The Myth of Global Science Collaboration - Collaboration patterns in epistemic communities

Scientific collaboration is often perceived as a joint global process that involves researchers worldwide, regardless of their place of work and residence. Globalization of science, in this respect, implies that collaboration among scientists takes place along the lines of common topics and irrespective of the spatial distances between the collaborators. The networks of collaborators, termed 'epistemic communities', should thus have a space-independent structure. This paper shows that such a notion of globalized scientific collaboration is not supported by empirical data. It introduces a novel approach of analyzing distance-dependent probabilities of collaboration. The results of the analysis of six distinct scientific fields reveal that intra-country collaboration is about 10-50 times more likely to occur than international collaboration. Moreover, strong dependencies exist between collaboration activity (measured in co-authorships) and spatial distance when confined to national borders. However, the fact that distance becomes irrelevant once collaboration is taken to the international scale suggests a globalized science system that is strongly influenced by the gravity of local science clusters. The similarity of the probability functions of the six science fields analyzed suggests a universal mode of spatial governance that is independent from the mode of knowledge creation in science.Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures, 1 tabl

Overlapping modularity at the critical point of k-clique percolation

One of the most remarkable social phenomena is the formation of communities in social networks corresponding to families, friendship circles, work teams, etc. Since people usually belong to several different communities at the same time, the induced overlaps result in an extremely complicated web of the communities themselves. Thus, uncovering the intricate community structure of social networks is a non-trivial task with great potential for practical applications, gaining a notable interest in the recent years. The Clique Percolation Method (CPM) is one of the earliest overlapping community finding methods, which was already used in the analysis of several different social networks. In this approach the communities correspond to k-clique percolation clusters, and the general heuristic for setting the parameters of the method is to tune the system just below the critical point of k-clique percolation. However, this rule is based on simple physical principles and its validity was never subject to quantitative analysis. Here we examine the quality of the partitioning in the vicinity of the critical point using recently introduced overlapping modularity measures. According to our results on real social- and other networks, the overlapping modularities show a maximum close to the critical point, justifying the original criteria for the optimal parameter settings.Comment: 20 pages, 6 figure

The Geographical and Institutional Proximity of Scientific Collaboration Networks

The geography of innovation has established itself as a central subject in economic geography. Geographical proximity to firms and organizations like universities is supposed to have a positive effect on a firms’ innovative performance. One of the reasons causing these positive agglomeration effects is the fact that collaboration is eased by geographical proximity. Although the role of proximity for collaboration is a well researched theme with regard to innovation, less is known about the role of proximity in scientific collaboration and how this affects the probability and nature of networking among research institutions. This is surprising given the fact that collaboration in science has become a central policy issue. In this paper we set out a number of theoretical considerations about the role of geography for innovation and see whether these apply for science as well. The empirical part will focus on the geography of collaboration in scientific knowledge production, testing the hypothesis that collaboration between different kinds of organizations is geographically more localized than collaboration between the same kinds of organizations due to institutional or organizational proximity. Besides this we will analyze the importance of spatial proximity for various forms of collaboration (such as university-university and university-firm collaboration) using the concept of the gravity model. Finally we will look at the spatial structure of these collaboration networks using insights from social network methodology. Based on co-publications, central nodes of collaborative interaction and network structures are analysed over time. On the network-level we conclude on differences in the fields of life- and physical sciences and on differences on the type of relations according to university-firm, university-university and university-governmental institution linkages. On the regional level we conclude on the centrality and spatial extent of scientific collaboration hubs over time

Explaining international co-authorship in global environmental change research

This paper maps the domain of earth and environmental sciences (EES) and investigates the relationship between cognitive problem structures and internationalisation patterns, drawing on the concepts of systemic versus cumulative global environmental change (GEC) and mutual task dependence in scientific fields. We find that scientific output concentration and internationalisation are significantly higher in the systemic GEC fields of Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences and Oceanography than in the cumulative GEC fields Ecology and Water Resources. The relationship is explained by stronger mutual task dependence in systemic GEC fields. In contrast, the portion of authorships with developing, emerging and transition countries among all international publications is larger for Water Resources than for three other fields, consistent with the most pressing needs for STI capacity development in these countries. --

Collaborative research: Accomplishments & potential

Although a substantial part of scientific research is collaborative and increasing globalization will probably lead to its increase, very few studies actually investigate the advantages, disadvantages, experiences and lessons learned from collaboration. In environmental epidemiology interdisciplinary collaboration is essential and the contrasting geographical patterns in exposure and disease make multi-location projects essential. This paper is based on a presentation given at the Annual Conference of the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology, Paris 2006, and is attempting to initiate a discussion on a framework for studying collaborative research. A review of the relevant literature showed that indeed collaborative research is rising, in some countries with impressive rates. However, there are substantial differences between countries in their outlook, need and respect for collaboration. In many situations collaborative publications receive more citations than those based on national authorship. The European Union is the most important host of collaborative research, mainly driven by the European Commission through the Framework Programmes. A critical assessment of the tools and trends of collaborative networks under FP6, showed that there was a need for a critical revision, which led to changes in FP7. In conclusion, it is useful to study the characteristics of collaborative research and set targets for the future. The added value for science and for the researchers involved may be assessed. The motivation for collaboration could be increased in the more developed countries. Particular ways to increase the efficiency and interaction in interdisciplinary and intercultural collaboration may be developed. We can work towards "the principles of collaborative research" in Environmental Epidemiology

Building Capacity for Comparative and International Social Sciences: Inter-organizational Collaboration and EU Research Funding & Degree Programs

In this essay, I present global mega-trends in higher education and science (expansion, competition, collaboration), discuss regional shifts in scientific publication globally since 1900 and systematic attempts to build capacity for knowledge production, especially in research universities. Pure exponential growth in the publication of research articles is matched by rising international, interorganizational, and transdisciplinary collaboration. The implications of these patterns, especially for international and comparative social sciences, are then briefly delineated on the basis of the case of EU research funding (Framework Programmes) and joint degree programs (Erasmus Mundus) that promote sustainable collaborations across borders in Europe

New approach to the visualization of international scientific collaboration

Chinchilla-Rodríguez, Z., Vargas-Quesada, B., Hassan-Montero, Y., González-Molina, A., Moya-Anegón, F. New approach to the visualization of international scientific collaboration. Information Visualization, 9 (4): 277-287, Winter 2010. DOI: 10.1057/ivs.2009.31In this study, visual representations are created in order to analyze different aspects of scientific collaboration at the international level. The main objective is to identify the international facet of research by following the flow of knowledge as expressed by the number of scientific publications, and then establishes the main geographical axes of output, showing the interrelationships of the domain, the intensity of these relations, and how the different types of collaboration are reflected in terms of visibility. Thus, the methodology has a twofold application, allowing us to detect significant differences that help characterize patterns of behaviour of a geographical system of output, along with the generation of representations that serve as interfaces for domain analysis and information retrieval.Peer reviewe

Collaboration and Citation Analysis Within Social Sciences: A Comparative Analysis Between Two Fields

The present study focuses on a collaboration of a citation analysis of the JCR journals of the categories Demography and Urban Studies indexed in Social Science Citation Index from the period 2000–2016. A total of 64 journals were covered (26 for Demography and 38 for Urban Studies). We found that the percentages of multi-authored documents in both categories are very similar; moreover, the citation distribution is shown to be increasing in both but behaves slightly different in the two samples analysed. It seems to be a relation between the number of citations a document received and the number of authors. Regarding international collaboration, both categories present a similar type of network with densities of the kind of social science networks. Anglo-Saxon countries are the most prolific ones and the biggest collaborators in both networks. Urban Studies shows a relative importance to countries of emerging economies since it indexed more journals in the sample with a wider regional scope