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Amplifying Impact: Developing Indicators of Public Value in Public CommunicationProf. Axel BrunsARC Future FellowDigital Media Research CentreQueensland University of [email protected] | @snurb_dot_info
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The Impact Agenda• Impact, for better or for worse:
– RAE, REF (UK), RQF, ERA (Australia), …– Traditional measures of impact:
• Citation rates• Competitive grants income• Industry partnerships
– Negative Consequences:• Reduction of research activities to those with countable metrics• Focus on established rather than emerging fields• Staff poaching to bolster institutional impact
– But: ‘impact’ is here to stay
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Revisiting Impact• Need to recognise other forms of impact:
– Altmetrics:• Not all forms of citation and dissemination covered by citation counts• E.g. pre-print / e-print access and citation• E.g. circulation through social networking platforms
– Public value of research:• Impact beyond scholarly and industry circles• Visibility of scholars in public debate• Media take-up of research and public presence of scholars• Social and societal impact of scholarly research• Take-up in public policy-making at all levels of government
Parallels with EU’s ‘public value test’ for public service media
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Developing the Indicators• Measures of altmetrics and public value:
– Altmetrics:• Some potential for harvesting institutional e-prints stats• Comprehensive, ‘big social data’ studies of social media / online circulation• (Incentivised) self-reporting by scholars themselves?
– Public value of research:• Media monitoring, especially for online media• Harvesting of Hansard and other parliamentary transcripts• Institutional self-reporting?• Qualitative, case study-based evaluations (cf. UK REF in 2013-14)
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A Network Model of Public Value• Public value arises from multi-partner collaborations:
– Formal partnerships:• Research institutions• Industry partners• Government agencies
– Informal arrangements• Media organisations• NGO support and engagement
– Third-party services:• Social media platform providers• Amplifier services: The Conversation, Medium, …
These all generate their own impact metrics, too!
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Amplifier Platforms• Amplifying the impact of scholarly work:
– Crowdsourced content:• Scholars themselves pitch stories based on their work• Curation of material by editorial team
– Journalism-as-a-service (JAAS):• Scholarly research, journalistic editors• One central, popular platform
– Designed for sharing:• Creative Commons licences used throughout• Promotion through social media
– Impact measurement:• Personal and institutional access and engagement dashboards• Tracking of social media sharing and mainstream media republication
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Assessing Amplification• Assessing the role of such third-party services:
– Directly measurable:• Website readership, comments, etc.• On-sharing through social media, email, etc.• Republication in other media outlets
– Potentially measurable:• Media-follow-ups – interviews, additional coverage• Impact on citation rates (short-term / longer-term)
– Qualitative impressions:• New partnerships with researchers, industry, media, …• Career impacts – publishing and keynote opportunities, promotion, …
Assessment against the null hypothesis also desirable
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Tweets sharing links to The Conversation, compared to other Australian news and opinion sites (Jan. 2016)
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Where to from Here?• ‘Impact’ is here to stay:
– Institutional responses:• Shift the conversation beyond simplistic citation and grant counts• Explore and embrace altmetrics where they make a meaningful contribution• Develop and define the concept of public value for publicly-funded research
– Scholarly strategies:• Scholars have a duty to engage as public intellectuals in public debate• Institutions should encourage and recognise such engagement• This should include amplifier platforms and social media where possible
– Research into impact:• Need to test and document reliable alternative impact indicators• Particular focus on role and utility of amplifier platforms QUT / CRCA / Conversation partnership to do so
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http://mappingonlinepublics.net/@snurb_dot_info
@socialmediaQUT – http://socialmedia.qut.edu.au/ @qutdmrc – https://www.qut.edu.au/research/dmrc
This research is funded by the Australian Research Council through Future Fellowship and LIEF grants FT130100703 and LE140100148.