Seminar Series
The Eric Friedheim Tourism Institute is proud to host academic and industry leaders, who provide their insights on major trends impacting the tourism industry. Below are just a few of the speakers and discussions that happened recently.
Sample Seminars
Jamie Murphy, PHD
Food (Waste) for Thought: A Wicked Problem
May 1, 2020 | 12:30 PM (EDT)
Join professor Jamie Murphy for a lively and intriguing presentation on something you encounter every day and which has massive negative environmental, social and economic costs.
Food waste, personally and in Tourism, Hospitality & Event Management, is a wicked problem that is beginning to surface with both industry and academia. Food wast takes on extra importance in the times of Coronavirus.
AAG Tourism ANalytics
Tourism Analytics: Social Media, Spatially Distributed Data and Data Mining in Tourism Research
Andrei Kirilenko, Yang Tang, Lijuan Su, Luyu Wang, and Shihan Ma
April 9, 2020 | 2:30 PM
This session was originally planned to happen at the Association of American Geographers (AAG) conference. Learn more about Tourism Analytics including: Spatial data analysis and visualization with GIS, Analysis of social media, Analysis of unstructured data: text analysis, analysis of photos and videos, Sentiment analysis, and People as sensors (digital traces, big data from sensory experiences, Google glasses and such) and more.
xiangyi dai, PHD
Beijing Capital University, Associate Professor
Heritage-led community transformation: strategy of local NGO in China
March 20, 2020 | 11:45 AM
Dr. Xiangyi Dai is a visiting scholar at UF and an associate professor in Capital Normal University, China. His research interest including heritage conservation, community participation and tourism planning. In his talk, he will share a story how a declining post-industrial community became a listed National Heritage site and a hot tourism destination. The strategies of a local NGO, which was the leading power in this process, were analyzed using participant observations and in-depth interviews with stakeholders.
Andrei kirilenko, phd
Department of Tourism, Hospitality & Event Management, University of Florida
Re-reading Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina helps analysis of tourists dissatisfaction
March 13, 2020 (Pictures)
Automated content analysis of online travel reviews allows identification of topics of travelers’ satisfaction and dissatisfaction, yet its domain is not well researched. We suggest that the Anna Karenina principle (TAK) positing a greater variability of the factors leading to a failure as opposed to those leading to the success can be applied to the domain of visitors’ reviews of historic and cultural sites and attractions. The larger variability of issues in reviews of dissatisfied visitors are likely to result in limitations for automated topic modeling. We confirm our proposition using TripAdvisor reviews of the Terracotta Army museum, China, Red Square, Moscow, Russia, and Chichen Itza, Mexico. We also report the main themes of satisfaction and dissatisfaction of visitors and provide practical implications for the attraction management.
Jinwon Kim, Phd
Department of Tourism, Hospitality & Event Management, University of Florida
Urban Sprawl and Physical Activity: A Macrolevel Approach
February 21, 2020 (Pictures)
Dr. Jinwon Kim shared his study on the effect of urban sprawl on physical activity which has been conducted on Florida’s 67 counties. The research analyzes whether urban sprawl is associated with physical activity and explores the spatially heterogeneous effects across the study area. Dr. Kim employed GIS-based mapping spatial regression analysis using GWR and the results indicate that the effects vary across types of physical activity and regions. Results of his research can assist community recreation policymakers to formulate a more efficient and effective community sport/recreation planning.
Bing Pan, phd
Department of Park, Recreation, and Tourism Management, Penn State University
Social Data Analytics
November 22, 2019 (Pictures)
On Friday, November 22th, the Eric Friedheim Tourism Institute hosted Dr. Bing Pan from Penn State University. He discussed his recent research on using tourism big data for forecasting tourist arrivals, identifying potential tourism markets, understanding social media biases in online reviews, and the recent development in smart tourism. He offered his views on the recent trend of over-tourism, the future challenges of this industry, and the strategies in addressing them.
till krenz, phd and jared adams
Bureau of Economic and Business Research, University of Florida
Context and Determinants of Cross-University Collaboration: Extracting and Analyzing Networks from Grant Acknowledgement Texts
November 8, 2019 (Pictures)
On Friday, November 8th, the Eric Friedheim Tourism Institute hosted Dr. Till Krenz and Jared Adams. They talked about their study in cross-university collaboration between research hubs in the health sector. Their findings can be applied in the tourism sector for better collaboration.
joseph st. germain, phd
President and Partner, Downs & St. Germain Research
Market Research of Industry
October 25, 2019 (Pictures)
On Friday, October 25th the Eric Friedheim Tourism Institute hosted the industry professional of our Fall 2019 Seminar Series, Dr. Joseph St. Germain. He shared with students his work conducting focus groups and surveys to develop marketing and strategic recommendations to their clients, which are mostly DMOs and other organizations in the tourism sector.
Heather Gibson, phd
Professor, Associate Director, EFTI
Thinking and Researching Qualitatively: Grounded Theory Method
October 18, 2019 (Pictures)
On Friday, October 18, Dr. Gibson and two of her PhD Students, Hongping Zhang and Yu Niu talked about the Grounded Theory Method and its three approaches for qualitative studies in the tourism and related fields. The trio presented examples of their own research studies applying the method.
Svetlana Stepchenkova, phd
Graduate Coordinator, EFTI
Operationalization of Authenticity Orientation: A New Concept
September 27, 2019
On Friday, September 27th the EFTI hosted its first seminar of the Fall 2019 series. Dr. Svetlana Stepchenkova kicked off the semester with a presentation about the impact of object-based authenticity in museums in the behavior of tourists.
Justin gressel, phd
Test & Learn Lead, Universal Orlando Resorts
Data and Analytics Analysis: An Industry Perspective
April 19, 2019 (Pictures)
On Friday, April 19th the Eric Friedheim Tourism Institute hosted its final Seminar Series for the Spring semester, and concluded the year with Justin Gressel, PhD, Channel Analytics Manger for Universal Orlando Resorts. The conversations began with more insight into Universal Orlando Resort’s use of data in management decision making.
Angelica Almeyda-Zambrano, PhD & Eben Broadbent, PhD
Assistant Professors, University of Florida
GatorEye and Drone LIDAR Analysis
March 29th, 2019 (Pictures)
Dr. Angelica Almeyda Zambrano is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Tourism, Recreation & Sport Management where she co-directs the Spatial Ecology and Conservation Lab. Dr. Almeyda Zambrano and her collaborator, and husband, Dr. Eben Broadbent did extensive field research across a variety of ecosystems during the summer. Locations included the Atlantic forest in Brazil, cloud forests in the Andes, the lowland Amazon, and Northern dry forests in Peru, tropical rain forests in Costa Rica, and ancient Mayan archaeological sites in Chiapas, Mexico.
Yang Yang, PhD
Assistant Professor, Temple University
Tourist Behavior Analysis using Online Review Data
March 15th, 2019 (Pictures)
Dr. Yang is currently an assistant professor of Tourism and Hospitality Management at Temple University. He received his Ph.D. in Geography, Master of Statistics, and M.A in Economics from University of Florida, as well as an M.Phil in Hotel and Tourism Management from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Dr. Yang’s major research interests lie in tourism demand analysis, big data analytics, as well as hotel financial and real estate analysis.
Brian Mills, phd
Assistant Professor, University of Florida
Tourist Tax Elasticity in Florida: Spatial Effects of County-Level Room Tax Rate Variation
Febraury 15th, 2019 (Pictures)
Brian Mills, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Tourism, Recreation and Sport Management at the University of Florida. His research interests encompass topics such as the sports labor market, industrial organization and sports league policy (demand, competitive balance, revenue sharing, etc.), public policy and economic development related to sport, and advanced analytics in the sports business. He is especially interested in applying economic lessons and quantitative analysis to problems that sport managers face in their everyday decision making.
Gary Daniels
VP, Digital Experience, Disney Parks & Resorts Digital
“What’s Next?” Trends and Potential Research Topics
November 16, 2018 (Pictures)
With 20 years’ experience at Disney, Gary Daniels (Vice President of Digital Experience) leads teams that create end-to-end, digital-plus-physical experiences for Disney Parks, Experiences and Consumer Products globally. Gary also serves as a member of the Walt Disney World Resort steering committee, leading digital efforts across Marketing, Sales, and Guest Experience. In this seminar, Gary discussed recent trends and how Disney Parks & Resorts is evaluating their strategy for the future.
Jamie Murphy, phD
Adjunct Professor & Research Fellow, University of Eastern Finland/University of Western Australia
The Quest to Research & Reduce Food Waste in Events, Hospitality, and Tourism
October 26, 2018 (Pictures)
On Friday, October 26th, Dr. Jamie Murphy Adjunct Professor and Research Fellow for the University of Eastern Finland and the University of Western Australia. Dr. Murphy has been focusing his research in the past couple of years on the importance of sustainable practices in the Tourism industry, doing research across the globe and learning what techniques are working and which techniques are falling short.
Fuad Mehraliyev
Visiting Scholar, University of Florida
Expert Power of Social Media Platforms
October 12, 2018 (Pictures)
Fuad Mehraliyev is a visiting scholar from Azerbaijan, where he received his bachelor’s degree in Tourism and Social Cultural Service from Baku State University in 2008. After his graduation from Umeå University in 2012, he returned to his home country and worked as a Lecturer for four years at Western University. In August 2016, Fuad was granted a fellowship from Hong Kong Research Grants Council for his PhD study at the School of Hotel & Tourism Management (SHTM) of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University and is expected to graduate in August 2019. His research interests are information communication technologies, social media power, and experimental design in tourism studies.
Thomas Hill
State Modeling Manager, Florida Department of Transportation
Tourist Season: Data, Models and Travel Demand
October 5, 2018 (Pictures)
Thomas Hill, State Modeling Manager for the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) spoke on Friday, October 5th to EFTI Faculty, Staff, and students about the importance of Tourism and Travel in Florida. Hill holds both his Undergraduate and Master’s degree in Urban Planning from Florida State University, and is currently working on updating the Florida Statewide Passenger and Freight Model which is in charge of monitoring the planning of freight routes and processes across the state of Florida.
