Doctoral Center for Social, Health and Economic Sciences

Welcome to the Doctoral Center for Social, Health and Economic Sciences
The four Universities of applied sciences in Saxony-Anhalt cooperate in the Doctoral Center for Social, Health and Economic Sciences. Those four Universities are:
- the Magdeburg-Stendal University of Applied Sciences
33 professors of those Universities are members of the Doctoral Center, i.e. they fulfill the required quality criteria to supervise doctorates.
The Doctoral Center offers an individual doctoral path, i.e. you will write your doctoral thesis under the supervision of a professor. The Center provides coaching and networking opportunities as well as non-subject specific qualification workshops like “Academic Writing in English” for free. Knowledge of the German language is necessary for many of those offers. The Center does not offer a structured PhD programme.
General information
You can find general information on doctoral centers, on financing your doctorate and living in Germany here.
How to find a supervisor
If you are interested in writing your dissertation with one of the professors, feel free to contact her or him via mail and ask for a telephone/online appointment. You should already have an idea for a topic, a preliminary research question and its relevance which you will present to your prospective supervisor.
Once your official application to become a doctoral student was accepted, you can matriculate to the University of applied sciences at which your supervisor works. The application documents are in preparation and will be uploaded within due time.
Supervising professors
Abbreviations h2: Magdeburg-Stendal University of Applied Sciences, HSH: Harz University of Applied Sciences, HOME: Merseburg University of Applied Sciences, HSA: Anhalt University of Applied Sciences
| ||||
Name | Uni. | Field | Professor for | Research focus |
---|---|---|---|---|
Prof. Dr. Kerstin Baumgarten | h2 | Health sciences | Health sciences, methods of health promotion | Strategies of health promotion in living environments, health competence |
Prof. Dr. Fabian | h2 | Economics | Logistics, manufacturing science, SAP | Production and logistics systems, industry 4.0, logistics 4.0, mobility and traffic |
Prof. Dr. habil. Gabriele Helga Franke | h2 | Health sciences | Psychological assessments | Assessments in rehabilita- tion psychology, clinical psychology and medical psychology |
Prof. Dr. | h2 | Social sciences | Research methods, sociology | Health sciences (sociology), integration and migration research, education research |
Prof. Dr. | h2 | Economics | Business informatics | Education technologies, Human-computer-interaction, adaptive information systems, digitization and sustainability |
Prof. Dr. habil. | h2 | Social sciences | Developmental psychology | Qualitative methodology and methods, biography, identity, childhood/ adolescence (culture), inter- transgenerationality, performative social science, Open Access and scientific communication |
Prof. Dr. Matthias Morfeld | h2 | Health and social sciences | Rehabilitation system | Research on participation and inclusion, participation benefits, ICF |
Prof. Dr. Mike | h2 | Health sciences | Clinical Psychology | (Intercultural) healthcare research, multilingualism in healthcare provision, intercultural opening up of the healtcare system, mental health, psychotherapy research |
Prof. Dr. Katrin | h2 | Social sciences | Child development, | Social psychology, childhood sciences, qualitative/ subject-scientific methods |
Prof. Dr. habil. | h2 | Social sciences | Education and didactics in the elementary sector | Child development and early education, biopsychosocial model, digital learning and training environments, digitalization in early education practice, practice materials |
Prof. Dr. habil. | h2 | Health sciences | Neurocognitive development | Development of cognitive functions on a neuronal and behavioral level |
Prof. Dr. Steffi Zander | h2 | Social sciences | General psychology | Motivation, emotion and cognitive load when learning with media, evidence-based design principles of learning media, learning in virtual and augmented reality |
Prof. Dr. habil. Markus Zenger | h2 | Health sciences | Differential and personality psychology | Psychometrics, representative surveys in the German population, mental health, Saxon Longitudinal Study |
Prof. Dr. habil. Birgit Apfelbaum | HSH | Social sciences | Communication and social sciences | Research on demographic consequences, age/aging and technology, integration and inclusion, social innovation, multilingual communication, applied conversational research, qualitative social research, transdisciplinary participative methods |
Prof. Dr. habil. Theo Berger | HSH | Economics | Statistics and data analytics | Forecasting, financial econometrics, sports analytics, data science, deep learning |
Prof. Dr. Alena Bleicher | HSH | Economics | Communication and social sciences | Design of technologies, circular economy, geothermal energy, production of wood for energy |
Prof. Dr. Axel Dreyer | HSH | Economics | Tourism management and marketing | Wine tourism, culinary tourism, regional products and further aspects of cultural tourism, sports-related tourism |
Prof. Dr. Philipp David Schaller Mail | HSH | Economics | General business administration and management | Organisation development, change management & sustainable transformation, organization theory & design, management and contemporary management concepts (e.g. scaled agile), sustainable management and IDGs, evidence-based management |
Prof. Dr. habil. Ulrike Starker | HSH | Social sciences | Human resources development and methodology | Complex problem solving, corporate management, management skills, emotion |
Prof. Dr. Jürgen Stember | HSH | Administrative sciences | Administrative sciences | E-Government, economic development, administrative modernization, New Public Management |
Prof. Dr. Jens Weiß | HSH | Administrative sciences | Administrative sciences | Administrative management, administrative reforms, administrative scientific evaluation research, administrative digitization |
Prof. Dr. habil. Ansgar Wübker | HSH | Economics | Economics | Health economics, empirical economic research |
Prof. Dr. habil. Gundula Barsch | HOME | Social sciences | Drugs and social work | Substitution, cannabis |
Prof. Dr. Jens Borchert | HOME | Social sciences | Criminology | Current developments in the penal system and penal enforcement, political education, anti-Semitism |
Prof. Dr. Maika Böhm | HOME | Social sciences | Sexology and family planning | Digital media and sexuality, sexual and gender diversity, pregnancy, family planning, reproductive self-determination |
Prof. Dr. Stefan Meißner | HOME | Social sciences | Media sciences and cultural sciences | Digital culture, media and cultural theory, sociology of culture, technical sociology |
Prof. Dr. Michael Meng | HOME | Economics | Applied linguistics and technical German | Usability, evidence-based information design, language comprehension and text optimization |
Prof. Dr. habil. Doreén Pick | HOME | Economics | General business administration, marketing and international economics | Relationship marketing, consumer behaviour, pricing, services marketing, sharing economy |
Prof. Dr. | HOME | Economics | General business administration, production economics and logistics | Operations and supply chain management |
Prof. Dr. Heinz-Jürgen Voß | HOME | Social sciences | Sexology and sexual education | Sexology, social sciences, prevention of sexualised violence, gender, diversity, intersectionality |
Prof. Dr. habil. Michael Brusch | HSA | Economics | General business administration, marketing and business planning | Methods of empirical market research, market orientation in product and service development, the wish of elderly employees for continued employment |
Prof. Dr. Carsten Fussan | HSA | Economics | Business administration, entrepreneurship and strategic management | Entrepreneurship, corporate entrepreneurship, digitization, digital communication |
Prof. Dr. Sebastian Trojahn | HSA | Economics | Logistics | Logistics, resource logistics, digital logistics |
Documents
The Doctoral Regulations and the Statute of the Doctoral Center will be translated soon. This process will take some time. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Josephin Winkler.
You will soon be able to download the documents for the application for acceptance as a doctoral candidate here.
The exposé instructions are a recommendation for prospective doctoral candidates. Individual agreements about the exposé with the supervisor take precedence.
Contact details

Advisor of the Doctoral Center for Social, Health and Economic Sciences
Josephin Winkler
Phone: 0049 3931 2187 3812
E-Mail: josephin.winkler(at)h2.de
Address: Stendal, Osterburger Str. 25, House 3, Room 0.19
Consultation hours via phone for PhD students and for those interested in pursuing a PhD:
Mondays 12:00 - 13:00, Central European Time
Wednesdays 11:00 - 12:00, Central European Time
Time Zone Converter [external link]
You can also make an individual appointment for a Zoom meeting.
Sessions of the Doctorate Committee
The documents for applying as a doctoral candidate need to be handed in two weeks prior to the respective session of the Doctorate Committee.
- April 22, 2022
- May 13, 2022
- June 10, 2022
The Directors

Director: Prof. Dr. habil. Gabriele Helga Franke, University of Applied Sciences Magdeburg-Stendal
Phone: 0049 3931 2187 4826
E-Mail: gabriele.franke(at)h2.de
Address: Stendal, Osterburger Str. 25, House 3, Room 1.18
Consultation hour via phone: Wednesdays 8:00 - 9:00

Deputy Director: Prof. Dr. Dirk Sackmann, University of Applied Sciences Merseburg

Deputy Director: Prof. Dr. Steffi Zander, University of Applied Sciences Magdeburg-Stendal