Nicolas Ruth

Nicolas Ruth

Professor of Digital Communication in the Music and Entertainment Industries

Unviersity of Music and Theatre Munich

Biography

Nicolas Ruth is a music and media communication science scholar with a focus on music/media psychology and management. Since 2022 he is a professor for Digital Communication in the Music and Entertainment Industries. After studying Musicology and Popular Music and Media, he did his PhD on prosocial music. Ruth has conducted research on music reception on radio/TV, music and advertising, and the development of musical abilities and personality in children using a wide range of methods such as experiments, surveys, data science, content analyses, and interviews. His current research is on uses and effects of music streaming technologies.

Interests

  • Digital communication
  • Development of musical abilities
  • Prosocial music
  • Streaming
  • Music marketing
  • Music in the media

Education

  • Doctoral degree in Media Communication, 2018

    Julius-Maximilians-University Wuerzburg

  • Master of Arts in Popular Music and Media, 2012

    University of Paderborn

  • Bachelor of Arts in Musicology, 2010

    Justus-Liebig-University Giessen

Experience

 
 
 
 
 

Professor for Digital Communication in the Music and Entertainment Industries

Institute for Cultural Management and Media, University of Music and Theatre Munich

May 2022 – Present Munich, Germany

Responsibilities include:

  • Teaching in M.A. Digital Communication in the Music and Entertainment Industries
  • Supervising theses
  • Managing the M.A. program
  • Writing research grant applications
  • Research on music streaming and digital communication
 
 
 
 
 

Interim Professor

Institute for Systematic Musicology, University of Hamburg

Apr 2021 – Sep 2022 Hamburg, Germany

Responsibilities include:

  • Teaching in B.A. and M.A. Systematic Musicology
  • Supervising theses
  • Elected Representative in the Committee for Teaching, Studies and Academic Reform
  • Writing research grant applications
  • Research on music streaming and mobile music usage
 
 
 
 
 

PostDoc Research Fellow

Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths, University of London

May 2019 – Mar 2021 London, UK

Responsibilities include:

  • Analysing data
  • Managing a longitudinal study
  • Writing papers
  • Supervising master theses
  • Elected Early Career Researcher Representative
 
 
 
 
 

Research & Teaching Associate / Doctoral Student

Media and Business Communication Group, Julius-Maximilians-University Würzburg

Nov 2012 – Mar 2019 Würzburg, Germany

Responsibilities include:

  • Teaching in B.Sc. and M.Sc. Media Communication
  • Research on music and media
  • Management of recording studio lab
  • Supervising bachelor and master theses

Funding & Grants

IASPM Travel Grant

International Association for the Study of Popular Music Jun 2019

Feodor Lynen Research Fellowship

Humboldt Foundation May 2019

2-year fully funded fellowship

  • Project title: Music was my first love? The impact of musical abilities on the development of personality

Start-up funding

Human Dynamic Centre Wuerzburg Dec 2015
Grant for organizing an interdisciplinary conference

DAAD Conference Grants

German Academic Exchange Service Jun 2015

Awards to assist with the costs of attending the following conferences:

  • ICA 2018 (Prague, Czech Republic)
  • ICMPC 2016 (San Francisco, USA)
  • IASPM 2015 (Campinas, Brazil)

Recent Publications

Survival of musical activities. When do young people stop making music?

Although making music is a popular leisure activity for children and adolescents, few stay musically engaged. Previous research has …
PDF Source Document DOI
Survival of musical activities. When do young people stop making music?

“Evacuate the Dancefloor”: Exploring and Classifying Spotify Music Listening Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic in DACH Countries

Many people used musical media via music streaming service providers to cope with the limitations of the COVID-19 pandemic. Accounting …
PDF Code Source Document DOI
“Evacuate the Dancefloor”: Exploring and Classifying Spotify Music Listening Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic in DACH Countries

Associations between musical preferences and personality in female secondary school students

It is widely believed that someone’s personality can be assessed through their musical taste. There are many theoretical approaches …
Source Document DOI
Associations between musical preferences and personality in female secondary school students

Save your artist! Der Einfluss moralischer Appelle von Musikschaffenden auf die Akzeptanz von kostenpflichtigen Musikstreamingdiensten (Save Your Artist! The Impact of Musicians' Moral Appeal on Acceptance of Paid Music Streaming Services)

Obwohl im Jahr 2018 erstmals der digitale den physischen Musikkonsum in Deutschland überholte, sind viele Musikerinnen nicht überzeugt …
PDF Source Document DOI
Save your artist! Der Einfluss moralischer Appelle von Musikschaffenden auf die Akzeptanz von kostenpflichtigen Musikstreamingdiensten (Save Your Artist! The Impact of Musicians' Moral Appeal on Acceptance of Paid Music Streaming Services)

Beamer, Benz, or Bentley: Mentions of products in hip hop and R&B music

Mentions of commercial products are common in hip hop and R&B lyrics, relative to other genres of popular music, although the …
PDF
See all publications

Talks & Posters

Soziale Situationen beim Musikhören. Experience Sampling mit der MuPsych App.
Thu, 02 Sep 2021 — Fri, 03 Sep 2021 Online
Perception of chord sequences modelled with Prediction by Partial Matching, Voice-leading distance, and Pitch-Class Spectral Similarity: A new approach for testing individual differences in harmony perception
Wed, 28 Jul 2021 — Sat, 31 Jul 2021 Online
Associations between musical sophistication and personality: Evidence from three countries
Wed, 09 Sep 2020 — Fri, 11 Sep 2020 University of Leeds
Associations between personality and musical emotion discrimination in secondary school students
Wed, 20 May 2020 — Thu, 21 May 2020 University of Kent
Wechselwirkung emotionaler Musik und prosozialer Songtexte auf Kognitionen, Emotionen und Verhalten
Fri, 06 Sep 2019 — Sun, 08 Sep 2019 Universität Eichstätt
See all talks

Teaching

M.Sc. & B.Sc. seminars

Download a complete list of teaching and supervising experience here

All universities Dec 2021
This is a downloadable pdf with all teaching experience and supervised theses in English and German

Einführung in die Musikpsychologie [Introduction to music psychology]

Universität Hamburg Oct 2021

Forschungsperspektiven auf populäre Musik [Research perspectives on popular music]

Universität Hamburg Oct 2021

Musikmarketing auf Basis theoretischer Ansätze und empirischer Erkenntnisse [Music marketing based on theoretical and empirical insights]

Universität Hamburg Apr 2021

Algorithmusgeleitetes Musikstreaming am Beispiel von Spotify [Algorithm based music streaming as shown on Spotify]

Universität zu Köln Nov 2020

Musik- und Eventmanagement

Universität Würzburg Apr 2016

Topics

advertising broadcasting content analysis development emotions experience sampling experiment flow general learning model hip-hop lyrics music industry music production personality popular music prosocial behavior radio Spotify streaming Technology Acceptance Model

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