A categorization of arguments for counting methods for publication and citation indicators

Most publication and citation indicators are based on datasets with multi-authored publications and thus a change in counting method will often change the value of an indicator. Therefore it is important to know why a specific counting method has been applied. I have identified arguments for counting methods in a sample of 32 bibliometric studies published in 2016 and compared the result with discussions of arguments for counting methods in three older studies. Based on the underlying logics of the arguments I have arranged the arguments in four groups. Group 1 focuses on arguments related to what an indicator measures, Group 2 on the additivity of a counting method, Group 3 on pragmatic reasons for the choice of counting method, and Group 4 on an indicator's influence on the research community or how it is perceived by researchers. This categorization can be used to describe and discuss how bibliometric studies with publication and citation indicators argue for counting methods

Sustainable development of a researcher's career trajectory

The ongoing Covid-19 pandemic has taught everyone that longterm planning and execution, which have always been taken for granted, are not a given. In many contexts, stagnation was the initial outcome of hard lockdowns. As international travel ground to a halt, the lack of mobility seriously hampered scholarly personal interaction as an essential part of the career development of especially early-career researchers. While the focus of this paper is not on the current or future effects of the pandemic, the temporary inaction associated with Covid might be seen as a wake-up call for an active, rigorous effort towards sustainable development. Education faculties and their research entities have a duty towards both earlycareer and established researchers to develop strategies through which a steady development path can be maintained despite local, national and international disruptions. The notion of sustainable development of researchers’ career trajectories implies a long-term approach to incessant growth, expansion and skills improvement, leading to maintained and increased productivity as well as higherquality research outputs. This paper explores strategies that may be followed by authorities and individuals that focus on a positive career trajectory for both early-career and established researchers. The question to be answered is how continuous development can be facilitated. The answers lie, inter alia, in stimulating a lifelong interest in research during pre-graduate and doctoral students’ introduction to research theory and practice, constantly building capacity through increased research skills levels. Mentorship offered by established researchers can also be seen as part of their own prolonged development. In addition, of equal importance is the development of the ability among individual researchers and project groups to take responsibility for their own career trajectory

The future higher education workforce in locally and globally engaged higher education institutions: a review of literature on the topic of 'the academic workforce'

Working Paper 43, authored by Dr Giulio Marini, Professor William Locke and Dr Celia Whitchurch, reviews the literature on the academic workforce, undertaking an in-depth review of journals dedicated to higher education studies, and other academic journals where contributions to the field occur. It is published two years after the start of CGHE research project 3.2, The future higher education workforce in locally and globally engaged HEIs. More than 200 publications were identified, including journal articles and monographs between 2013 and 2017, searching by keywords such as “career”, “gender + academia”, “labour market”, “division of labour”, “working conditions”, “mobility”, “casualization”, “mentorship”, etc. (all ‘& “higher education”’ where the journal was not dedicated to the field). The aim of the literature review is to highlight trends in the international literature, covering theoretical approaches, policy perspectives and empirical work. The analysis also considers the traditional disciplines relevant to the topic of the academic workforce, including economics, management, sociology, social psychology and public administration. The authors were interested in understanding which perspectives, approaches and methods are most used by researchers in the field, and which less so, and to detect possible gaps to be filled, emerging trends that have not yet been fully explained, and new perspectives on familiar issues. The main findings of the review can be expressed as two interrelated aspects of academic work and careers informing the interpretation of the primary data collected for the project so far. These are the personal agency of the individuals who work in academia (the individual career aspect), and the organisation of work and careers within academia (the organisational aspect). For the first aspect, it appears that, currently, the British higher education system is a collection of heterogeneous employers within which individuals may find different opportunities, not only in terms of career pathways or tracks (e.g. linked to traditional teaching-plus-research, teaching-only and research-only), but also in terms of varying degrees of flexibility and autonomy. For the second, organisational aspect, the literature review reveals that ‘human resource management’, a term that is contested in a higher education environment, is seen as having a stronger profile than hitherto. However, it also suggests that managing people in higher education is more complex than organisational policies and procedures alone might imply, and that the picture is, therefore, more nuanced, Overall, the review suggests that despite an apparent division of labour between teaching and research activity, evidenced by, for instance, teaching-only and research-only roles in some institutions, in practice the interpretation of policy at middle management level has helped to modulate these trends

Domestic researchers with longer careers generate higher average citation impact but it does not increase over time

© The Authors. Published by MIT Press. This is an open access article available under a Creative Commons licence. The published version can be accessed at the following link on the publisher’s website: https://doi.org/10.1162/qss_a_00132Information about the relative strengths of scholars is needed for the efficient running of knowledge systems. Since academic research requires many skills, more experienced researchers might produce better research and attract more citations. This article assesses career citation impact changes 2001-2016 for domestic researchers (definition: first and last Scopus journal article in the same country) from the twelve nations with most Scopus documents. Careers are analysed longitudinally, so that changes are not due to personnel evolution, such as researchers leaving or entering a country. The results show that long term domestic researchers do not tend to improve their citation impact over time but tend to achieve their average citation impact by their first or second Scopus journal article. In some countries, this citation impact subsequently declines. These longer-term domestic researchers have higher citation impact than the national average in all countries, however, whereas scholars publishing only one journal article have substantially lower citation impact in all countries. The results are consistent with an efficiently functioning researcher selection system but cast slight doubt on the long-term citation impact potential of long-term domestic researchers. Research and funding policies may need to accommodate these patterns when citation impact is a relevant indicator

Academic Human Capital and Research Performance

Academic research has been considered a relevant research topic in academia. Universities have emerged as a key agent for innovation and knowledge generation. Recently, universities are betting on a paradigm shift based on research efficiency. In view of the changes in the universities' vision, and with the aim of responding to these new demands, academic research institutions have articulated new types of resources and different management procedures that favour their contribution and commitment to the processes of knowledge generation. Therefore, the determinants of academic researchers' performance have been postulated as variables to be addressed in the field of human resource management. This thesis highlights the role of academic researchers as a unit of analysis. More specifically, this work aims to provide an answer to understanding the relationship between human capital and the research performance of academics, as well as the effect of motivation and opportunity as moderating variables. Human capital at the organisational level has been studied through three main dimensions following the KSA model (Knowledge, Skills, Abilities). This framework is contextualised in the academic environment, considering its particularities. Moreover, motivations and opportunity can enhance human capital advantages and scientific performance. To this end, this thesis also proposes the use of the AMO approach (Abilities as Human Capital, Motivation and Opportunity) as a framework for study in academia. The results of the empirical analysis suggest that there is a direct and positive relationship between human capital and research performance. Our study shows that research knowledge and research abilities drive research activity. However, there is some negative relationship between proactive creativity and research performance. This result is surprising because all dimensions of human capital contribute to performance. Furthermore, the results suggest that motivation and opportunity moderate the relationship between human capital and research performance. From this perspective, the results confirmed the existence of a greater contribution of research motivation than opportunity. In addition, the thesis proposes and validates a scale specifically developed to measure the different dimensions of human capital of academic researchers. The use of this scale allows to consider those attributes necessary for research activity in order to understand the complex nature of the topic. The thesis also provides a measure of the incentives that are perceived by academic researchers as drivers of research activity in an integrative way and at the individual level. To this end, researchers' perception of these incentives could be crucial for the management of research in universities. Finally, this thesis contributes significantly to (1) a better understanding of the research capabilities of academics and, (2) offering new variables to evaluate research performance and the implementation of research incentive policies. This contextualisation of the human capital approach is also related to the analysis of the factors that condition research performance, which favours the introduction and implementation of specific measures for the management of academic staff. Moreover, its application represents a significant contribution, since traditionally the determinants of research performance have been studied from a macro perspective, whereas through this approach we propose to deepen more intrinsic and specific dimensions reseachers.La investigación académica se ha considerado un tópico de investigación relevante en la academia. En la sociedad actual, la Universidad se ha erigido como un agente clave para la innovación y generación de conocimiento. Recientemente, las universidades están apostando por un cambio de paradigma basado en la eficiencia investigadora. Ante los cambios de visión de las universidades, y con objeto de dar respuesta a estas nuevas demandas exigidas, las instituciones de investigación académica han articulado nuevos tipos de recursos y diferentes procedimientos de gestión, que favorecen su aportación y compromiso a los procesos de generación de conocimiento. Por ello, los determinantes del rendimiento de los investigadores académicos se han postulado como variables a tratar en el ámbito de la gestión de los recursos humanos. Esta tesis destaca el rol de los investigadores académicos como unidad de análisis. Más específicamente, este trabajo tiene como objetivo dar respuesta a entender la relación entre el capital humano y el resultado de investigación de los académicos, así como el efecto de la motivación y la oportunidad como variables moderadoras de esa relación. El capital humano en el ámbito organizativo se ha estudiado a través de tres dimensiones principales siguiendo el modelo KSA (conocimiento- Knowledge, habilidades-Skills y competencias-abilities). Este marco se contextualiza en el ámbito académico, considerando las particularidades del mismo. Asimismo, las motivaciones y la oportunidad pueden potenciar las ventajas del capital humano y el rendimiento científico. Para ello, la presente tesis también propone la utilización del enfoque AMO (Abilities como capital humano, motivación y oportunidad) como marco de estudio en el ámbito académico. Los resultados del análisis empírico sugieren que existe una relación directa y positiva entre el capital humano y el rendimiento de investigación. Nuestro estudio refleja que los conocimientos de investigación y las competencias investigadoras impulsan la actividad investigadora. Sin embargo, existe una cierta relación negativa entre la creatividad proactiva y los resultados de investigación. Este resultado sorprende porque la naturaleza del capital humano es que todas las dimensiones contribuyan al rendimiento. Además, los resultados sugieren que la motivación y la oportunidad moderan la relación existente entre el capital humano y el rendimiento de investigación. Desde esta perspectiva, los resultados confirmaron la existencia de una mayor contribución de la motivación investigadora que de la oportunidad. Además, la tesis propone y valida una escala desarrollada específicamente para medir las diferentes dimensiones del capital humano de los investigadores académicos. El uso de esta escala permite tener en cuenta aquellos atributos necesarios para la actividad investigadora con el fin de comprender la naturaleza compleja del tópico. Asimismo, la tesis aporta una medida sobre los incentivos que son percibidos por los investigadores académicos como propulsores de la actividad investigadora de forma integradora y a nivel individual. Para ello, la percepción que tienen los investigadores de estos incentivos podría ser crucial para la gestión de la investigación en las universidades. Por último, señalar que esta tesis contribuye significativamente a (1) una mejor comprensión de las capacidades investigadoras de los académicos y, (2) ofrece nuevas variables para la evaluación del rendimiento de investigación y la implementación de políticas de incentivos en la actividad investigadora. Esta contextualización del enfoque del capital humano también lleva asociado el análisis de los factores que condicionan el desempeño investigador, lo que favorece la implantación y puesta en marcha de medidas específicas de gestión del personal académico. Además, su aplicación supone una novedad significativa, ya que tradicionalmente se han estudiado los factores determinantes de la productividad científica desde una perspectiva macro, mientras que a través de los planteamientos este enfoque profundizaremos en las dimensiones más intrínsecas y específicas del propio investigador académico