The Impacts of Academic Events
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
THE IMPACTS OF ACADEMIC EVENTS CYCLES OF CREDIBILITY AS AN ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK by Thomas Trøst Hansen Dissertation submitted Thesis submitted: xxxxxxxxx PhD supervisor: Prof. David Budtz Pedersen, Aalborg University Assistant PhD supervisor: Associate Prof. Carina Ren, Aalborg University Director of Convention, Kit Lykketoft, Wonderful Copenhagen PhD committee: Prof. Margaret Deery, University of Technology Sydney Senior researcher Mads P. Sørensen, Aarhus University Prof. Christian Jantzen, Aalborg University PhD Series: Faculty of Humanities, Aalborg University ISSN: xxxx- xxxx ISBN: xxx-xx-xxxx-xxx-x Published by: Aalborg University Press Skjernvej 4A, 2nd floor DK – 9220 Aalborg Ø Phone: +45 99407140 [email protected] forlag.aau.dk © Copyright by author Printed in Denmark by Rosendahls, 2020 CV Thomas Trøst Hansen Website: http://personprofil.aau.dk/138810 LinkedIn: https://dk.linkedin.com/in/thomas-tr%C3%B8st-hansen-3216751 EDUCATION 2010 BA & MSc Political Science, University of Copenhagen. 2008 MA Ideology and Discourse Analysis, University of Essex EMPLOYMENT HISTORY 2020 – Science Attaché & Consul, Innovation Centre Denmark – Shanghai, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Denmark 2016-2019 Industrial PhD Fellow, Wonderful Copenhagen & Humanomics Research Centre, Aalborg University Copenhagen. 2015 – 2016 Senior Advisor, Danish National Research Foundation. 2010 – 2015 Special Advisor, Danish Ministry for Higher Education & Science. 2012 – 2014 Head of Media and Marketing, EuroScience Open Forum 2014. ACADEMIC ACTIVITIES Hansen, T. T., & Pedersen, D. B. (2018). The impact of academic events: A literature review. Research Evaluation, 27(4), 358 – 366. Hansen, T. T., Foley, C. & Pedersen, D. B. (2020). An empirically-grounded typology of academic events. Event Management, 24(4) Hansen, T. T., & Ren, C. (2020). Chairs of academic events: the investments and academic impact. Science and Public Policy, scaa007 Conference proceedings at CAUTHE 2018: (s. 858-863). University of Newcastle & ATLAS Annual Conference 2018: Destination Dynamics: Book of Abstracts (s. 138- 140) & Summer School (2018): Science and Politics at FIW, University of Bonn Guest lecturer & external examiner: University of Copenhagen & Aarhus University DISSEMINATION ACTIVITIES Presentations at meetings industry events: IMEX 2018 – Legacy, Frankfurt, ECM 2018 – Make Tourism Matter, Malmö, Tomorrows Urban Travel 2018, Copenhagen Stakeholder presentations: Aalborg University, Board of Deans, Aarhus University Research and Innovation Committee, University of Copenhagen KU Research and Innovation Committee, Inspiring Denmark Ambassador Network Commentary: Forskningspolitik 2018 (2) & Videnskab.dk, Forskerzonen 2017, (8) 3 THE IMPACTS OF ACADEMIC EVENTS ENGLISH SUMMARY This PhD dissertation explores the impact of academic events such as congresses, conferences, symposia, and meetings. More specifically, the focus is on the academic impact for individual attendees and chairs. The project is funded as part of the Danish Industrial PhD Program in collaboration with Wonderful Copenhagen and VisitAarhus, taking aim at the global debate on the evaluation of the meetings industry. Traditionally, the meetings industry has been evaluated based on the direct tourism value, that is, the direct financial investments in an event and the expected daily expenditure by delegates. However, several actors from the meetings industry, public authorities, and the university sector have pointed out that the meetings industry probably generates greater impact as a platform for knowledge exchange, scientific networking, and research dissemination activities. This extended impact is discussed under several headings, such as “beyond tourism benefits,” “legacy,” and “intangible impact.” The PhD dissertation contributes with analyses and new perspectives in relation to the meetings industry's impact on scientific knowledge production. The research project is focused on academic events, which is a choice motivated by both commercial considerations as well as a historical and science policy analysis, which concludes that academic events are one of the pillars on which modern science is based but, nevertheless, is not included in the research policy toolkit. The literature review of the dissertation reveals that a wide range of studies have investigated how academic events have an impact on society and the academic sector. The review identifies 13 sub-categories of impact. Moreover, it is concluded that the literature is fragmented and does not investigate academic events as an independent topic. Furthermore, the impact is not investigated within conceptual frameworks, as the literature comes from a very wide range of disciplines, each examining a specific event of importance for their discipline. The dissertation draws on science studies and event studies for the development of a framework to investigate the individual academic impact of participation and chairmanships of academic events. With this framework, academic impact is conceptualized as a continuous exchange of various forms of credibility. The framework not only takes into account the output for the individual researcher but focuses on the types of credibility that are invested in the academic event. Furthermore, an analytical framework is developed to distinguish between types of academic events. Enriched by qualitative interviews, four dimensions are identified through which academic events differ: size, academic focus, participants, and tradition. Based on the dimensions and interviews, four types of academic events are identified; congress, specialty conference, symposium, and practitioners’ meeting. How attendees exchange credibility is investigated based on the four types of 4 academic events. The most important exchanges involve recognition and networking. Significant differences are identified in relation to the researchers’ career stage. In the subsequent analysis of the dissertation, chairs of academic events are studied based on qualitative interviews. The chairmanship is described as a multifaceted investment that also includes investment in non-academic forms of credibility. The investment in the chairmanship gives the chair access to networks, buzz, and recognition as well as a range of other exchanges of credibility. Taken together, the dissertation contributes to establishing academic events as a research topic as well as setting a direction for future research on the topic. The dissertation contributes to research in science studies and event studies by establishing academic events as a special category with four specific types of events as well as by developing an analytical framework to investigate academic impact. In relation to science studies, the contribution is more specifically an analysis of how non-academic exchanges are included in the exchange of credibility. Specific contributions are also made to event studies by exemplifying how interdisciplinary research projects are a fruitful path when investigating the non-direct tourism value of the meetings industry. Finally, the dissertation contributes to a discussion of the implications for the meetings industry and the academic sector. For the former, the implication should be the development of partnerships with the academic sector. For the latter, academic events ought to be considered for the research policy toolkit. 5 DANSK RESUME I denne ph.d.-afhandling undersøger jeg værdiskabelsen ved akademiske events, som for eksempel kongresser, konferencer, symposier og møder, herunder særligt værdien for individuelle deltagere og værter. ErhvervsPhD-projektet skriver sig ind i en global diskussion om evaluering af mødeindustriens værdiskabelse. Traditionelt er den globale mødeindustris værdiskabelse dokumenteret gennem den såkaldte turistøkonomiske effekt, hvilket udregnes med udgangspunkt i investeringer i begivenheden samt forventet døgnforbrug ganget med antallet af overnattende delegerede. Imidlertid har en række aktører fra mødeindustrien, offentlige myndigheder og forskere påpeget, at mødeindustrien formentlig i endnu højere grad skaber værdi som en platform for videns- og erfaringsudveksling, netværksdannelse og formidlingsaktiviteter. Denne værdiskabelse diskuteres under en række overskrifter, deriblandt beyond tourism benefits, legacy og intangibles. Ph.d.- afhandling bidrager med analyser og nye perspektiver i forhold til mødeindustriens ikke-turistøkonomiske værdiskabelse. Projektets fokus på akademiske events er motiveret af kommercielle hensyn og en historisk og forskningspolitisk analyse, der konkluderer at akademiske events er en af søjlerne, som moderne videnskab bygger på, men på trods af dette, ikke er en del af den forskningspolitiske værktøjskasse. I afhandlingens litteraturstudie afdækkes, at en bred vifte af studier har undersøgt hvordan akademiske events, har indvirkning (impact) på både samfundet og den akademiske sektor. Der identificeres 13 forskellige sub-kategorier af indvirkning. Litteraturen er dog i altovervejende grad fragmenteret og kendetegnet ved ikke at behandle akademiske events som et selvstændigt tema. Desuden undersøges indvirkningen ikke inden for konceptuelle rammer. Det skyldes bl.a. at litteraturen stammer fra en meget bred palet af discipliner, der hver uafhængigt af hinanden undersøger ét særligt møde inden for sin egen disciplin. Med udgangspunkt i den manglende konceptuelle ramme, trækkes der i ph.d.- afhandlingen på eksisterende forskning inden for henholdsvis videnskabsstudier og event studier, hvilket bidrager