La gouvernance des données en contexte universitaire : proposition d’un modèle de maturité

Auteur.ices/Authors : Ugo Verdi, Nathalie Pinède, Guy Melançon

Dans le contexte d’une production très rapide des données, la question de leur gouvernance traverse l’ensemble des organisations. Si cette problématique a été principalement étudiée dans un contexte entrepreneurial où une gestion optimale des données sert en priorité des objectifs économiques, elle a moins fait l’objet d’une étude dans un cadre universitaire.

Cet article propose ici un modèle de maturité pour permettre aux universités de disposer d’un outil concourant d’une part à identifier et analyser les mécanismes de la gouvernance des données et, d’autre part, à évaluer le niveau d’implication des acteurs et de l’organisation.

Bien qu’adapté à un contexte local particulier, à savoir les projets ACT de l’université de Bordeaux, il a pour vocation d’être adaptable à d’autres contextes universitaires.

HAL : https://hal.science/hal-04585975

Data services at the academic library: a natural history of horses and unicorns

Authors : Jeffrey Oliver, Fernando Rios, Kiriann Carin, Chun Ly

Objective

Increases in data-intensive research at colleges and universities is driving demand for data services provided by academic libraries. The current work investigates the distribution of library data services, how such services are offered, and the effect of resourcing on the amount of services offered by a library.

Methods

We used a web-based inventory of 25 academic libraries at U.S. Research 1 (R1) Carnegie institutions to assess the state of data services at university libraries. We categorized and quantified services, and tested for an effect of library resourcing on the size of library data service portfolios.

Results

Support for data management and geospatial services was relatively widespread, with increasing support in areas of data analyses and data visualization. There was significant variation among services in the modality in which they were offered (web, consult, instruction) and library resourcing had a significant effect on the number of data services a library offered.

Conclusions

While a core subset of these data services are offered at most academic libraries, more specialized topics are restricted to well-resourced libraries. In light of the influence of resource scarcity on the number of services a library can offer, intra- and inter-campus partnerships will be critical to ensure campus support for data service needs.

URL : Data services at the academic library: a natural history of horses and unicorns

DOI : https://doi.org/10.7191/jeslib.780

How can revivals of scientific publications be explained using bibliometric methods? A case study discovering booster papers for the 1985 Physics Nobel Prize paper

Authors : Robin Haunschild, Werner Marx, Jürgen Weis

The unusual citation profile of the 1985 Physics Nobel Prize paper has been analyzed. The number of citing papers per year exhibits a maximum of 123 citations in the mid-1980s and increases to more than 200 citations about two decades later.

The publication set of the citing papers was analyzed in terms of co-authorships and research topics. The USA and (more recently) the People’s Republic of China appear prominently among the countries of the citing authors. A keyword analysis of the citing papers revealed research dealing with topological insulators as one of the major newly evolving research topics. An analysis of the co-cited papers has been performed via reference publication year spectroscopy (RPYS).

The most-frequently co-cited papers (the peak papers of the RPYS spectrogram) were identified and discussed. As a result, we found two primary booster papers and three secondary booster papers that renewed the interest in the 1985 Physics Nobel Prize paper.

URL : How can revivals of scientific publications be explained using bibliometric methods? A case study discovering booster papers for the 1985 Physics Nobel Prize paper

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-023-04906-z

The Role of Academic Libraries in Scientific Production Evaluation – the Experience of University of Zagreb, Croatia

Authors : Branka Marijanović, Tatijana Petrić, Zrinka Udiljak Bugarinovski, Višnja Novosel

Since internationally visible scientific productivity is a criterion for state evaluation of Croatian academic and scientific institutions and their scientists, Croatian academic libraries have a key role in quantitative evaluation of scientific productivity using methods such as bibliometrics, scientometrics and the like.

The aim of this case study is to identify and illustrate the current situation of library services for evaluating scientific production at the University of Zagreb, Croatia, and to make recommendations for the further development of such services, which could serve as a framework for the systematic implementation of this type of service in all libraries at the University of Zagreb and beyond.

More specifically, the purpose of this paper was to identify the existence of the bibliometric services in the libraries of the University of Zagreb (UNIZG), examine the status and involvement of university librarians in the academic advancement procedures and to identify the required competences for bibliometric experts in Croatia.

The research was conducted using the content analysis method, the survey method, and the focus group method. The research results show that although UNIZG libraries are integrated into the system of academic promotion and the role of UNIZG libraries is enshrined in Croatian regulations, the bibliometric service is not standardised at the University level.

The results also indicate that the service needs to be strengthened in terms of training of professional staff and greater investment in staff capacity and infrastructure.

The fact that the study was conducted at a single Croatian university is a possible limitation that could relate to the application of guidelines for further actions and the development of bibliometric services at national level. It would therefore be desirable to conduct future research to identify the situation at other Croatian universities as well.

It would also be necessary to determine the open science and open access policies at UNIZG through further research and, in this context, to establish guidelines for possible improvements in the processes of evaluating scientific productivity.

The results of this study make an important contribution to the possible future positioning of university libraries and UNIZG librarians in the process of evaluating scientific productivity. In addition, some practical advice is given so that this case study may be a good introductory overview for the wider academic community in relation to this topic.

URL : The Role of Academic Libraries in Scientific Production Evaluation – the Experience of University of Zagreb, Croatia

DOI : https://doi.org/10.53377/lq.13523

Gender diversity and publication activity—an analysis of STEM in the UK

Authors : Yasaman Sarabi, Matthew Smith

Gender diversity in STEM remains a significant issue, as the field continues to be a male dominated one, despite increased attention on the subject. This article examines the interplay between gender diversity on projects funded by a major UK research council, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, and the publication activity of a project, as measured by the average journal quality of project publication output, over a 10-year period.

The proportion of female representation and leadership on these projects remains very low. For the projects examined as part of this study, over 70% of these projects have no female representation, and less than 15% have a female lead.

This study does not find a significant relationship between gender diversity and journal quality output. This study highlights that an important avenue for future work is the development of alternative metrics to assess the performance of research projects in a discipline characterized by very low levels of gender diversity, to fully unpack the impact of project team gender diversity on project output activity.

URL : Gender diversity and publication activity—an analysis of STEM in the UK

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1093/reseval/rvad008

How unpredictable is research impact? Evidence from the UK’s Research Excellence Framework

Authors : Ohid Yaqub, Dmitry Malkov, Josh Siepel

Although ex post evaluation of impact is increasingly common, the extent to which research impacts emerge largely as anticipated by researchers, or as the result of serendipitous and unpredictable processes, is not well understood.

In this article, we explore whether predictions of impact made at the funding stage align with realized impact, using data from the UK’s Research Excellence Framework (REF). We exploit REF impact cases traced back to research funding applications, as a dataset of 2,194 case–grant pairs, to compare impact topics with funder remits.

For 209 of those pairs, we directly compare their descriptions of ex ante and ex post impact. We find that impact claims in these case–grant pairs are often congruent with each other, with 76% showing alignment between anticipated impact at funding stage and the eventual claimed impact in the REF. Co-production of research, often perceived as a model for impactful research, was a feature of just over half of our cases.

Our results show that, contrary to other preliminary studies of the REF, impact appears to be broadly predictable, although unpredictability remains important. We suggest that co-production is a reasonably good mechanism for addressing the balance of predictable and unpredictable impact outcomes.

URL : How unpredictable is research impact? Evidence from the UK’s Research Excellence Framework

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1093/reseval/rvad019