Document Type : Articles
Author
PhD, Department of Knowledge and information science, Islamic Azad University Science and Research Branch, Tehran, IRAN
Abstract
The aim of this article is to study factors that affect continuance and gaps or transience in scientific activity of Iranian scholars. Scientific activity here is considered as writing and publishing articles in ISI ranked journals. Email interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of 48 scholars from the fields of biotechnology, psychology, humanities, health policy & services, aerial engineering, behavioral sciences, chemistry, and information science in 2015. The chosen fields were mentioned as priority in the Iranian scientific roadmap. The interviews were the qualitative phase of a mixed-methods study. The scholars were asked about the reasons for transience and suggestions for increasing continuance in article writing. The interviews revealed nine categories of factors causing gaps in the scientific works including personal and family factors, internal and external motivating factors, factors relating to work environment and facilities and the nature of the field, factors relating to publishing process, and finally factors relating to the knowledge of ISI journals. Interdisciplinary differences were found with regard to these factors, and five groups of solutions were suggested by interviewees for improving the continuance in authorship including providing research requirements, motivating researchers, encouraging team work, empowerment or enabling, and helping creativity or idea fostering.DOR: 98.1000/1726-8125.2017.15.43.0.2.70.115
Keywords
- Barrios, M., Villarroya, A., & Borrego, Á. (2013). Scientific production in psychology: A gender analysis. Scientometrics, 95(1), 15-23.
- Becher, T. (2000). Academic tribes and territories: Intellectual enquiry and the culture of disciplines. Buckingham: SRHE & Open University Press (2nd ed).
- Blackburn, R., Bieber, J., Lawrence, J., & Trautvetter, L. (1991). Faculty at work: Focus on research, scholarship, and service. Research in Higher Education, 32(4), 385-413.
- Bland, C., & Berquist, W. (1997). The Vitality of Senior Faculty Members. Snow on the Roof-fire in the Furnace. (ERIC Digest).
- Buchheit, S., Collins, A. B., & Collins, D. L. (2001). Intra-institutional factors that influence accounting research productivity. Journal of Applied Business Research (JABR), 17 (2), available at: http://journals.cluteonline.com/index.php/JABR/article/view/2070/2257
- Caelli, K., Ray, L., & Mill, J. (2003). ‘Clear as Mud’: Toward greater clarity in generic qualitative research. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 2(2), 1-13.
- Davarpanah, M.R., & Moghadam, H.M. (2012). The contribution of women in Iranian scholarly publication. Library Review, 61(4), 261-271.
- Dundar, H., & Lewis, D. R. (1998). Determinants of research productivity in higher education. Research in Higher Education, 39(6), 607-631.
- Fry, J. & Talja, S. (2004). The cultural shaping of scholarly communication: Explaining e‐journal use within and across academic fields. Proceedings of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 41(1), 20-30.
- Garvey, W.D. & Tomita, K. (1972). Continuity of productivity by scientists in the years 1968-71. Social Studies of Science, 2(4), 379-383.
- Gordon, A. (2007). Transient and continuant authors in a research field: The case of terrorism. Scientometrics, 72(2), 213-224.
- Gorman, A. M., & Scruggs, M. M. (1984). Characteristics of home economics researchers, Home Economics Research Journal, 12(4), 461-69.
- Hawkins, D. (1978). The literature on noble gas compounds, Journal of Chemical Information and Computation Science, 18, 190–199.
- Hu, Q., & Gill, T. G. (2000). IS faculty research productivity: Influential factors and implications. Information Resources Management Journal (IRMJ), 13(2), 15-25.
- Ioannidis, J.P.A, Boyack, K.W., & Klavans, R. (2014). Estimates of the continuously publishing core in the scientific workforce. PLoS ONE 9 (7), e101698. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0101698
- Jamali, H.R., Mansourian, Y., & Alijani, M. (2015). LIS research in Iran: authorship flow and scientific life expectancy of researchers, The 6th International Conference on Asia-Pacific Library and Information Science Education and Practice 28-30 October 2015, Manila, Philippines.
- Kelly, M. E., & Warmbrod, J. R. (1986). Developing and maintaining productive researchers in agricultural education, Journal of the American Association of Teacher Educators in Agriculture, 27(1), 27-32
- Kotrlik, J.W, Bartlett, J.E, Higgins, C.C., & Williams, H.A. (2002). Factors associated with research productivity of agricultural education faculty. Journal of Agricultural Education, 43(3), 1-10.
- Kumaravel, J, Rani, P.P., & Selvi, S.K. (2013). Transient and continuant authors in robotic medicine: A scientometric view. Journal of Scientometric Research, 2(3), 202-205.
- Lincoln, Y.S., & Guba, E.G. (1985). Naturalistic inquiry. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage. Retrieved from: http://www.qualres.org/HomeLinc-3684.html (accessed 1 April 2016)
- Marshall, C., & Rossman, G.B. (2006). Designing Qualitative Research, Sage Publications.
- Meho, L.I. (2006). E‐mail interviewing in qualitative research: A methodological discussion. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 57(10), 1284-1295.
- Meho, L.I., & Tibbo, H.R. (2003). Modeling the information‐seeking behavior of social scientists: Ellis's study revisited. Journal of the American society for Information Science and Technology, 54(6), 570-587.
- Merriam, S. B. (1998). Qualitative research and case study applications in education. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
- Mozaffarian, M., & Jamali, H. R. (2008). Iranian women in science: a gender study of scientific productivity in an Islamic country. Aslib Proceedings, 60 (5), 463-473.
- Nikzad, M. (2015). Actuarial trend of Scientific Production of Iranian Authors in ISI Ranked Journals from 1931 to 2012, PhD dissertation in Library and Information Studies, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University.
- Nikzad, M., Hariri, N, Babolhavaeji, F., & Nooshinfard, F. (2016). Transition and Continuance in Science Production: Authorship Flow in Chemistry, Iranian Journal of Information Processing and Management, 31(2), 301-323.
- Price, D., & Gürsey, S. (1975a). Studies in Scientometrics I: Transience and continuance in scientific authorship. Ciência da Informação, 4(1), 27-40.
- Price, D., & Gürsey, S. (1975b). Studies in Scientometrics II: The relation between source author and cited author. Ciência da Informação, 4(2), 103-108.
- Silke, A. (2004). The devil you know: Continuing problems with research on terrorism, In: A. SILKE (Ed.), Research on Terrorism, Trends, Achievements and Failures, London: Frank Cass, pp. 57–71.
- Smith, L. D., Best, L. A., Stubbs, D. A., Johnston, J., & Archibald, A. B. (2000). Scientific graphs and the hierarchy of the sciences: A Latourian survey of inscription practices. Social Studies of Science, 30(1), 73-94.
- Talebi, M. (2002). Study of factors affecting publishing articles in prestigious international journals. Rahyaft, 27, 184-196. (In Persian)
- Vasil, L. (1992). Self-efficacy expectations and causal attributions for achievement among male and female university faculty. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 41(3), 259-269.
- Wible, J.R. (1998). The Economics of science: Methodology and epistemology as if economy really mattered, London: Routledge.