History and Past Activities
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History and Past Activities |
Otto Auranen
University of Tampere, Finland
Changes in Forms of Academic Productivity
Academic productivity, the consequence of research activity of university researchers, comes in different forms. Four forms of academic productivity can be distinguished: scientific output, commercial output, output for civil society, and output for public administration. Traditionally, different academic disciplines, organizations or even nations have favoured certain forms over others. Some studies suggest that changes are taking place in the relationships between the forms of productivity and disciplinary and other contexts. These changes are not uniform. In some contexts we may not even see changes. However, there are clear indications that one of the forms - scientific output - is going through changes. Publication cultures in different disciplines are approaching each other.
The first part of my paper describes the forms of academic productivity, connects them to theirtraditional contexts, and traces some of the changes or trends between the modes during recentdecades. Which forms are becoming more common than before, and to which contexts do the trends apply? In which contexts there is no change? Special attention will be paid to changes in scientific output.
The second part deals with the relationship between organic and policy-driven change in the forms of productivity. Which of the changes are the results of unintended processes, and which are promoted by policy actors or scientists themselves? For instance, in Finland the state has been actively favouring the commercialisation of academic research results. This is a part of the “national innovation system” policy. Similar efforts can be seen in many other countries. There are also policy pressures to enhance “international publishing” in universities, even though the definition of“international publishing” differs between disciplines and nations.
This paper is part of my beginning PhD work entitled “Connections between research communities’social capital and productivity”. I’m reviewing literature to form a theoretical base of the PhD thesis before moving on to the empirical work. Paper will be based on some of the outcomes of theliterature review.
Sociology of Science and Technology NETwork - last update: April 2006