Abstract
It has been argued that due to the growing importance attributed to research impact and forms of its evaluation, an academic ‘culture of impact’ is emerging. It would include certain concepts, values, and skills related to the area of generating and documenting impact. We use thematic and discourse analysis to analyse open answers from 100 questionnaires on research impact submitted by ECRs working in the social sciences and humanities (SSH) in Europe. We explore ECR’s early-career stage positions relative to societal impact and the trade-offs necessary to assure an academic career. The results show how, as the first generation of scholars to be socialized towards value of academic research beyond academia, ECRs are confronted with policy signals that encourage a drive for impact, which are at the same time often in line with respondents’ personal values around impact beyond academia. However, ECRs face a number of competing signals about research value within the evaluation spaces necessary to navigate an academic career. Current evaluative structures often dismiss the achievement of societal impact favouring instead narrower definitions of research excellence. Career structures and organizational realities are often unfavourable to impact-related activity, which has implications for an ECRs’ ability to develop coherent professional positionings.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | rvad024 |
| Number of pages | 11 |
| Journal | Research Evaluation |
| Early online date | 21 Nov 2023 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | E-pub ahead of print - 21 Nov 2023 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information: The team would like to thank European Network for Research Evaluation in the Social Sciences and the Humanities (ENRESSH) for funding CB’s short-term scientific mission (STSM) to the Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS) at Leiden University. It is where a good part of the qualitative analysis was conducted, under the guidance of Prof. Paul Benneworth. Marta Wrwska wishes to acknowledge the support of National Science Centre, Poland. Part of the work presented in this paper was funded under grant number 2022/47/B/HS6/01341.Publisher Copyright: © The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press.