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I was surprised to read that my university, Nottingham Trent, "would look for less in the way of quantity of research output than would happen in old universities" ("Is an easy chair culture taking over campus?", December 17).

While this may be a generalisation about the university as a whole, it is certainly not the case for the School of Social Sciences. Our procedures are rigorous and require those going for chairs on the basis of their research to be internationally respected in their field. When I went for a chair a few years ago, I already had more than 100 refereed papers, 20 book chapters, two books and a number of international research prizes.

My research output in no way guaranteed a chair at the university and I was turned down at school level. Thankfully, I won an appeal and was awarded a chair in April 2002, but it does at least show that Nottingham Trent is not a soft touch when it comes to the awarding of professorships.

Mark Griffiths
Professor of gambling studies
Nottingham Trent University