Current Research Students

Adrian Smyth

PhD Research Student

Adrian Smyth

Understanding the digital lives of older people: contexts, encounters, practices

Research Supervisor: Professor Brian O'Neill

Adrian Smyth is a part-time postgraduate student on the PhD programme in the TU Dublin School of Media where he is completing a study of the digital lives of older people in Ireland.

Adrian graduated from DIT with an MA in Media Studies and he holds a BSc degree in Social Sciences and Politics and a Diploma in Sociology from the Open University. Adrian is an Assistant Principle II at Dun Laoghaire Further Education Institute, where he teaches QQI levels 5 & 6 modules in Radio Programme Production, Media Industry Awareness, Multimedia Sound, and Political Studies - he is the author of the QQI Level 6 module Radio Documentary Production.

Adrian has worked as a manager and broadcaster in the commercial radio sector in Ireland and as a radio documentary maker for the Irish national broadcaster, RTÉ.

Publications

Smyth, A (2016) The News Lives of 80 Year Olds, DCU Institute of Future Media, Democracy and Society. Available at: https://fujomedia.eu/news-lives-80-year-olds

Smyth, A (2016) Media Literacy: Rewind/Fast Forward, DCU Institute of Future Media, Democracy and Society. Available at: https://fujomedia.eu/media-literacy-rewindfast-forward

Smyth, A, (2017), Denis McQuail: a Personal Appraisal, DCU Institute of Future Media, Democracy and Society. Available at: https://fujomedia.eu/denis-mcquail-personal-appraisal

Smyth, A (2018) The Digital Lives of Older Irish People: Contexts and Methods of Enquiry, NPPSH Reflections 2, NUI Maynooth, ISSN 2565-6031. Available at: https://mural.maynoothuniversity.ie/10835/1/Adrian%20Smyth%2C%20The%20Digital%20Lives%20of%20Older%20Irish%20People.pdf

Smyth, A (2018) All Aboard? Seniors and Their Media, Irish Communications Review, Technological University Dublin. Available at: https://arrow.tudublin.ie/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1155&context=icr

Conference Presentations

Smyth, A (2019) Out in the field: a personal reflection on the diary method as a means of data collection. The challenges and opportunities of the diary method in the study The Digital Lives of Older People: the Challenges and Opportunities of their Digital Worlds. Presentation to the Sociology Association of Ireland Postgraduate Conference 23 September 2019, Technological University Dublin.

Smyth, A (2019) ‘Actor-Network Theory’ as an epistemological ‘thought-disruptor’ in the study The Digital Lives of Older People: The Challenges and Opportunities of their Digital Worlds. Presentation to ECREA Midterm Conference “Datafication, Mediatization, and the Machine Age”, 2 November 2019, University of Bonn, Germany.