Since September 2018: Professor of Media Psychology, RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau (until 12/2022: University of Koblenz-Landau)

March – April 2024: Visiting Scholar at the University Diego Portales and UC Chile, Santiago

October 2022 – January 2023: Visiting Scholar at UC Chile, Santiago de Chile

February 2017 - August 2018: Assistant Professor (tenured since February 2018 ), Persuasive Communication, Group: Marketing Communication (Chair: Peter Neijens), Amsterdam School of Communication Research (ASCoR), University of Amsterdam

December 2015 - January 2017: Principal Investigator of the research project “The social side of news: Attitude formation and expression in social networking sites under conditions of impression motivation” (funded by the German Research Foundation), University of Duisburg-Essen

April 2012 - November 2015: Postdoctoral researcher, Social Psychology: Media and Communication (Chair: Nicole C. Krämer), University of Duisburg-Essen, Lecturer and research associate / Projects: “Reception of online science information – Factors of selection and attitude formation,” “Effects of social audience reactions on the perception of online news in participatory websites,” and “Automated allocation of volunteers in major disasters”

September - December 2014: Visiting scholar, Center for Information Technology and Society (Prof. Miriam J. Metzger), University of California, Santa Barbara, USA

July 2009 - March 2012: Research assistant and doctoral student, Social Psychology: Media and Communication (Chair: Nicole C. Krämer), University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany

January 2010 - September 2011: Journalist for Deutschlandradio (German public broadcasting: “Germany Radio”), DRadio Wissen (station for science and knowledge)

September - October 2010: Visiting researcher, Department of Communication (Prof. Joseph B. Walther), Michigan State University, USA

October 2007 - June 2009: Editorial traineeship, Westdeutsche Zeitung (German daily newspaper), Düsseldorf

During Bachelor and Master studies: internships at several German newspapers and TV and radio stations (e.g., Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, ZDF, Sat.1) and freelance journalist; Student assistant in course on psychological research methods

Key Publications

Klebba, L.-J., & Winter, S. (2025). The influence of threat and right-wing authoritarianism on the selection of online (dis)information—a conceptual replication and extension of Lavine et al. (2005). Human Communication Research, 51, 52-56. doi:10.1093/hcr/hqae016

Hirschhäuser, V., & Winter, S. (2024). Moral comments in social media: Analyzing the role of ideology-matching moral framing and impression motivation in the persuasive effect of user comments on YouTube. Mass Communication and Society. doi:10.1080/15205436.2024.2415019

Winter, S. (2023). Verschwörungstheorien in sozialen Netzwerkseiten und Messenger-Diensten aus medienpsychologischer Perspektive [Conspiracy theories in social networking sites and messenger services from a media psychology perspective]. In R. Imhoff (Hrsg.), Die Psychologie der Verschwörungstheorien – Von dunklen Mächten sonderbar belogen... (S. 83-100). Göttingen: Hogrefe

Winter, S., Remmelswaal, P., & Vos. A. (2022). When posting is believing: Adaptation and  internalization of expressed opinions in social network sites. Journal of Media Psychology, 34(3), 177-187. doi:10.1027/1864-1105/a000308

Winter, S., Maslowska, E., & Vos, A. L. (2021). The effects of trait-based personalization in social media advertising. Computers in Human Behavior, 114. doi:10.1016/j.chb.2020.106525

Winter, S. (2020). Do anticipated Facebook discussions diminish the importance of argument quality? An experimental investigation of attitude formation in social media. Media Psychology, 23, 79-106. doi:10.1080/15213269.2019.1572521

A list of publications of Stephan Winter can be found here...

Stephan Winter on ResearchGate and Google Scholar 

• Opinion formation and expression in digital media
• Credibility and information selection in fragmented media environments
• Science communication and attitudes towards scientific debates
• Sharing and processing online misinformation
• Online self-presentation and interpersonal relationships
• Microtargeting and the effect of personalized advertising
• Social TV and media entertainment

Since 2025: Editor, Media Psychology (Taylor & Francis)

Since June 2024: Associate Dean for Teaching, Faculty of Psychology, RPTU University Kaiserslautern-Landau

Since September 2023: Vice chair of the division Media Psychology of the German Psychological Society DGPs

2021-2024: Associate Editor, Journal of Media Psychology (Hogrefe)

Since 2021: Member of the task force „Conspiracy theories“ of the German Psychological Society DGPs (with Stefan Schulz-Hardt, Tobias Rothmund, Pia Lamberty und Roland Imhoff)

2018-2021: Chair of the Examination Committee Social and Communication Sciences, Universität Koblenz-Landau