IMPACT AND SUBJECT
DIFFERENCES
Jack Meadows
Loughborough University
Definition of Impact
REF14
An effect on, change or benefit to the economy, society, culture, public policy or
services, health, the environment or quality of life, beyond academia
RQF
The beneficial application of research to achieve social, economic,
environmental and/or cultural outcomes
Research Assessment v Impact Assessment
Differences - for example
* Local History
* Applied Mathematics
Comments from Pilot Study
Panels are likely to take into account the relative contribution of
research from different institutions to an impact where these are
clearly of a different order.
HE physics up to 1,000 authors
T. Aaltonen23, A. Abulencia24, J. Adelman13, T. Affolder10, T. Akimoto55, M. G.
Albrow17, S. Amerio43, D. Amidei35, A. Anastassov52, K. Anikeev17, A. Annovi19,
J. Antos14, M. Aoki55, G. Apollinari17, T. Arisawa57, A. Artikov15, W.
Ashmanskas17, A. Attal3, A. Aurisano53, F. Azfar42, P. Azzi-Bacchetta43, P.
Azzurri46, N. Bacchetta43, W. Badgett17, A. Barbaro-Galtieri29, V. E. Barnes48, B.
A. Barnett25, S. Baroiant7, V. Bartsch31, G. Bauer33, P.-H. Beauchemin34, F.
Bedeschi46, S. Behari25, G. Bellettini46, J. Bellinger59, A. Belloni33, D.
Benjamin16, A. Beretvas17, J. Beringer29, T. Berry30, A. Bhatti50, M. Binkley17, D.
Bisello43, I. Bizjak31, R. E. Blair2, C. Blocker6, B. Blumenfeld25, A. Bocci16, A.
Bodek49, V. Boisvert49, G. Bolla48, A. Bolshov33, D. Bortoletto48, J. Boudreau47,
A. Boveia10, B. Brau10, L. Brigliadori5, C. Bromberg36, E. Brubaker13, J.
Budagov15, H. S. Budd49, S. Budd24, K. Burkett17, G. Busetto43, P. Bussey21, A.
Buzatu34, K. L. Byrum2, S. Cabrera16,j, M. Campanelli20, M. Campbell35, F.
Canelli17, A. Canepa45, S. Carillo18,b, D. Carlsmith59, R. Carosi46, S. Carron34,
B. Casal11, M. Casarsa54, A. Castro5, P. Catastini46, D. Cauz54, M. CavalliSforza3, A. Cerri29, L. Cerrito31,f, S. H. Chang28, Y. C. Chen1, M. Chertok7, G.
Chiarelli46, G. Chlachidze17, F. Chlebana17, I. Cho28, K. Cho28, D. Chokheli15, J.
P. Chou22, G. Choudalakis33, S. H. Chuang52, K. Chung12, W. H. Chung59, Y. S.
Chung49, M. Cilijak46, C. I. Ciobanu24, M. A. Ciocci46, A. Clark20, D. Clark6, M.
Coca16, G. Compostella43…………………..
International collaboration by UK authors
Papers with a non-UK co-author as a % of output:
18.5% [1997]; 32.1% [2004]
Author Subject
Biochemistry
One author [%]
19
Two authors [%]
46
Three authors [%]
22
Four authors [%]
13
Psychology
45
36
15
4
Economics
83
16
1
0
Sociology
75
21
3
1
Media/Public Interest
* Perceived relevance to audience
* Accessibility of subject
* Pretty pictures
* Query - problems of attribution
Modes of Communication
Traditional
IT
One-to-one
X
X
One-to-many
X
X
Many-to-many
?
X
What government really wants from academics is ‘wise advice’. It is
this wise council that means academics are extensively used by
government on advisory boards, expert panels, as witnesses and panel
chairs. ..... these ‘academic service’ roles can sometimes not be directly
related to the academics core research ..... policymakers explicitly want
academic expertise rather than necessarily the results of a specific piece
of research (or even set of research findings). However these expertise
or academic service roles are not always considered in themselves
to be evidence of impact by the REF process.
* Informal modes of communication often have greater impact
* IT excellent for informal communication
Documented Evidence [A & B]
A [Medicine and Biological sciences]
* Documented evidence of influence on health policy
* Critical reviews in the media
Plus another fourteen points
B [Physical sciences and Engineering]
* Documented evidence of policy debate
* Traceable reference to inclusion of research in industry standards/ guidance
Plus another twelve points
Documented Evidence [C & D]
C [Social sciences]
* Improvements to legal and other frameworks
* Development of resources to enhance professional practice
D [Humanities]
* Publication and sales figures, web-site hits, etc.
* Citations in reviews outside academic literature
Twitter and Research
Tweet about each new publication, website update or new blog that
the project completes. To gauge feedback, you could send a tweet
that links to your research blog and ask your followers for their
feedback and comments.
Blogs
Seed Media Group's Research Blogging Awards honor the outstanding
bloggers who discuss peer-reviewed research.
With over 1,000 blogs registered at ResearchBlogging.org and 10,000
posts about peer-reviewed journal articles collected, it is time to
recognize the best of the best.