459 research outputs found

    Science in an age of globalisation : the geography of research collaboration and its effect on scientific publishing

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    Although scientific knowledge is considered by many a universal and context-free product, its producers are often embedded in geographically bounded networks of research collaboration. However, in an age of globalisation these local networks of knowledge production are challenged by pressures to make science more efficient and to align its priorities with problems of global relevance such as climate change and worldwide epidemics. Against this background, the dissertation sets out to examine changes in the contemporary geography of research collaboration and explores how these changes affect the publication of research findings in scientific journals. The dissertation starts with introducing a framework to understand how geographical space structures research collaboration among researchers. The two structuring principles in this framework are a logic of proximity that provides solutions for coordination problems in research practice, and a logic of stratification that provides researchers with differential means to engage in collaborations. The logic of proximity mainly follows from the importance of physical co-presence both for carrying out the complex tasks associated with scientific research and for establishing trust in research results. The logic of stratification is an outcome of the reward system in science which provides differential credit to researchers on the base of their past productivity. Globalisation affects these logics through technological advancements in ICTs and mobility, and through the harmonisation of research policies and practices across territories. It is hypothesised in this dissertation that these changes have implications for geographical patterns of research collaboration, and also for the way research findings are communicated in scientific publications. The empirical validation of this framework centers around two main themes that very much bear the imprint of globalisation in science. The first theme concerns the research policies of the European Union that are focused on the harmonisation of regional and national institutions in Europe in order to create an integrated ‘European Research Area’ (ERA) which should make the European research system more efficient and competitive. The Framework Programmes are explicitly designed to facilitate this integration process and in doing so they fund thousands of transnational research projects making it the largest transnational funding scheme in the world. Against this background, Chapter 2 evaluates the extent to which European research collaboration networks are already spatially integrated based on publication and patent data with multiple addresses. The results indicate that research collaborations in Europe are structured by geographical proximities as the choice for collaboration partners is impeded both by the kilometric distance between researchers and by national borders separating them. The chapter also presents some evidence that research collaboration networks are stratified on the base of similarity in productivity and access to resources. This logic of stratification operates irrespective of the location of researchers vis-à-vis each other. The main conclusion that follows from this analysis is that the present efforts towards the creation of ERA are well justified. The empirical study in Chapter 3 develops a dynamic approach to the geography of research collaboration by studying whether the logic of proximity is changing over time. The main argument of this chapter holds that one should make a conceptual distinction between a possible changing effect of geographical distance and a possible changing effect of territorial borders when studying proximity dynamics in research collaboration networks. When making such a distinction in the context of the European research system, the chapter shows that it is primarily the importance of regional and national borders that is decreasing over time, but that the role of geographical proximity in structuring research collaborations is remarkably stable. The findings indicate that globalisation in science is mainly realised through the harmonisation of territorial institutions, but that physical co-presence remains an important coordination device for exchanging complex forms of knowledge that cannot be easily communicated over large distances. The objective of Chapter 4 is to study to what extent the Framework Programmes (FPs), as the main funding instrument of the European Commission, are affecting the geography of European research collaboration. It is hypothesised that, in case the FPs indeed render territorial borders less important, they are likely to create (new) stratified networks of research collaboration that disproportionally consists of high-performance researchers located in Europe’s core regions. Contrary to the expectation no evidence for this hypothesis is found. The presented analysis indicates that the FPs indeed have a substantial effect on promoting international scientific collaboration networks which are still relatively uncommon in comparison to national collaboration networks. However, it is also shown that acquisition of FP funding is rather equally distributed over Europe and that the FPs are more effective in establishing ties between poorly connected researchers than in further strengthening existing ones. When stimulating already existing networks the FPs run the risk of being a substitute for other funding sources. This implies that current EU research policy is in line with the cohesion objective of the European Union. The second theme of this dissertation concerns the global standardization of medical experiments on human subjects. In recent years, proponents of an evidence-based medicine have pushed for standards concerning the conduct of clinical trials and subsequent publication of research findings in clinical trial registers and scientific publications. This standardization process is closely linked to an increase in the number and size of clinical trials that involve scientific researchers and patients from across the globe. The empirical chapters address whether this standardization process has an effect on several aspects of scientific publishing including the constitution of authorship on publications, the communication of evidence after study completion, and the presence of error in scientific publications. In order to analyse these questions, a database is created that links information on registered clinical trial projects (www.clinicaltrials.gov) to scientific publications of the main findings after study completion. Chapter 5 focuses in this respect on the standardization of good clinical practice (ICH-GCP) which has made the exchange of clinical data between geographically dispersed research sites less complicated. This has resulted in a process of global outsourcing with increasing enrolment of patients from emerging economies, especially in Central and Eastern Europe, Latin America and Asia. The chapter describes this globalisation tendency and studies whether worldwide patient involvement in clinical trials is reflected in the geographical composition of scientific management teams in those trials. The chapter develops an empirical strategy to determine the geographical distribution of management teams by using authorship data from publications reporting on primary outcomes. On the basis of this data it is shown that, given patient involvement, authorships are disproportionally granted to researchers in a few leading countries. The chapter discusses possible adverse consequences of this situation especially concerning the monitoring of clinical trial quality and (the lack of) interactions between researchers that are in immediate contact with patients and researchers that design trials and interpret their results. Chapter 6 concentrates on the publication behaviour of pharmaceutical companies who are well known for their strategy to withhold negative research findings from the scientific literature. To remedy this situation several authorities have recently mandated both registration of clinical trials before study onset and publication of major research findings after study completion. The main question holds under what conditions pharmaceutical companies decide to publish their clinical trial findings either in scientific journals or on the web. The main hypothesis is that under the new institutional context pharmaceutical companies will continue to highlight positive results in the scientific literature as it provides them with certification that their research findings are scientifically sound, methodologically rigourous and thus credible. Negative results, by contrast, are expected to be published on the web. This hypothesis is tested against a sample of clinical trials that assess the efficacy of glucose lowering agents in diabetes patients. The results indicate that firms continue to highlight positive results in scientific journals which results in an ongoing and persistent bias of evidence in the literature. Finally, Chapter 7 studies the production and detection of error in scientific publications on the basis of published errata and retractions. It is derived from earlier chapters that geographical proximity remains an important coordination device in research practice. This begs the question whether researchers operating in geographically dispersed research projects are also more likely to produce error because effective peer-control may be lacking and the establishment of mutual understanding hindered. The chapter addresses this question by making a conceptual distinction between modes of coordination that influence error production, and the prestige of research findings that influences error detection. With respect to prestige of research the chapter shows that editorial policies of scientific journals may actively steer the process of error detection by organising impact around particular findings and by enforcing strict publication guidelines. After controlling for these factors the analysis finds that geographically distributed research results in less accurate scientific publication. Globalisation tendencies thus put increasing responsibility on the publication system to correct errors in publications. Based on the findings of the empirical chapters, the overall conclusion of the dissertation is three-fold. The first conclusion holds that changes in the contemporary geography of research collaboration are mainly visible in institutional harmonisation across territories, rather than in a tendency towards a ‘death of distance’ per se. This paradoxical process provides new prospects for worldwide research collaborations, but limits at the same time the possibilities to make these prospects work in actual research practice. Second, the presented analysis indicates that in an age of globalisation, science does not become a global level playing field where chances of success level off. Rather, stratified structures are reproduced at different spatial scales via the creation of new reward systems and global research collaboration network that exhibit high entry barriers. Third, globalised science reveals new publication practices that concern authorship norms, the prevalence and correction of error in scientific publications and the conditions under which disclosure of research findings takes place. In this respect, new global contexts have often been cited as contributors to the quality, impact and practical application of research findings. The results presented here do not support the argument and at least point to some potential side-effects of geographically distributed research. These effects require a rethinking of science’s institutions in light of globalisation

    The microfoundations of university-industry interactions

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    In the last three decades universities have experienced major changes, which have affected both their research objectives and their sources of funding. Universities are increasingly asked to contribute to economic growth by increasing their commercialization and technology transfer efforts. The relationship between university and industry has attracted a great deal of interest because of both the opportunities that can be generated by collaboration and the controversy surrounding universities‘ commercial activities. Previous research has analysed in depth these issue at the level of institutions and universities. Collaborating with industry, however, constitute discretionary behaviour for academics: while literature has examined the role of individual characteristics such as demographics and productivity, aspects related to psychological traits, perceptions and social influence are poorly understood. To address this gap, I employ an interdisciplinary approach to investigate the drivers of university-industry interactions at the level of the individuals. The analysis draws upon data on the characteristics and activities of a sample of academic scientists in different scientific disciplines in Italy and in the UK. The datasets integrate information collected through surveys, as well as data on scientists, department and universities gathered through several secondary sources. Results show that researchers‘ evaluation of potential benefits and costs of collaboration with industry are a major driver of academic engagement. Moreover, this thesis highlights the crucial role of scientists‘ personality in determining academic engagement and entrepreneurship, while putting back into perspective the role of organizational support mechanisms. The role of the academics‘ immediate social context is also assessed, showing that individuals look to their immediate peers for their orientation, both collaboratively via learning as well as competitively via social comparison. Finally, this research informs policy on how to devise more effective strategies to promote university-industry interactions

    Making Knowledge and Making Drugs? Experimenting with University Innovation Capacity

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    The innovation process for novel medical therapies needs repair. The United States spends more than ever before on drug discovery without a corresponding increase in new medical therapies

    Open Access Publishing: A Literature Review

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    Within the context of the Centre for Copyright and New Business Models in the Creative Economy (CREATe) research scope, this literature review investigates the current trends, advantages, disadvantages, problems and solutions, opportunities and barriers in Open Access Publishing (OAP), and in particular Open Access (OA) academic publishing. This study is intended to scope and evaluate current theory and practice concerning models for OAP and engage with intellectual, legal and economic perspectives on OAP. It is also aimed at mapping the field of academic publishing in the UK and abroad, drawing specifically upon the experiences of CREATe industry partners as well as other initiatives such as SSRN, open source software, and Creative Commons. As a final critical goal, this scoping study will identify any meaningful gaps in the relevant literature with a view to developing further research questions. The results of this scoping exercise will then be presented to relevant industry and academic partners at a workshop intended to assist in further developing the critical research questions pertinent to OAP

    Unmet goals of tracking: within-track heterogeneity of students' expectations for

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    Educational systems are often characterized by some form(s) of ability grouping, like tracking. Although substantial variation in the implementation of these practices exists, it is always the aim to improve teaching efficiency by creating homogeneous groups of students in terms of capabilities and performances as well as expected pathways. If students’ expected pathways (university, graduate school, or working) are in line with the goals of tracking, one might presume that these expectations are rather homogeneous within tracks and heterogeneous between tracks. In Flanders (the northern region of Belgium), the educational system consists of four tracks. Many students start out in the most prestigious, academic track. If they fail to gain the necessary credentials, they move to the less esteemed technical and vocational tracks. Therefore, the educational system has been called a 'cascade system'. We presume that this cascade system creates homogeneous expectations in the academic track, though heterogeneous expectations in the technical and vocational tracks. We use data from the International Study of City Youth (ISCY), gathered during the 2013-2014 school year from 2354 pupils of the tenth grade across 30 secondary schools in the city of Ghent, Flanders. Preliminary results suggest that the technical and vocational tracks show more heterogeneity in student’s expectations than the academic track. If tracking does not fulfill the desired goals in some tracks, tracking practices should be questioned as tracking occurs along social and ethnic lines, causing social inequality

    Health and the environment: a critical enquiry of the construction and contestation of ecological health

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    A crucial contemporary public health issue is the construction and contestation of the relevance of the natural world to human health. Taking a critical approach, this thesis examines how the natural environment as a health determinant is positioned in relation to the ‘social’ within social epidemiological studies of health, illness and disease. Using conceptual and empirical forms of enquiry, this study shows how current constructions of natural environmental health drivers contour public health practice in the UK and that by challenging the limits of existing structures, innovative responses emerge, which can generate new frameworks for health policy and practice. Having identified a lacuna in research on the ‘natural’ environment in medical sociology, this inductive qualitative research project brings into conversation the findings from extensive desk and field research. Specially, a study of the elaboration of environmental health discourses within the UK public health policy arena and disciplinary wide discourse analyses of key academic journals are read together to describe the discursive practices shaping environmental public health work in the UK. Linking theory to practice, data from in-depth interviews with sixty health professionals working on health and the environment in the UK and internationally are used to investigate how public health practitioners produce the environment within their work remits. The research breaks ground for further social scientific studies of health and the environment and in particular substantiates the call for an extended notion of the ‘environment’ using ecological principles. Methodologically, the interdisciplinary reach of this research draws attention to the tensions that arise when working across the medical, natural and social sciences. Practical and philosophical questions about the challenge of expanding the sociological imagination in the contemporary moment are also considered. Empirically, to medical sociology the ‘EcoBioPsychoSocial’ framework is offered as a tool for studying health at the nexus between the ‘social’ and the ‘natural environment.’ Finally, the ways informal public health institutions are serving as ‘invisible’ forces impeding the uptake of prevention oriented environmental health policies are findings offered to the health policy arena

    Beyond the PhD: the significance of boundaries in the early careers of highly qualified Greek scientists and engineers

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    Higher education and research have come to the forefront of international debate about economic growth highlighting the significance of doctoral education for fostering innovation and international competitiveness. Currently, there is limited information about doctoral graduates in Greece from both a demand and supply side. This study seeks to address this gap by examining the early career paths of Greek doctoral graduates in natural sciences and engineering educated in Greece and the UK, and how they are deployed in the labour market. This study is informed by the debate on human capital and its links to productivity and growth, social capital influences, career theories and the existing evidence on highly skilled migration. A mixed methods approach was adopted to deliver new quantitative and qualitative data and enable the understanding of complex phenomena, such as careers. An online survey of Greek PhD graduates was complemented by followup interviews with a sub-sample, to explore their perceptions of doctoral education and its outcomes. The career trajectories of Greek doctorate holders, together with individual and contextual determinants that shape career choices are presented. Within this investigation, the effect of country of doctoral study, and doctoral education experience are also explored. Emphasis is given to disciplinary labour markets in relation to engineering and biological sciences and the academic system in Greece as contextual considerations that influence career choices. This information is extended by a small number of interviews with Greek based non-academic employers, contributing to a better understanding of their views, informing both the PhD graduates and employers’ (mis)perceptions regarding doctoral education and its value beyond academia. Overall, it will be concluded that Greek PhD graduates are under-utilised in the Greek labour market raising concerns about educational investment and potential brain drain under the current economic crisis in Greece

    Interdisciplinarity and academic writing: a corpus-based case study of three interdisciplines

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    This corpus-based study is aimed at exploring interdisciplinarity in academic writing in the light of two different linguistic aspects: citation practices and adjectives of importance. More specifically, these features have been compared across a corpus of Research Articles from the interdisciplines of Educational Neuroscience, Economic History, and Science & Technology Studies. In addition, comparisons between the interdisciplinary fields and their related single-domain disciplines have been carried out. The methodology applied for the study of the linguistic features combines the analysis of the quantitative data with their qualitative interpretation by means of close reading. It has been concluded that both citations and adjectives of importance are viable tools to explore typical features of interdisciplinary writing in the fields explored. Furthermore, it has been suggested that the findings reported are useful to the description of different types of relationships between disciplines when interacting in the matrix of interdisciplinary fields
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