Real impact newsletter:
issue 3
The latest news and insights for the changemakers in the research community, who are passionate about making a difference and challenging the status quo.
Our third newsletter focuses on the results of our academic culture survey 2020. The findings and insights from this survey are set out as a report, divided into four sections:
- Academic culture
- Impact evaluation
- Openness and transparency in academic research
- The future role of publishers
You can use the 'On this page' and 'In the report' menus to quickly see and jump to content you're interested in, or scroll down to see what's here. Download this report as a PDF.
Welcome to our third issue of Real impact
There is mounting evidence that academic culture needs to be re-imagined. Competition driven by performance targets and metrics is partly to blame for a research culture that is increasingly overwhelmed, insecure and stressed.
At the same time, the research landscape is changing – open publishing is gaining momentum and there is a growing desire for a broader range of metrics and indicators. To drill down into these and related topics, particularly in light of the COVID-19 crisis, we conducted a global survey asking members of the research community their views on change within the academic sector.
The four main areas we sought to unearth were cultural issues within academia, research impact evaluation, open research and transparency, and the role publishers can play in driving change.
In this newsletter, we present the findings of Emerald’s Academic culture survey 2020 across these four topics, along with expert commentary and the steps needed for change.
For more about what we’ve been doing to drive change within society and academia, see our Global inclusivity report 2020.
Emerald academic culture survey 2020
In August 2020, we commissioned a global survey to gather views on change within the academic sector. The survey was sent to a random selection of 172,033 academics, librarians and students within Emerald’s literati community. A total of 1,274 literati from 188 countries responded. Topics covered attitudes to research impact evaluation, cultural challenges within academia, openness and transparency, and the role publishers can play in furthering change within the research ecosystem.
Here, we present the key results of the survey, together with expert opinions from Emerald. The focus is largely on global perspectives, but regional specific breakdowns have been added where there are significant points of difference. To assess how views have changed over time, we also present comparable results from our Change ready report 2019.
| Regional breakdown | Percentage |
|---|---|
| UK | 9.4% |
| Australasia | 7.0% |
| China/East Asia/NAT | 11.8% |
| India | 9.5% |
| Latin America | 3.2% |
| Middle East & North Africa | 8.5% |
| North & Western Eu excl UK | 8.0% |
| North America | 14.4% |
| Southern & Eastern Europe | 19.7% |
| Sub Saharan Africa | 8.4% |
| Gender breakdown | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Male | 62.1% |
| Female | 37.1% |
| Other | 0.9% |
| Position breakdown | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Head of Department | 11.9% |
| Research Manager | 4.3% |
| Impact Officer | 0.3% |
| Researcher | 25.3% |
| Faculty/Teaching | 46.0% |
| Student | 4.7% |
| Librarian | 1.2% |
| Other | 6.3% |
| Career stage breakdown | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Student | 7.2% |
| 1-5 years post PhD | 18.0% |
| 6-10 years post PhD | 16.3% |
| 11-15 years post PhD | 13.8% |
| 16-20 years post PhD | 9.9% |
| 20+ years post PhD | 26.7% |
| Not applicable | 8.07% |
| Organisation breakdown | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Academic institution | 91.2% |
| Funding body | 0.4% |
| National or local government | 2.6% |
| A not for profit organisation | 1.0% |
| A commercial organisation | 1.5% |
| I am retired | 1.7% |
| Other | 1.4% |
