Karen Hughes

Karen’s research interests include interpretation and environmental education, wildlife tourism, heritage tourism, visitor behavior and sustainable tourism. Her recent projects include designing and evaluating interpretive signs at the Chengdu Panda Research Base in China, exploring the travel patterns of Chinese students, and evaluating and designing interpretive materials for Canterbury Cathedral in the UK. Her PhD focused on designing and evaluating the impact of interpretive resources on families’ adoption of environmental behaviors following a visit to Mon Repos turtle rookery. Karen has over 20 years of tourism research experience, and has also been a lecturer and researcher at James Cook University, Charles Darwin University and Queensland University of Technology. Karen holds a Bachelors of Arts (Honors) and Master of Arts from James Cook University, Graduate Diploma in Further Education and Training from USQ and PhD from the University of Queensland.