[NEW] 159th STIG PoP Seminar “Joining evenly while remaining unlike: how do plural and balanced participation in inter-sectoral research collaborations influence scientific performance?”

Date & Time:
16:50-18:35 Thursday 12 December 2024

Venue:
SMBC Academia Hall, 4F, International Academic Research Bldg., Hongo Campus, The University of Tokyo

Speaker:
Dr. Alfredo Yegros
Senior Researcher
Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS), Leiden University, The Netherlands

Overview:
Knowledge co-production involving academic and non-academic actors is increasingly expected to promote good scientific practice since it prioritises diversity and participation within academic research. However, whether, and to what extent, knowledge co-production results in substantive contributions to science is open to debate. The purpose of this research is to examine the relationship between co-production processes and scientific impact, by looking at two distinct features of knowledge co-production: participants’ diversity (plurality) and degree of involvement (balanced participation). The analyses draw on two main data sources: inter-sectoral projects funded by the EU FP7-Cooperation Programme, and bibliometric data derived through a combined search strategy from the European Union’s Project Database and Web of Science. The final sample consists of 6,658 collaborative inter-sectoral research projects. The results indicate that a higher proportion of triads with participants from distinct institutional sectors and a greater balance in participation among project members are both positively associated with the scientific impact of project findings (as measured by highly cited publications). In addition, the study finds that a more balanced involvement of partners from the same institutional sector strengthens the relationship between plurality and scientific impact. These findings contribute to the literature on knowledge co-production and to the assessment of transdisciplinary research processes.