Among the ways social sciences research can have impact is by influencing public policy. Duncan Green recently attended an event at which this subject was much discussed, with a leading government research analyst offering clear advice on what officials are looking for. Comparative work highlighting a range of possible solutions is valued, as are multidisciplinary approaches. Most useful is demonstrating […]
Category: Impact
How can blogging help research make an impact beyond academia? Illustrative examples from the LSE blogs
Previous posts in our series on the Impact of LSE Blogs project examined the effects of blogging on the academic sphere, looking more closely at citations to the original research outputs and also to the blog posts themselves. But what about the effects of blogging beyond academia, on the public sphere? In the final post of the series, Kieran Booluck […]
Book Review: The Open Book: Stories of Academic Life and Writing or Where We Know Things by Ninna Meier and Charlotte Wegener
In The Open Book: Stories of Academic Life and Writing or Where We Know Things, Ninna Meier and Charlotte Wegener offer an experimental co-memoir that blurs, unhooks and reweaves the relationship between “academic” and “creative” writing, while also disturbing traditional divisions between professional and personal life. The book succeeds in bringing emotion and empathy to academic writing, writes Vanessa Longden, and prompts reflection on personal practice. This […]
On the co-production of research: why we should say what we mean, mean what we say, and learn as we go
Researchers are increasingly encouraged to “co-produce” or “co-create” their research, particularly if it is to have that much-prized impact. But what exactly does this really mean? Bev J. Holmes defines co-production as the collaboration between researchers and others with a stake in a project in its governance, priority-setting, conducting of research, and knowledge translation. Once what is meant by co-production is […]
Clickbait and impact: how academia has been hacked
It has become increasingly clear that prevailing academic incentive structures have a potentially damaging and distorting effect on the nature of academic debates. Portia Roelofs and Max Gallien use the example of a controversial recent journal publication to illustrate how deliberately provocative articles have the capacity to hack academia, to privilege clicks and attention over rigour in research. This is […]
Peer review processes risk stifling creativity and limiting opportunities for game-changing scientific discoveries
Today, academics must prepare written proposals describing the research they wish to conduct and submit them to funding agencies for evaluation – a process known as peer review. According to Don Braben and Rod Dowler, the current peer review process actually serves as a blocker to more radical research, stifling creativity and limiting opportunities for game-changing discoveries. Obviously peer review should not be abandoned entirely, but it […]
Involving non-academic partners at all relevant stages of the research process can drive knowledge and understanding
At a time when some audiences and commentators seem intent not simply to resist academic knowledge but to discredit it, the perception of academic researchers as somewhat under siege is perhaps unsurprising. But rather than aggressively reasserting the value of academic expertise, Claire Packman, Louise Rutt and Grace Williams argue for a reconceptualising of the meaning of professional community and […]
Rather than promoting economic value, evaluation can be reclaimed by universities to combat its misuse and negative impacts
To critics across higher education, evaluation frameworks such as the REF and TEF represent mechanisms of control, the generation of a “target and terror” culture. Deirdre Duffy explains how the REF and TEF resonate most closely with impact evaluation, a form of evaluation that can prove useful for a simple cost-benefit analysis but can also be problematic as it encourages […]
Credit for research outputs should go to the originating institution but with a transitional arrangement for this REF cycle
One of the most contentious aspects of the Stern review of the 2014 REF was the recommendation that research outputs should not be portable in future exercises. The subsequent consultation revealed a significant minority to be in support of this, echoing Stern’s concerns that current rules distort investment incentives and encourage rent-seeking. However, a majority opposed this recommendation as stifling […]
The 2014 REF results show only a very weak relationship between excellence in research and achieving societal impact
Results of the 2014 Research Excellence Framework have, in some quarters, been interpreted as evidence of a direct relationship between the quality of scientific outputs and the degree of societal impact generated by researchers. However, such an interpretation, allied to definitions of impact such as that used by Research Councils UK, arguably promotes a stronger reading of the REF results […]