Since June 2026, Michelle Terschi has been a pre‑doctoral researcher (Prae-Doc) with the LONERS project in the research area of the Sociology of Emotions and Political Sociology.
At the centre of her doctoral research is psychotherapy as a socially and politically embedded institution, and how emotions related to unemployment and loneliness are processed and categorised within it.
Michelle studied Social and Cultural Anthropology and Sociology at the University of Vienna, as well as Psychotherapeutic Propaedeutics (introductory psychotherapy training) at the Postgraduate Center. From April 2023 to April 2025, she was research associate in social work at Mannheim University of Applied Sciences on a participatory research project addressing experiences of sexualised violence in childhood.
Within the LONERS project, she focuses primarily on the sociology of emotions and political sociology in the context of mental health. In her dissertation embedded in this project, Michelle examines emotions within the institution of psychotherapy that arise in connection with loneliness and unemployment.