Professor Stephane Hess

Professor Stephane Hess

Profile

Current positions

  • 05/2014 - present: Director of the Choice Modelling Centre (CMC), University of Leeds
  • 10/2012 - present: Professor of Choice Modelling, Institute for Transport Studies, University of Leeds
  • 05/2011 - present: Honorary Professor in Choice Modelling, Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies, University of Sydney
  • 11/2018 - present: Honorary Professor of modelling behaviour in Africa, University of Cape Town
  • 05/2014 - present: Director, RSG inc,

Past positions

  • 04/2014 - 04/2017: Affiliated Professor in Demand Analysis, KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm
  • 03/2010 - 10/2012: Reader in Choice Modelling, Institute for Transport Studies, University of Leeds
  • 05/2008 – 03/2010: Principal Research Fellow, Institute for Transport Studies, University of Leeds
  • 12/2006 – 12/2007: Research Fellow, Centre for Transport Studies, Imperial College London
  • 01/2006 – 12/2007: Senior Researcher, Institute for Traffic Planning and Transport Systems, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH)

Professional Engagements 

  • Editor-in-chief (founding) of the Journal of Choice Modelling
  • Founding chair of the International Choice Modelling Conference series
  • Member of the Editorial Advisory Board (EBA) of Transportation Research B
  • Member of the Editorial Advisory Board (EBA) of Transportation
  • Member of the Transportation Demand Forecasting committee, TRB
  • Member of the Travel Behaviour and Values committee, TRB

Awards, prizes & fellowships

  • January 2014, Outstanding Young Member of the Transportation Research Board (TRB), For exceptional achievements in transportation research, policy, or practice and service to TRB, Transportation Research Board of North America
  • October 2010: Fred Burggraf Award for excellence in transportation research by researchers 35 years of age or younger (with James Fox), Transportation Research Board
  • October 2008: Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship, Leverhulme Trust
  • August 2006: Eric Pas prize for the best PhD thesis in the field of Travel Behaviour Research, International Association for Travel Behaviour Research

Stephane's area of work is the analysis of human decision using advanced discrete choice models. He is active in the fields of transport, health and environmental economics, and has made contributions to the state of the art in the specification, estimation and interpretation of such models, notably in a valuation of travel time context, where has led the modelling on the most recent UK and German national studies, as well as the reestimation of the Swiss study.

He has published widely (over 70 peer reviewed journal papers in the last 10 years) and has been involved as a principal or co-investigator in academic projects with a combined income generation of over £8.5M.

In his current work, he is looking at bridging the gap between behavioural science and mathematical modelling of human decision making.

His contributions have been recognised for example by the 2014 Outstanding Young Member of the Transportation Research Board (TRB) award for exceptional achievements in transportation research, policy, the 2010 Fred Burggraf award handed out by the Transportation Research Board, the 2005 Eric Pas award for the best PhD thesis in the area of travel behaviour modelling, and the 2004 Neil Mansfield award handed out by the Association for European Transport.

He is also the founding editor in chief of the Journal of Choice Modelling and the founder and steering committee chair of the International Choice Modelling Conference.

Teaching in Leeds

TRAN5282: Masters module on 'Choice modelling and stated preference survey design'

Teaching outside of Leeds

Taught on courses on choice modelling and survey design at Imperial College London, ETH Zurich, Tainan University and the University of Cape Town as well as a large number of commercial courses.

Responsibilities

  • Director of the Choice Modelling Centre

Research interests

  • Advanced discrete choice models
  • Data for choice modelling
  • Heterogeneity in preferences
  • Travel behaviour research
<h4>Research projects</h4> <p>Any research projects I'm currently working on will be listed below. Our list of all <a href="https://environment.leeds.ac.uk/dir/research-projects">research projects</a> allows you to view and search the full list of projects in the faculty.</p>

Qualifications

  • PhD “Advanced discrete choice models with applications to transport demand”, Imperial College London
  • MPhil, Statistical Science, University of Cambridge

Research groups and institutes

  • Choice Modelling

Current postgraduate researchers

<h4>Postgraduate research opportunities</h4> <p>We welcome enquiries from motivated and qualified applicants from all around the world who are interested in PhD study. Our <a href="https://phd.leeds.ac.uk">research opportunities</a> allow you to search for projects and scholarships.</p>
Projects
    <li><a href="//phd.leeds.ac.uk/project/1644-developing-new-behavioural-models-at-the-intersection-of-econometrics-and-machine-learning">Developing new behavioural models at the intersection of econometrics and machine learning</a></li> <li><a href="//phd.leeds.ac.uk/project/1643-developing-new-behavioural-models-at-the-intersection-of-psychology-and-econometrics">Developing new behavioural models at the intersection of psychology and econometrics</a></li>