As a tourism academic with a social science background, I have had an interest in meetings and conferences for some time now, but I have always felt I was pressured into rather economic, market research-type studies. I always felt my social science interests could give the research area an exciting added dimension, but I was not sure how to go about it.

I guess Maarten Vanneste was way ahead of me, and when I read his book, the pieces of the puzzle fell into place. Meeting content has to be a key research area co-existing with the more organisational and market research studies in the future if the field is ever to be taken seriously. The wealth of research areas and topics this offers is impressive, and to me, as a researcher, very exciting.