[7] Hughes' research interests include problematised consumption; drugs, addiction and health; emotions, work and identity; figurational sociology and sociological theory; methods and methodology; moral panics; regulation, and more recently, e-cigarettes and vaping, temporality and futures.
[8][9] He completed, together with Eric Dunning, a study of the work of Norbert Elias entitled Norbert Elias and Modern Sociology: Knowledge, Interdependence, Power, Process.
[10][11] And together with Ruth Simpson and Natasha Slutskaya he wrote Gender, Class and Occupation.
[12] He has also published a number of edited books, including Visual Methods[13] and Internet Research[14] and co-edited books, including, together with Kahryn Hughes, John Goodwin and Jerry Coulton Contemporary Approaches to Ethnographic Research;[15] together with John Goodwin, Documentary and Archival Research[16] together with Chas Critcher, Julian Petley and Amanda Rohloff, Moral Panics in the Contemporary World;[17] and, together with Nick Jewson and Lorna Unwin, Communities of Practice: Critical Perspectives.
[18][19] Hughes has published articles, chapters and papers relating to his research interests.