April 2023
This month’s reports summarises four articles that in/directly relate to the impact of universities. The first represents text mining of UK and Australian impact case studies (Zheng et al. 2021). The second study looked at papers and patents published over several decades, noting that disruptive innovation is declining (Park et al. 2023). The third paper examines the bad research culture in STEM and its adverse mental health implications (Limas et al., 2022). The last piece of research conducts an extensive literature review in relation to research on research impact (Viana-Lora & Nel-lo-Andreu, 2021).
[1]) This empirical study aimed to identify the impact types documented in over 6,800 case studies submitted to impact evaluation groups in Australia and the UK. Text mining revealed three emerging impact types not hitherto encapsulated by existing frameworks, including "recognition of new opportunities," "length of use," and "experience improvement." They argue that the impact framework they are using offers a starting point for quickly determining suitable types of impact before delving into specific metrics. They claim that the extended framework can also serve as a basis for developing a more balanced evaluation of impacts, promoting research that serves the needs of science as well as society, and multidisciplinary collaboration.
[2]) The paper analyses six decades of data on 45 million papers and 3.9 million patents to examine whether scientific and technological progress is slowing down, despite the exponential growth of knowledge. Using a new metric called the CD index, which measures the degree to which papers and patents break with past knowledge, the authors find that disruption is decreasing across all fields. This decline is not due to changes in the quality of published science, citation practices, or field-specific factors, but rather reflects a narrowing in the use of previous knowledge. The authors suggest that to promote disruptive science and technology, scholars should read widely and be given time to keep up with the rapidly expanding knowledge frontier. Universities should focus on research quality, and federal agencies should invest in longer-term individual awards to support scholars' careers.
[3]) The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted mental health struggles in the STEM academic community. Mental health interventions often focus on individuals rather than improving the research environment. In this paper, four aspects of research that heavily impact mental health are identified: bullying and harassment, precarity of contracts, diversity, inclusion, and accessibility, and the competitive research landscape. The recommendations to improve the mental health of researchers include leading with data, avoiding minimizing experiences, training both principal investigators and students, diversifying diversity initiatives, ensuring visible reporting routes, encouraging conversation, putting diversity and inclusion at the core, providing mentorship and sponsorship, investing in people, rewarding collaboration over competition, highlighting existing resources, and promoting work-life balance. These recommendations are a useful starting point for institutions, course leaders, and students trying to drive change through grassroots efforts.
[4]) This study is a systematic literature review of the social impact of research. It aims to highlight the factors that enable research to generate social benefits, describe the tools and methods used to measure social impact, specify the limitations that researchers and reviewers encounter when measuring social impact and identify research gaps. The article identifies the problems encountered in assessing the social impact of research, including the lack of a standardized framework, criticism of the indicators used and the difficulty of measuring social impact through quantitative indicators. Social Sciences and Humanities stand out as the area with the highest scientific production, and researchers have a moral obligation to demonstrate the social value of their research. The study suggests developing qualitative methodologies to measure the social impact of research and a joint social and scientific impact framework.
[1] Zheng, H., Pee, L. G., & Zhang, D. (2021). Societal impact of research: a text mining study of impact types. Scientometrics, 126, 7397-7417.
[2] Park, M., Leahey, E., & Funk, R. J. (2023). Papers and patents are becoming less disruptive over time. Nature, 613(7942), 138-144.
[3] Limas, J. C., Corcoran, L. C., Baker, A. N., Cartaya, A. E., & Ayres, Z. J. (2022). The impact of research culture on mental health & diversity in STEM. Chemistry–A European Journal, 28(9), e202102957.
[4] Viana-Lora, A., & Nel-lo-Andreu, M. G. (2021). Approaching the social impact of research through a literature review. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 20, 1609
