About the position

Are you passionate about understanding the digital forces shaping our public sphere? Join our cutting-edge research team at NTNU to tackle critical questions about echo chambers, filter bubbles, and political polarization, especially among younger generations.

Take your research career to the next level. We offer an exciting 3-year postdoctoral position that gives you the opportunity to develop a strong profile as researcher in Political Communication. You will also gain valuable experience relevant for your further career, including in project management, survey research, content analysis, text scraping, and text mining. 

The position is specifically designed to help you build up a strong researcher profile that qualifies you for an associate professor position, while also offering additional skills pertinent to your long-term career development. Apply for this position to become part of our research environment and take the next step in your career with us.

Your immediate leader will be the Head of Department.

About the project 

Echo Chambers, Filter Bubbles, Affective Polarization—there are many concerns and worries about how the public sphere is developing, and changing information environments and patterns of information exposure are suspected of being pivotal driving forces. However, theoretical and methodological limitations still hold back research from generating much-needed insights into disconcerting trends in political communication and political behavior.

The postdoctoral researcher participates in a project set between classical public opinion research, (social) media (content) analytics and data linkage, and Computational Social Science. The goal is to capture the complexities of information input (young) citizens expose themselves to. This allows to investigate:

• how well- or badly-equipped (young) citizens are to wrestle with the excessive amount of stimuli competing for their attention, the massive volume of available political messages, and the extensive variability of reliability and information value of these messages,
• how (young) citizens experience the challenges and results of this constant wrestling with incoming information
• how patterns of information exposure and information literacy relate to outcomes such as precursors to fragmentation, polarization, underinformedness, and ill-informedness.

The postdoctoral researcher will build skills and knowledge in all these sectors as part of a strong team, a strong network, and with help of summer schools or other academic training programs. After the postdoctoral fellowship, the fellow will be well-equipped to compete for permanent positions in Computational Social Science as well as Public Opinion Research, Political Communication, and Political Behavior.

Duties of the position

• Carry out research of good quality
• Academic publications and popular science dissemination
• Participate in the research group EVPOC - NTNU
• Apply for research funding and write applications and report on progress to funding sources
• Participate in international activities such as conferences and/or research stays at foreign educational institutions
• Teaching
• Other career-promoting work 

Required selection criteria

• Doctoral degree (PhD or equivalent) in Political Science, Sociology, or Media and Communication Research (or other relevant fields)
  • You must have completed a completed a Norwegian doctoral degree or corresponding foreign doctoral degree recognized as equivalent to a Norwegian doctoral degree in Political Science, Sociology, or Media and Communication Research (or other relevant fields)
  • If you are in the final phase of your doctorate and can document that the thesis has been submitted or that the defense date has been confirmed, your application can be considered even if you have not defended yet. NOTE: Documentation of the obtained doctorate must be presented before you can take up the position.
• Good oral and written skills in English
• High quality of the project sketch that is to be submitted with the application (max. 1500 words).
  • Applicants are assessed based on (1) the quality and potential of the project sketch, including methodological approach, (2) the quality and relevance of the scientific output, (3) possible contribution to the research group and the institute.
• Convincing letter of motivation (max. 400 words)

PLEASE NOTE: For detailed information about what the application must contain, see paragraph “About the application”.

If you do not already have educational competence that meets the requirements for a position as associate professor in Norway, NTNU will arrange for you to acquire such competence during the employment period. In such cases, you will also be assigned relevant teaching as part of the career-promoting work.

The appointment is to be made in accordance with Regulations for the Universities and Colleges Act (university and colleges regulations) and Regulations for the degrees philosophiae doctor (ph.d.) and philosophiae doctor (ph.d.) in artistic development work at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) for general criteria for the position. 

Preferred selection criteria

The following qualities and experiences, if documented, will count as an advantage for candidates if they fulfill the required selection criteria:

• Experience with (a) scraping and analysis of social media content, search engine results, and AI chatbot chats; (b) quantitative content analysis; (c)text mining and machine learning methods; (d) survey design and public opinion research; (e) election studies; (f) the Norwegian political context; (g) analysis of large amounts of quantitative data, data merging, data management (“big data”)
• A strong publication track-record and experience with publishing in international top journals
• Norwegian language skills at level A2/B1/B2/C1/C2 will be preferred (the better the language skill, the more favorable this will be for the assessment of the candidate). The successful candidate is expected to reach A2 level Norwegian language skills within a year after starting the position.
• Interest in teaching in ISS study programs

If you cannot document skills in Norwegian, Swedish or Danish at upon employment NTNU will facilitate so that you can complete relevant Norwegian language courses before the end of the employment period. 

Personal characteristics

Emphasis will be placed on personal qualities. Specifically, we are looking for candidates with the following characteristics:

• Scholarly creativity
• Motivation for personal skill development (in courses and self-teaching)
• A natural inclination towards asking questions and thinking outside the box
• Ability to work well with others in a research team or academic setting
• Capacity to handle setbacks and persist through challenges
• Efficiently managing time to balance multiple tasks and deadlines, work independently
• Commitment to ethical standards in research and academic conduct
• Ability to familiarize quickly with new research fields, topics, and methods

We offer 

• An exciting job with an important social mission
• Developing tasks in a strong and international professional environment
• Career guidance throughout the postdoctoral program and together with you we will prepare a career plan, which containsthe skills and knowledge you will acquire
• Open and inclusive working environment with committed colleagues
• Mentor programmeas a new employee at NTNU
• Favourable terms in the Norwegian Public Service Pension Fund
• employee benefits

Diversity

Diversity is a strength, and at NTNU we aim to be an employer that reflects the diversity in society and that makes use of the potential of the population's collective skills. Our vision is Knowledge for a better world and our values ​​are creative, critical, constructive and respectful. We believe that an organization that is equal, diverse and gender-balanced is essential for us to achieve our goals.

We strive to attract employees with different skills, life experiences and perspectives to contribute to even better problem solving of our societal mission in research and education.

If you think this position is relevant and interesting, we encourage you to apply, regardless of gender, functional ability and cultural background, or whether you have been out of work for a period of time.

Salary and conditions

As a Postdoctoral Fellow (code 1352) you are normally paid from gross NOK 633 400 per annum before tax, depending on qualifications and seniority. From the salary, 2% is deducted as a contribution to the Norwegian Public Service Pension Fund.

The period of employment is 3 years, included one year of career promotion work. 

As an employee at NTNU, it is important to keep yourself up to date with academic and organizational changes and to adapt to them. 

For the necessary professional and social interaction, it is a prerequisite that you are physically present and available to the institution on a daily basis.

The appointment is carried out in accordance with the principles of the State Employees Act, and Export control (legislation that regulates the export of knowledge, technology and services). Candidates who, after assessment of the application and attachments, are considered to be in conflict with the criteria in the latter act, will not be able to be employed. 

About the application 

The attachments (including a description of your scientific work) must accompany the application as these documents form the basis of the application assessment. The documents must be in Norwegian/a Scandinavian language or English. 

Please note: the application will only be assessed on the basis of the information we have by the application deadline. Therefore, make sure that your application clearly shows how your skills and experience meet the criteria described above. If you have used AI when applying for this position: You must specify in the application in what way AI has been used when writing your application.

The application must include: 

• Transcripts and diplomas for Bachelor's-, Master's- and PhD degrees. If you have not yet completed your PhD, you must provide confirmation on your estimated date for the doctoral dissertation, and/or confirmation that your PhD thesis has been submitted. Documentation of a completed doctoral degree must be presented before taking up the position.
• CV
• A copy of the doctoral thesis. If you are close to submitting, you can attach a draft of the thesis.
• A project sketch containing proposals for an overall description of research questions, theoretical perspectives, methodological design for the project and progress plan (max. 1500 words). Consider the description of the position's profile and the description of the project to create a relevant project sketch.
• A short application letter that specifies your motivation for the position (400 words/one page)
• Academic works - published or unpublished (up to 3 items)
• Possible recommendation letters
• Name and contact information of three references

If all or parts of your education has been taken abroad, we also ask you to attach documentation of the scope and quality of your entire education. Description of the documentation required can be found here. If you already have a statement from Norwegian Directorate for Higher Education and Skills (HK-dir), please attach this as well.

Joint works will be considered. If it is difficult to identify your contribution to joint works, you must attach a brief description of your participation.

If you have had leave or another break in your career, it is important that this is stated in your application so that the selection committee can take this into account and that the amount of your research may be reduced as a result.

In the evaluation of which candidate is best qualified, emphasis will be placed on education, experience and personal qualities. Motivation, ambitions and potential for research will also be emphasized in the assessment of the candidates.

NTNU recognizes a wide range of academic contributions and is committed to follow evaluation criteria for research quality according to The San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment DORA and the obligations in CoARA (responsible assessment of research and recognition of a greater breadth of academic contributions in accordance with NTNU's social mission).

General information 

A public list of applicants with name, age, job title and municipality of residence is prepared after the application deadline. If you wish to be exempt from entry on the public list of applicants, this must be justified. Assessment will be made in accordance with current legislation. You will be notified if the exemption is not granted.

If you have any questions about the position, please contact Professor Stefan Geiss, phone: +47 93491983, email: stefan.geiss@ntnu.no. If you have any questions about the recruitment process, please contact HR Advisor Renate Lillian Johansen email: renate.johansen@ntnu.no.

If you find this position interesting, and in accordance with your qualifications, please submit your application electronically via jobbnorge.no with your CV, diplomas and certificates attached. Applications submitted elsewhere will not be considered. Upon request, you must be able to obtain certified copies of your documentation.

Application deadline: 15.09.2025

For practical information about working at NTNU, please visit this webpage. 

The city of Trondheim is a modern European city with a rich cultural scene. Trondheim is the tech capital of Norway with a population of 200,000.The Norwegian welfare state, including healthcare, schools, kindergartens and overall equality, is probably the best of its kind in the world. Professional subsidized day-care for children is easily available. Furthermore, Trondheim offers great opportunities for education (including international schools) and possibilities to enjoy nature, culture and family life and has low crime rates and clean air quality. 

NTNU - knowledge for a better world

The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) creates knowledge for a better world and solutions that can change everyday life.

Department of Sociology and Political Science

We conduct research, teaching and dissemination in sociology, political science, media, communication and information technology, and sport sciences. The Department offers five-year master’s programmes in teacher education (lektorutdanning) in social sciences as well as in physical education and sports. As a social science department we have a special obligation to contribute to the public debate on important social issues. The Department of Sociology and Political Science is one of seven departments in the Faculty of Social and Educational Sciences.