Tourism and hospitality PhD

As a tourism, hospitality and events PhD student at Brighton, you can develop research plans and apply methods involving both quantitative and qualitative data, supported by appropriate research methods training. You will benefit from:

• a supervisory team comprising two or sometimes three members of academic staff. Depending on your research specialism you may also have an additional supervisor from another School, another research institution, or an external partner from government or industry.
• desk space and access to a computer in a space specifically designed for research students. There are a range of facilities on the Eastbourne campus including various catering options.
• access to a range of electronic resources via the university’s Online Library, as well as to the physical book and journal collections housed within the network of university campus libraries.

Details of specific topic areas can be located in the lists below and on the university research pages. Please contact the relevant member of staff before submitting an application through the university’s Doctoral College.

Based on the university’s Moulsecoomb campus, the School of Business and Law has a vibrant community of research staff, which PhD students join as active members.

Academics deliver translational research with local, regional and international benefits. PhD students form an integral part of BBS and take an active role in a range of intellectual and social activities within the school. All postgraduate students are invited to join the university's research centres and groups, including the Tourism, Hospitality and Events Research and Enterprise Group, which will provide you with opportunities to present ‘work in progress’ and network with other researchers.

The Brighton Doctoral College offer a training programme for postgraduate researchers, covering research methods and transferable (including employability) skills. Attendance at appropriate modules within this programme is encouraged, as is contribution to the school’s seminar series. Academic and technical staff also provide more subject-specific training.

We welcome approaches for PhD supervision across most aspects of tourism hospitality and events research. Fields of recent pursuit have included: investigations of human resource issues, sociology and social issues, food and consumer behaviour, digital technologies and social media. The following list of interests will serve as a guide to some of the department’s outlook and expertise:

• sustainable, responsible, ethical and community-based tourism
• tourism - policy, planning, development and management
• globalisation, migration and mobility
• sexuality and gender
• niche and special interest tourism - particularly cruise tourism; sport tourism, family tourism, rural tourism, nature based tourism
• tourism and development in developed, developing and emerging countries
• tourism and social justice
• tourism environmental justice (i.e. animal rights in tourism)
• travel philanthropy
• consumer behaviour in tourism
• destination management and marketing
• tourism impacts management
• visual and visuality; culture and media, popular films and tourism
• heritage, landscape and memorialisation
• identities and culture, embodiment, materiality and the senses
• international events and festival
• subculture, counterculture and spectacle

Dr Matthew Adams

Matt supervises PhD students addressing a range of topics including human-animal relations, more-than-human and multispecies methods, Anthropocene studies, the posthumanities, psychology and the climate crisis, climate activism, mental health and distress, social and cultural identity.

He is especially interested in supervising students adopting qualitative and creative methods. Interdisciplinary projects are especially welcome. 

Dr Mandy Curtis

I am interested in supervising Post Graduate Researchers in events, public space, and identities. I am also keen to support students researching diversity in all its forms, as well as those looking at accessible and sustainable events.

The doctoral project I most recently supervised, examined the application of the circular economy in waste management for toursim beach sites in Ghana.  

Dr Barbara Grabher

I am interested in supervising doctoral students in their research projects linking to the field of Critical Event Studies, urban/ regional regeneration, gender/equality/diversity, ecological sustainability as well as community and identity creation. Due to my thorough education and extensive experience of ethnographic fieldwork in event settings, my supervisory interest strongly grounds in this methodological approach. If you're interested in undertaking research that examines the above mentioned themes, please feel free to contact me. 

Dr Nigel Jarvis

I have successfully supervised a number of PhDs to completion, with candidates getting academic publications as part of their journey even before they defend their thesis.  I am interested in supervising research projects on gender and sexuality, the cruise sector, sport tourism, sport and event sponsorship, sport event legacies, the socio-cultural impacts of tourism and events, and leisure management.

Dr Adam Jones

I am interested in supervising PhD students interested in sustainability related to tourism, marketing, and corporate social responsibility. I am also interested in those wanting to research behaviour change, especially related to the environmental crisis. Recently completed research and publications include those concerning behaviour change and travel demand management, destination planning and management and information overload on the internet. I specifically welcome projects that adopt innovative qualitative methodological approaches to creating new knowledge.

I am supervising students researching tourism and the circular economy, monitoring and evaluation of tourism development, art and the tourism economy and behaviour change as a result of environmental exposure 

Dr Catherine Kelly

I welcome the opportunity to supervise PhD students with an interest in the areas of tourism and wellbeing, place and wellbeing, sustainability, nature-based tourism, coastal tourism, blue spaces, water and wellbeing, rural tourism, cultural/heritage tourism, national parks and biospheres.

Dr Rodrigo Lucena De Mello

I welcome students' research projects in the following areas: Consumer psychology and behaviour; Customer relationship marketing; Marketing for families; Gender and sexuality in marketing

For further supervisory staff including cross-disciplinary options, please visit research staff on our research website.