Phd Candidate

**Date**:18 Apr 2025

**Location**: Esch-sur-Alzette, LU, L-4366

**Company**:LISER

**The Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER)**

**is recruiting a**

**Thesis title**:
**Socio-Spatial Differences in People’s Experiences and Their Attachment**
**to Mobility Cultures: A Cross-border Approach**
- **Ref**:25-20**:

- **3 years (36 months) fixed-term employment contract at LISER**:

- **Full-time, 40 hours/week**:

- **Department: Urban development and Mobility (UDM)**:

- **Work location: Belval (Luxembourg)**:

- **Expected start date : between September 1st, 2025 and November 1st, 2025**:

- **Deadline**:15th of June 2025 at midnight CET**

TRANSFORM Project (“_Urban Mobility Cultures in Transition: Socio-spatial implications of transformative practices_”) is a Doctoral Network funded by Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (Horizon Europe Programme). TRANSFORM investigates the efficacy of transformative practices as mechanisms for initiating and consolidating transitions in urban mobility cultures, and analyses the resulting socio-spatial effects.

**About the project TRANSFORM**:
**Your role**:
**Objectives**:

- To develop a conceptual framework able to link ‘accessibility biographies’ to mobility cultures attachment ;
- To analyse how people with different levels of attachments and accessibility biographies experience and perform public space in cross-border places by using sensor-based measurements (including GPS, sound recordings and physiological sensors) ;
- To understand the willingness to change mobility behaviours based on the accessibility biographies and attachment concepts in order to achieve sustainable transitions in mobility.

**Expected Results**:

- Developing the conceptual framework linking accessibility biographies and mobility cultures attachment ;
- Application of novel methodologies dealing with big data (e.g. GPS and other sensors) for assessing people’s mobility experiences in public space ;
- A database of 800 participants (including Belgium, Luxembourg, France and Germany) with innovative measurements of momentary experiences in public space, attachment (to mobility cultures and places) and willingness to change travel behaviour.

**Duties**:

- Complete a research proposal, containing research objectives, description of research, methodology, proposed completion timeframe and originality of contribution ;
- Participate in network-wide training events in the course of the project and complete any additional training required to successfully carry out the research proposal ;
- Develop materials for TRANSFORM reporting and personal training requirements (e.g., personal career development plan; annual summaries of research findings) ;
- Prepare and disseminate research findings, in academic journals and for relevant stakeholders ;
- Prepare a manuscript for submission as a PhD thesis in accordance with the regulations of the University of Luxembourg.

Three secondments are foreseen within the framework of this position, and each one with a duration of approx. 2-3 months: (i) Goethe University Frankfurt-am-Main GUF (Germany), (ii) Technical University of Denmark DTU (Denmark), (iii) Network Sustainable Mobility NDM (Belgium). The main purpose of the secondments are field visits, to prepare the conceptual framework, to analyse the relationships between activity patterns and types of place attachment to propose ways of improving modal changes in different mobility culture contexts and to evaluate the usefulness of accessibility biographies in participatory planning approaches.

**Your profile**:

- Master’s degree in Quantitative Geography / Psychology / Sociology / Health or Epidemiology / Transport or Civil engineering / Data Science / Urban Planning / or other relevant quantitative field ;
- Excellent knowledge and experience in regression analyses (SEM, multi-level, discrete choice behavior modeling ) based on statistical software (R, STATA or SAS) ;
- Excellent skills in GIS, Python is an asset ;
- Excellent communication and collaboration skills ;
- Excellent veral communication and academic writing skills in English, any other language such as French, German, or Luxembourgish is considered as an asset ;
- Enthusiasm for research, critical thinking and working in an interdisciplinary and diverse team.

**What we offer**:

- A dynamic and international research environment with attractive working conditions and a stimulating work environment ;
- Flexibility in the organisation of the working hours and the possibility of teleworking ;
- Competitive remuneration according to the Collective Labour Agreement in force ;
- Investment in career support and development (trainings, seminars, participation to international meetings and conferences);
- 32.5 days of annual leave for a full-time contract.

**How to apply**:

- Curriculum vitae ;
- Motivation letter ;
- Recent piece of research/reporting ;
- Copy of your Master diploma and transcripts;

**Why LISER?**:
LISER is a