A space to explore, share and shape the issues facing social and behavioral scientists
If traditional filters of prestige are themselves steeped in a set of tacit values that may no longer adequately respect the modes of labor (or the laborers themselves), then when better to step back for a moment to ask what we are counting — and why?
One way or another, the Journal Citation Reports today play an outsized role in determining whose careers thrive and whose careers whither and which journals flourish or fade away.
Not one single metric can encapsulate the importance of a field, notes Digital Science’s Mike Taylor, and in fields where broader uptake is slower, this is especially true.
In this first response to Ziyad Marar’s thought piece “On Measuring Social Science Impact,” professor Sue Fletcher-Watson, who represents a field where the direct purpose is to improve the quality of life for a group of individuals, shares why current metrics fall short and what we can do about it.
The following essay by Ziyad Marar is adapted from “On Measuring Social Science Impact,” published in the journal Organization Studies. To […]
Quantification can reformulate something as complex and multidimensional as teaching into a one-dimensional score. And such a score gives the possessor a sense of control and understanding. But, given the implications of quantification, this is an illusion.
By focusing on researchers, rather than research, Paul Nightingale and Rebecca Vine suggest research systems would be better positioned to appreciate the multifaceted ways in which fields of research, such as the social sciences, impact society.
Reporting on their recent survey of websites cited in REF 2014 impact case studies, Kayvan Kousha, Mike Thelwall and Mahshid Abdoli, discuss which websites are most commonly used as supporting evidence for impact and how these vary across academic disciplines.
Presenting evidence from a new analysis of business and management academics, the authors explore how journal status is valued by these academics and the point at which journal status becomes more prized than academic influence.
The aim of peer review for research grants and academic hiring boards is to provide expert independent judgement on the quality of research proposals and candidates. Based on findings from a recent survey, Liv Langfeldt, Dag W. Aksnes and Ingvild Reymert, find metrics continue to play a significant role in shaping these decisions, especially for reviewers who are highly ranked themselves.
“Make sure you’re not only citing white guys!” That was the unmistakable takeaway Wednesday as Deen Freelon discussed his research into citation inequities in the social sciences.
In this post, Jorrit Smit and Laurens Hessels, draw on a recent analysis of different impact evaluation tools to explore how they constitute and direct conceptions of research impact. Finding a common separation between evaluation focused on scientific and societal impact, they suggest bridging this divide may prove beneficial to producing research that has public value, rather than research that achieves particular metrics.
