variation is also observed by gender, migration background and place of residence. Overall, these findings provide a population-level perspective on the early emergence and persistence of educational inequalities in Austria.
This article examines the multifaceted nature of social negotiations around sound, taking the Vienna-based venue Arena as its empirical point of departure. From a practice-theoretical perspective, I reconstruct how the same sonic source can simultaneously be framed as music, noise emission, a technical problem, and a site of political contestation. Drawing on ethnographic observations and interviews, sound emerges as a relational constellation in which bodies, spaces, technical arrangements, legal categories, and cultural interpretations become situationally and normatively intertwined. The audience is involved as a collective resonance space and an affective co-producer of the sonic event. Particular attention is paid to practices of objectification: measurements stabilize sound as a decision-relevant entity and thereby enable forms of sound governance. This objectivity is constructed through professional routines, selective reductions, and the situational interplay of heterogeneous practices and forms of knowledge. The article argues for a sociology that addresses sound as a politically, materially, and affectively mediated problem of social ordering, and that analyses noise conflicts as expressions of social power relations and processes of negotiation.
Am Beispiel des Wiener Veranstaltungsorts Arena zeige ich im vorliegenden Beitrag die Vielschichtigkeit sozialer Verhandlungen um Sound. Aus praxistheoretischer Perspektive rekonstruiere ich, wie dieselbe Klangquelle zugleich als Musik, Lärmemission, technisches Problem und politischer Streitfall auftreten kann. Auf Grundlage ethnografischer Beobachtungen und Interviews erscheint Sound als relationale Konstellation, in der Körper, Räume, technische Arrangements, rechtliche Kategorien und kulturelle Deutungen situativ und normativ ineinandergreifen. Das Publikum fungiert dabei als kollektiver Resonanzraum und affektiver Mitproduzent des Klanggeschehens. Besondere Aufmerksamkeit gilt den Praktiken der Objektivierung: Messungen stabilisieren Klang als entscheidungsrelevante Größe und ermöglichen Sound-Governance. Objektivität wird durch professionelle Routinen, selektive Reduktionen sowie die situative Überlagerung unterschiedlicher Praktiken und Wissensformen konstruiert. Mit meinem Beitrag plädiere ich für eine Soziologie, die Sound als politisch, materiell und affektiv vermitteltes Ordnungsproblem begreift und Lärmkonflikte als Ausdruck gesellschaftlicher Macht- und Aushandlungsverhältnisse analysiert.
In the age of digitalization, private and professional identities are increasingly intertwined in a tension between personal expression and strategically staged online personas. This applies above all, but not exclusively, to the increasingly important group of content creators (CC), who are the focus of this article. Based on a thematic analysis of 30 problem-centered interviews with creators on YouTube, we examine how authenticity is institutionalized in practice in a dynamic, context-dependent process. Our findings show that CC are subject to a constant balance between the idea of an authentic self and a deliberately constructed online presence in their professional self-presentation. Key dynamics here are the cultivation of relationships of trust with the audience, public self-economization, and adaptation to platform-specific and economic conditions.
In Zeiten der Digitalisierung sind private und berufliche Identitäten zunehmend in einem Spannungsfeld zwischen persönlichem Ausdruck und strategisch inszenierter Online-Persona miteinander verwoben. Dies betrifft vor allem, aber nicht nur, die an Bedeutung gewinnende Gruppe der Content Creator:innen (CC), die im vorliegenden Beitrag im Zentrum steht. Anhand einer Themenanalyse von 30 problemzentrierten Interviews mit Creator:innen auf YouTube untersuchen wir, wie Authentizität in der Praxis in einem dynamischen, kontextabhängigen Prozess institutionalisiert wird. Unsere Ergebnisse zeigen, dass CC in ihrer professionellen Selbstinszenierung einer ständigen Balance zwischen der Vorstellung eines authentischen Selbst und einer bewusst konstruierten Online-Präsenz unterliegen. Zentrale Dynamiken sind dabei die Pflege von Vertrauensverhältnissen zur Zuschauer:innenschaft, die öffentliche Selbstökonomisierung und die Anpassung an plattformspezifische sowie ökonomische Rahmenbedingungen.
Vocational training in prisons shows high dropout rates, yet underlying causes remain poorly understood as existing research emphasizes institutional factors while neglecting pre-incarceration socialization experiences. This study analyzes how pre-incarceration school and vocational socialization shape work values and work ethic among incarcerated trainees. A descriptive exploratory multiple case study following Yin was conducted with 18 male inmates across six Austrian prisons. Data collection occurred via problem-centered interviews following Witzel, analyzed through qualitative content analysis following Mayring structured by the value dimensions of Kristof-Brown and colleagues (intrinsic, extrinsic, social). Biographies reveal cumulative disadvantage through learning difficulties, school dropout, and precarious employment. During incarceration, inmates emphasize extrinsic values such as economic security, social values such as fairness, and intrinsic values such as achievement, systematically articulated as contrasts to prior exploitation and failure experiences. The study identifies biographical patterns influencing educational motivation in prison, with the central limitation being the inability to distinguish authentic values from strategic self-presentation. Implications for biography-sensitive pedagogy are discussed, while the sustainability of expressed values requires longitudinal research.
Berufliche Qualifizierung im Strafvollzug zeigt hohe Abbruchquoten, deren Ursachen unzureichend verstanden sind, da bisherige Forschung haftinterne Faktoren fokussiert und prägende Sozialisationserfahrungen vor der Inhaftierung vernachlässigt. Die vorliegende Studie analysiert den Einfluss schulischer und beruflicher Sozialisation auf berufliche Werte und Arbeitsmoral von Inhaftierten in Ausbildung. Es wurde eine deskriptive explorative Mehrfachfallstudie nach Yin mit 18 männlichen Inhaftierten aus sechs österreichischen Justizanstalten durchgeführt. Die Datenerhebung erfolgte durch problemzentrierte Interviews nach Witzel, die Auswertung mittels qualitativer Inhaltsanalyse nach Mayring entlang der Wertedimensionen nach Kristof-Brown und Kolleg:innen (intrinsisch, extrinsisch, sozial). Die Biografien zeigen kumulative Benachteiligungen durch Lernschwierigkeiten, Schulabbrüche und prekäre Erwerbsverläufe. Während der Haft dominieren extrinsische Werte wie Existenzsicherung, soziale Werte wie Fairness und intrinsische Werte wie Erfolgserlebnisse, die systematisch als Kontrast zu Ausbeutungs- und Versagenserfahrungen formuliert werden. Die Studie identifiziert biografische Muster, die Bildungsmotivation im Vollzug beeinflussen, wobei die zentrale Limitation in der Ununterscheidbarkeit authentischer Werthaltungen von strategischen Selbstdarstellungen besteht. Implikationen für biografiesensible Pädagogik werden diskutiert, während die Nachhaltigkeit der geäußerten Werthaltungen Längsschnittforschung erfordert.
Mobility, as a social science category, is usually understood as the mobility of social advancement or decline of individuals or groups in an unequal, hierarchical society. Recently, there have been increased efforts to examine the relationship between social and spatial mobility in the context of a discourse of justice. In the background, some promising efforts to conceptualize mobility in Pierre Bourdieu's categories and thus to analyze the connection between social and spatial mobility from a post-structural materialist perspective have faded. These efforts have not been crowned with resounding success: spatial mobility has neither become a prominent topic in sociology, nor has the "Bourdieu School" received a significant innovative boost from its study of mobility. This may be due to the categorical inadequacy of previous approaches. The following article aims to counter this by theoretically defining three categories that can be used to place spatial mobility within Bourdieu's praxeology and enable sociology to play a greater role in the study of spatial mobility. The introduction of the three categories of mobicity (or mobile capacity), mobitus and mobitat is intended to develop a sociological theory of mobility.
The concept of science skepticism was diffused during the Covid-19 pandemic. Epistemic uncertainty and conflicts, the potentially catastrophic effects of non-compliance with state-enforced anti-pandemic restrictions, polarization in public debate, the specter of authoritarian threats and a novel category of actors-science skeptics, anti-vaxxers and Covid-19 denialists/pandemic skeptics-conditioned the situation in which the concept of science skepticism was increasingly mobilized in politics, media and the social sciences. The contributions to this special collection engage with the concept through analyses that can be grouped under three broad themes. The first theme concerns semantics, i.e. discourses about facticity and its crisis or science skepticism in the public sphere. The second theme revolves around knowledge and includes analyses of counter knolwedge, not/knowing and conspiracy. The third theme engages with the relationship between politics and Wissenschaft (the scientific field). The collection seeks to illuminate the political function of the concept of science skepticism and its usage, trace the emergence of a research field and analyze the (apparent) phenomenon of science skepticism through empirical studies.
Das Konzept der Wissenschaftsskepsis gewann im Zuge der Covid-19 Pandemie an Popularität. Epistemische Unsicherheit und Konflikte, das katastrophische Potenzial nicht-konformen Verhaltens, Polarisierungen in der öffentlichen Debatte, autoritäre Bedrohungen und jene neuartige Akteurskategorie der Wissenschaftsskeptiker:innen, Impfgegner:innen und Corona-Leugner:innen waren Elemente jener Gemengelage, in der Politik, Medien und Teile der Sozialwissenschaften vermehrt den Begriff Wissenschaftsskepsis bemühten. Die Beiträge der vorliegenden Collection nähern sich diesem Konzept durch Analysen an, die (1) auf Semantik fokussieren, womit der Diskurs um Faktizität und ihre Krise bzw. Wissenschaftsskepsis in der politischen Öffentlichkeit gemeint ist, die sich (2) mit Wissen näher auseinandersetzen, was Gegenwissen, Nicht-Wissen und Heterodoxie oder Verschwörung einschließt, und die schließlich (3) das Verhältnis von Wissenschaft und Politik reflektieren. Mit diesen Schwerpunkten zielt die Collection darauf, reflexiv-historisierend die politische Funktion des Begriffs und seine Verwendung, die Entstehung eines Forschungsstrangs und das (vermeintliche) Phänomen als ein empirisches zu beleuchten.
Mobilität wird als sozialwissenschaftliche Kategorie meistens als Mobilität des gesellschaftlichen Auf- oder Abstiegs von Individuen oder Gruppen in einer ungleichen, hierarchischen Gesellschaft aufgefasst. Seit kurzem sind verstärkte Bemühungen zu verzeichnen, die Relation von sozialer und räumlicher Mobilität im Kontext eines Gerechtigkeitsdiskurses zu untersuchen. In den Hintergrund treten dabei einige vielversprechende Bemühungen, Mobilität in den Kategorien von Pierre Bourdieu zu fassen und damit die Verbindung von sozialer und räumlicher Mobilität poststruktural-materialistisch zu analysieren. Diese Bemühungen waren nicht von durchschlagendem Erfolg gekrönt: Weder ist räumliche Mobilität ein prominentes Thema der Soziologie geworden, noch hat die „Bourdieu-Schule“ einen bedeutenden innovativen Schub durch die Beschäftigung mit der Mobilität erhalten. Dies liegt möglicherweise an der kategorialen Unzulänglichkeit der bisherigen Ansätze. Dem möchte der folgende Beitrag mit einer theoretischen Bestimmung dreier Kategorien entgegentreten, mit denen die räumliche Mobilität sinnvoll in Bourdieus Praxeologie eingeordnet werden kann und mit denen die Soziologie bei der Erforschung räumlicher Mobilität eine größere Rolle spielt. Es geht mit der Einführung der drei Kategorien Mobilitätsvermögen, Mobitus und Mobitat um den Entwurf einer soziologischen Theorie der Mobilität.
While physical violence is often immediately perceptible, psychological violence-particularly in the lives of children whose parents have mental illness-tends to be far more elusive and difficult to name. In families affected by parental mental illness, children face an elevated risk of experiencing psychological violence; however, this form of abuse remains markedly underrepresented in research. Existing studies frequently prioritise themes such as resilience or coping strategies, whereas psychological violence, as an insidious and less readily discernible form of maltreatment, is rarely the central focus. The present study investigates how individuals who grew up with parents with mental illness narrate experiences of psychological violence in their biographical accounts, and explores the social, emotional, and cultural meanings they ascribe to these experiences. Drawing on eleven biographical interviews with adults aged 20 to 35, all of whom had parents with mental illness during childhood, the study employs an interpretive hermeneutic approach that combines microstructural and systems analysis to examine participants' portrayals of such violence. Findings indicate that respondents frequently did not recognise these experiences as psychological violence at the time, but rather perceived them as a "normal" feature of the parent-child relationship. It was only through reflective distance in adulthood that they came to identify these experiences as abuse-a realisation with profound implications for their self-concept, capacity to establish trust, and interpersonal relationships. The study underscores the urgent need to sensitise children at an early stage to the realities of psychological violence and emphasises that interventions for families affected by parental mental illness must address the specific relational dynamics of such abuse in order to provide needs-oriented support.
Ethical tensions arise in qualitative social research in many respects, not least in research with groups that are considered vulnerable. In this article, we focus on these tensions in research with parents with learning difficulties, a group whose living conditions can be reconstructed as (potentially) vulnerable due to the interplay of a variety of different factors. The ethical tensions between the consideration of disability as a vulnerability of parents with learning difficulties in research and the simultaneous avoidance of their vulnerabilisation through research are at the centre of our article. Based on existing theory and literature, we outline vulnerability in general and the vulnerability of parents with learning difficulties in particular, as well as ethical issues in research with this group. Then, we present empirical reflections on our research practice with parents with learning difficulties, drawing from two qualitative studies that we conducted. Our findings indicate three key ethical areas of tension in the research process between the consideration of disability as vulnerability and the danger of vulnerabilisation through a generalising risk perspective. In our conclusion, we emphasise a self-reflective approach as researchers, which allows for the equal consideration of the potentials and risks regarding (created) vulnerability/vulnerabilities.
Using a recognition-theoretical concept of performance, this article examines the phases of teaching, testing, and assessment as trans-situational forms of university instruction and evaluation. It documents the evocation of each respective phase through temporal anticipations and retrospections, analyzes their situational enactment, and explores their social conditionality within local constellations. At the core is the transformation of students' activities and actions across time, individuals, and spaces into individually attributable performances-through legitimizing or delegitimizing speech acts in teaching, written exam tasks, exam formats, and the evaluation of oral or written work or participation. The attributed and constructed performance emerges from collaborative chains of evaluation that are socially ratified and secured.
This article examines how far-right appropriations become possible in the context of a socio-ecological turn-not only through the agency of far-right actors, but also due to ambivalences within the self-understanding of the societal mainstream that supports such a turn. The analysis is theoretically framed by feminist and decolonial approaches, as well as by concepts from far-right studies that enable a perspective on societal lines of conflict that is sensible to relations of power and domination. The empirical core of the study is a content analysis of accounts from the field of socio-ecological agriculture. For the empirical analysis, we conceptualize community, nature/naturalness, and place as fields of tension in which societal struggles over a socio-ecological turn condense. We are interested in how, in references to community, nature/naturalness, and place, ideal-typical developmental paths of a socio-ecological turn (transformation, modernization, authoritarianism) factually overlap. We identify three interpretive logics that structure these overlaps: (1) the assumption of an ontological given versus the recognition of social contingency, (2) the imposition of harmony versus the negotiation of difference, and (3) a personalized logic of relationship versus a structure-critical politics of society. We argue that reflecting on these interpretive logics is a necessary condition for identifying points of connection for far-right narratives-and simultaneously marks potential starting points for a democratically resilient socio-ecological transformation.
The Austrian education system is known for its highly diversified structure that channels students into ability groups. It is characteristic of this system that, after a comprehensive school-like education in primary school, tracking begins (in international comparison) early, at the age of ten. In fact, tracking in Austria begins much earlier, namely at the very beginning of a child's school career. So the downgrading of "immature" children at the age of six to pre-school also falls under this category. Intended as a measure to give children more time to develop the prerequisites for attending school, attending preschool represents a loss of career path due to its inclusion in compulsory schooling. The article is specifically dedicated to two questions. Firstly, what is the extent and social distribution of preschool attendance? Secondly, which level of success in the further educational career is associated with preschool attendance? The basis for these analyses is a register data set that covers an entire school entry cohort and maps the further educational career over 15 years. Descriptive analyses show a highly social and regionally uneven distribution of preschool attendance. Regression analyses reveal that preschool attendance is significantly positively associated with early school leaving and even more strongly negatively associated with obtaining a university entrance qualification at the end of upper secondary education. The results contribute to a better understanding of the selectivity in the Austrian education system and add to the empirical evidence on the relationship between tracking and further educational pathways. On a policy level, the article provides a basis for initiating a reform of the school entry phase.
