Quantifying the impact and relevance of scientific research

Qualitative and quantitative methods are being developed to measure the impacts of research on society, but they suffer from serious drawbacks associated with linking a piece of research to its subsequent impacts. We have developed a method to derive impact scores for individual research publication...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2011-11, Vol.6 (11), p.e27537-e27537
Main Authors: Sutherland, William J, Goulson, David, Potts, Simon G, Dicks, Lynn V
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Agriculture
Biodiversity
Biology
Climate change
Conservation
Documents
Ecology
End users
Health care
Journal Impact Factor
Primary care
Principal Component Analysis
Public health
Quality of life
Research - statistics & numerical data
Science
Science - statistics & numerical data
Science Policy
Scientific research
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Social research
Society
Special interest groups
Taxonomy
Time Factors
Zoology
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Description
Summary:Qualitative and quantitative methods are being developed to measure the impacts of research on society, but they suffer from serious drawbacks associated with linking a piece of research to its subsequent impacts. We have developed a method to derive impact scores for individual research publications according to their contribution to answering questions of quantified importance to end users of research. To demonstrate the approach, here we evaluate the impacts of research into means of conserving wild bee populations in the UK. For published papers, there is a weak positive correlation between our impact score and the impact factor of the journal. The process identifies publications that provide high quality evidence relating to issues of strong concern. It can also be used to set future research agendas.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0027537