Translation. Region: Russian Federal
Source: State University Higher School of Economics – State University Higher School of Economics –
Many young scientists in Russia continue their academic careers at the same university where they studied. This path is called inbreeding. Institute of Education HSE University analyzed the impact of inbreeding on publication activity in the natural and exact sciences. It turned out that it is ambiguous and depends on a combination of factors: the university’s geographical location, its financial resources, and the state of the regional academic labor market. An article with the results of the work was published inResearch Policy.
In Russia, almost every second PhD candidate continues to work at the same university where he or she received their education. This career trajectory is called academic inbreeding. It is believed that such a practice can contribute to the isolation of the scientific environment and a decrease in innovative potential. However, the impact of inbreeding on the productivity of young scientists has not yet been sufficiently studied.
Junior Research Fellowproject-training laboratory “University Development” HSE University Victoria Slepikh studied the careers of 1,132 Russian scientists who defended their PhD theses in 2012 in the fields of physics, biology, chemistry, and mathematics. To assess scientific productivity, the author used publications in international journals, their citation rate, and the presence of publications in journals in the first quartile (Q1).
The analysis was conducted at two levels. First, the author looked at all PhD candidates (1,132 researchers) who remained in the academy during the first eight years after defending their dissertation. Among them, the level of academic inbreeding was 61%. It turned out that graduates who changed universities after receiving their degree were, on average, more likely to publish, get into prestigious journals, and have a higher citation rate compared to those who remained working at their alma mater.
The most pronounced negative effect of inbreeding is observed in universities that do not have a special status, i.e., are not federal, national research universities or participants in state programs to support science. Young specialists from such universities published on average 34% fewer articles indexed by Scopus, and the probability that they will have at least one publication in a prestigious journal was almost half that of mobile scientists.
According to the author, if a young researcher remains in a university that is weakly involved in scientific activity and has limited resources, he continues to reproduce low-level academic standards. Moreover, monotonous professional experience reduces his competitiveness compared to colleagues who have changed organizations.
“In prestigious and scientifically oriented institutes, academic inbreeding, as a rule, does not have a noticeable impact on productivity. This is explained by a rich professional environment: the presence of a strong scientific team, modern equipment, stable connections with other organizations and participation in large projects,” explains Victoria Slepikh.
The author then identified a subgroup of the most productive scientists — 417 people whose number of publications exceeded the median values (from 4 to 6 publications in the first eight years of their academic career). In this sample, the proportion of inbreds was 56%. At the same time, the influence of academic inbreeding on productivity in this subgroup turned out to be minimal and was manifested only in individual cases — among graduates who defended their theses in regions with a saturated academic labor market.
In regions with a large number of scientific institutions, graduates are more likely to have the opportunity to change jobs. If, in such conditions, continuing a career at an alma mater occurs not by choice but by inertia, this may deprive young researchers of the chance to realize themselves in a more suitable professional environment. In less developed regions, academic inbreeding is usually due to a lack of alternatives. The results of the study confirm the hypothesis: where young scientists have more employment options, working at their home university may negatively affect their scientific results.
In addition, the study showed differences in the behavior of representatives of different scientific disciplines. For example, mathematicians more often chose mobile trajectories and less often stayed at the universities where they defended their dissertations, while physicists and chemists demonstrated a more pronounced tendency toward inbreeding. The author associates these differences with the nature of the research infrastructure and traditions of publication activity in different fields of science.
“Inbreeding itself is not a problem. However, its consequences can negatively affect scientific activity, especially in universities without special status or with limited resources. To compensate for the risks of isolation, it is necessary to stimulate academic mobility and expansion of external relations. This could be internships, scientific exchanges, development of partnerships with leading research centers. Such steps will increase not only productivity, but also the quality of the academic environment as a whole,” says Victoria Slepykh.
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