BU Research Blog

We tried to see how much value might be placed on our scholarly work – PhD work mainly – by those in industries that are linked closely to our subject. In this case that meant talking to people from advertising agencies and our investigations into consumer culture. A series of brief introductory talks each followed by a seminar based discussion led by one of the academic team took place following this format:
The commercial value of academic research: insightful processes and findings
Dr Janice Denegri-Knott PhD work – virtual consumption
Dr Rebecca Jenkins PhD work – consumer imagination
Dr Mike Molesworth PhD work – consumer play
Dr Richard Scullion PhD work – consumer choice
Dr Carrie Hodges – cultural impacts on consumption
Some fascinating insights emerged from the day and I share them in no particular order of importance here.
Industry people are just as likely to say they will turn up and then not do so as our students!
They are locked firmly in the now, in their own practices and many resist being challenged on this
Despite our efforts to ‘talk business language’ it still felt a little impenetrable to our audience ‘for the sake of being clever’
Seeing things in ‘Black and white’ is still very much valued, the complexity and nuances are acknowledged but they want us to iron them out not explain why we shouldn’t, can’t, or are in danger of missing the essence of the material by doing so
More ‘positively’ they sort of know they need to break out of the now mode and the counting mentality but narrow definitions of ROI is currently a major block
Want to know more check this out
http://eccg.wordpress.com/2012/03/01/event-eccg-the-ipa-london-making-commercial-sense-of-scholarly-research-about-consumer-culture/