Prof. Francisco Dias

Francisco Dias held a PhD degree in Tourism Sciences from the University of Perpignan (France). He held a master's degree in Neuropsychology, from Moscow State University (Russia), and a master's degree in Social Psychology, at the University of Porto (Portugal). He is a full professor in the Leiria Polytechnic (Portugal). From 2010 to 2013, he was the director of GITUR - the Tourism Research Unit of the IPL. In 2010, he was the founder and the first editor-in-chief of the European Journal of Tourism, Hospitality, and Recreation (EJTHR) until 2015. He also was the founder and the first President of the EATSA – Euro-Asia Tourism Studies Association. His empirical studies cover a large scope of tourism, mostly its psychological and sociological aspects - imaginary, social representations, destination image, motivation, perceived quality – but also several aspects of destination management. Currently, he is a full member of CITUR – Centre for Research, Development, and Innovation in Tourism, where he has been the principal researcher of several research projects. Nowadays, he is the coordinator of two important projects: - OTSCP - Observatory of Sustainable Tourism of Centro de Portugal (https://smat.observatorio-tcp.pt/); OLIVE4ALL - Olive Heritage for Sustainable Development Aside from the academic world, for the last 16 years, he has been the Director of the ART&TUR - International Tourism Film Festival (https://tourfilm-festival.com/), which he created in 2008.