In 2008, WU re­se­ar­cher and Witt­gen­stein Award win­ner Wolf­gang Lutz was given the pres­ti­gious ERC (Eu­ropean Re­se­arch Coun­cil) Ad­van­ced In­ves­ti­ga­tor Grant for his re­se­arch pro­ject "Fo­re­cas­ting so­cie­ties' ad­ap­ti­ve ca­pa­ci­ty to cli­ma­te chan­ge." Lutz was the first German-​speaking so­cio­lo­gist ever to be awar­ded this grant. Now the ERC has awar­ded Lutz ad­di­tio­nal fun­ding, the Proof of Con­cept Grant. This was the only grant given to an Aus­tri­an re­se­ar­cher in this round.

The Proof of Con­cept Grant is worth € 150,000 and is avail­able only to Eu­ropean re­se­ar­chers who have al­rea­dy been awar­ded an ERC grant. The grant is in­ten­ded to help scholars mar­ket the re­sults of their re­se­arch work and to en­cou­ra­ge in­no­va­ti­on.

Pre­dic­ting de­mo­gra­phic de­ve­lo­p­ments based on edu­ca­ti­on le­vels

The main goal of this ERC Proof of Con­cept Grant is to sup­port Wolf­gang Lutz in his ef­forts to de­ve­lop ge­ne­ra­li­zed de­mo­gra­phic me­thods ca­pa­ble of pre­dic­ting trends based not only on age or gen­der, but also on fac­tors like edu­ca­ti­on le­vels and other at­tri­bu­tes. "The me­thod was de­ve­lo­ped for the first ERC grant," ex­plains Lutz. "Now we want to apply it to mar­ke­ting fo­re­casts, using re­le­vant at­tri­bu­tes such as cer­tain buy­ing pat­terns and pre­fe­ren­ces, for examp­le." Toge­ther with WU's Pro­fes­sor of Mar­ke­ting Tho­mas Reut­te­rer, Lutz and his team will be ana­ly­zing in­ter­na­tio­nal data and dis­cus­sing the ap­p­li­ca­bi­li­ty of the me­thods with selec­ted com­pa­nies.

Suc­cess­ful re­se­ar­cher

De­mo­grapher Wolf­gang Lutz is one of the most suc­cess­ful so­cio­lo­gists in the German-​speaking world. After re­cei­ving the Witt­gen­stein Award in 2012, he foun­ded the Witt­gen­stein Cent­re for De­mo­gra­phy and Glo­bal Human Ca­pi­tal, the only in­sti­tu­ti­on of its kind. At the Cent­re, the Vi­en­na In­sti­tu­te of De­mo­gra­phy, the World Po­pu­la­ti­on Pro­gram (IIASA) and WU's Re­se­arch In­sti­tu­te for Human Ca­pi­tal and De­ve­lo­p­ment work clo­se­ly toge­ther on re­se­arch in the fields of glo­bal de­mo­gra­phics and edu­ca­ti­on re­se­arch. The goal of the Witt­gen­stein Cent­re is to be­co­me a world lea­der in the de­mo­gra­phic ana­ly­sis of the struc­tu­res of human re­sour­ces and their ef­fects on so­cie­ty and the eco­no­my.

Click here for more in­for­ma­ti­on about the WU Re­se­arch In­sti­tu­te for Human Ca­pi­tal and De­ve­lo­p­ment and the ERC Proof of Con­cept Grant.

Con­tact:
Cor­ne­lia Moll
Press re­la­ti­ons of­fi­cer
Tel.: +43-​1-31336-4977
cor­ne­lia.moll@wu.ac.at
http://www.wu.ac.at/press