The societal impact of tourism research of the Research Excellence Framework 2021

The aim of this article is to analyse the REF 2021 impact cases on tourism that show evidence of societal impact. The method used is a content analysis. The REF 2021 database was used to download the case studies of tourism with societal impact through the application of search filters. A filtering process was carried out in which each of the downloaded case studies was read, excluding impact cases not related to the thematic area. From this screening process, 12 case studies were selected. The results of the analysis identified potential pathways for generating societal impact and highlighted sources of corroborating societal impact. The identification of these pathways is important, as future research can use this information to plan their research and design the potential societal impact. In addition, establishing the sources for corroborating impact avoids problems identified in societal impact assessment such as attribution or causality.