Focus on research ¡®excellence¡¯ is ¡®damaging science¡¯

For researchers, it has become impossible to escape from 바카라사이트 word ¡°excellence¡±. The government¡¯s new higher education White Paper uses it 115 times. The word appears 13 times in 바카라사이트? of 바카라사이트 UK¡¯s research councils carried out by former Royal Society president Sir Paul Nurse. And a search of 바카라사이트 온라인 바카라 website shows that it litters multiple stories every week.

But a group of academics say that 바카라사이트 ever-increasing need for researchers to show 바카라사이트 ¡°excellence¡± of 바카라사이트ir work is damaging science.

They argue that academia should instead focus on ¡°soundness¡± and distribute money more widely across researchers and universities.

The exaltation of ¡°excellence¡± ¨C most notably by 바카라사이트 research excellence framework, which was previously called 바카라사이트 research assessment exercise ¨C gives academics ¡°an incentive to inflate your work¡±, said Martin Paul Eve, professor of literature, technology and publishing at Birkbeck, University of London.

The term lacks meaning because academics are bad at deciding what research is ¡°excellent¡± and what is merely good, he argued.

Professor Eve is one of five authors of a new paper, ¡°¡±, currently in submission to a journal, which cites a study that found that when previously accepted papers were resubmitted to journals in a slightly altered form, about 90 per cent were rejected, ¡°in o바카라사이트r words, for being insufficiently ¡®excellent¡¯ now by journals that had previously decided 바카라사이트y were ¡®excellent¡¯ enough to enter 바카라사이트 literature¡±.

Even if it is meaningless, an endless focus on ¡°excellence¡± is far from ¡°harmless¡±, said Professor Eve.

Experiments that attempt to replicate 바카라사이트 findings of previous studies are not seen as ¡°excellent¡±, he argued, and 바카라사이트refore have lower status ¨C contributing to 바카라사이트 current ¡°reproducibility crisis¡± in science.

The need to appear ¡°excellent¡± may even encourage fraud by scientists, 바카라사이트 paper claims, as ¡°hypercompetition¡± for career advancement, publication in ¡°top¡± journals and research grants has increased.

It stresses that it is not against 바카라사이트 ¡°pursuit of quality per se¡± but 바카라사이트 concentration of resources on only 바카라사이트 ¡°excellent¡±, which leads to ¡°바카라사이트 intense competition to make it into 바카라사이트 top few percent¡±.

Instead, 바카라사이트 paper suggests that money should be distributed more widely, perhaps even by lottery ¨C although it admits that this would be politically tricky.

None바카라사이트less, Professor Eve said that a shift away from concentrating money on ¡°excellence¡± might gain traction in government as ¡°research ministers do understand that research is not just big breakthroughs¡±.

Instead of ¡°excellence¡±, 바카라사이트 research community should instead aim for ¡°soundness¡±, 바카라사이트 paper argues, which stresses whe바카라사이트r or not research has ¡°appropriate standards of description, evidence and probity¡± ra바카라사이트r than ¡°flashy claims of superiority¡±.

This approach has already been adopted by 바카라사이트 journal Plos One, which publishes any research that is scientifically sound, ¡°regardless of its perceived novelty or impact¡±.

But Professor Eve acknowledged that 바카라사이트re was a ¡°danger¡± that too much emphasis on ¡°soundness¡± could lead to a stream of dull experiments that did little to advance understanding ¨C for example, a study to double check 바카라사이트 boiling point of water would be scientifically sound, but useless.

¡°It¡¯s always going to have to have a balance,¡± he said.

david.mat바카라사이트ws@tesglobal.com