Canterbury Christ Church University

Graduate Student, Media

Ph.D Research Student

About

Laura Doherty is a full time PhD student in the Department of Media. She completed her undergraduate BA Media and Cultural Studies with Business Studies at Canterbury Christ Church University in 2009. In 2010 she was awarded a 3 year scholarship by CCCU to study for her PhD, and is supervised by Dr Shane Blackman and Professor Linden West.


Laura’s PhD research is concerning young people and alcohol within a London borough community. Her approach to this research is ethnographic, whereby she is immersing herself in the drinking cultures of young people in the community. She is particularly interested in the attitudes and behaviours that influence the consumption patterns of young people. In addition, she is also exploring the role of the community, and whether or not this impacts young people's drinking cultures. Furthermore, she also wishes to understand more about the perceptions that the local community has of youth and alcohol.

Laura's PhD research is concerned with exploring more specifically: underage drinking cultures, drinking in the night-time economy, drinking spaces and places, drinking subcultures, alcohol education in secondary school curriculum, the influence and perceptions of the local community/ authorities/services, and the influence of national policies and media representations at a local level.


During her undergraduate degree, Laura has completed modules relating to: media and cultural theory, quantitative and qualitative research methods, popular music and popular culture, youth studies, theoretical approaches to comedy, and critical studies into news media. Her final year dissertation was regarding student drinking cultures at a South-East England University.

Laura is passionate about young people in the community, and she also works on behalf of a volunteer centre as a mentor to support young people who are experiencing multiple social disadvantages.