A ‘perverse incentive’ from bibliometrics: could National Research Assessment Exercises (NRAEs) restrict literature availability for nature conservation?

Calver, Michael C.; Lilith, Maggie; Dickman, Chris R.

doi:10.1007/s11192-012-0908-1

Cited by 19 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 51 publications

(65 reference statements)

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“…These findings reflect recent calls in the literature for a revolution in research assessment, highlighting the need to build a collaborative infrastructure between funding sources, research institutions and practitioners (e.g. Largent and Lane 2012;Calver et al 2013). Until institutions rethink the criteria by which they measure success and allocate funding, they will continue to reinforce mismatches between research and practice.…”

Section: Bridging the Gap -What Now?supporting

confidence: 73%

Conservation, mismatch and the research–implementation gap

Jarvis¹,

Borrelle²,

Breen³

et al. 2015

Pac. Conserv. Biol.

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Despite calls to better link research and practice, the gap between knowing and doing continues to limit conservation success. Here we report on the outcomes from a workshop at the Society for Conservation Biology Oceania Conference 2014 on bridging the research–implementation gap. The workshop highlighted how the gap is still very real in conservation and the importance of bringing together researchers and practitioners to discuss their work. Workshop participants discussed how the research–implementation gap influenced their conservation efforts, identified five key mismatches between research and practice, and recommended seven ways we can work together to bridge the gap. The outcomes identified by the workshop are highly relevant to conservation efforts around the world.

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Section: Bridging the Gap -What Now?supporting

confidence: 73%

Conservation, mismatch and the research–implementation gap

Jarvis¹,

Borrelle²,

Breen³

et al. 2015

Pac. Conserv. Biol.

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“…Nevertheless, these studies would enlighten efforts to conserve Australian native mammals, and need to be recognised for their important contribution (Calver et al. ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Studies of specific aspects of a threatened species' biology are most likely to influence how we manage the recovery or conservation of that species; however, such studies are likely to be turned away by the editorial boards of the highest impact international journals as being parochial and of limited interest. Nevertheless, these studies would enlighten efforts to conserve Australian native mammals, and need to be recognised for their important contribution (Calver et al 2013b).…”

Section: Should We Be Talking About Research Effort or Research Impact?mentioning

confidence: 99%

The good, the bad, and the ugly: which Australian terrestrial mammal species attract most research?

Fleming

Bateman

2016

Mammal Review

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The Australian mammalian fauna is marked by high endemism and evolutionary distinctiveness and comprises monotreme, marsupial, and eutherian (‘placental’) native species. It has suffered the highest extinction rate of any mammalian fauna in any global region; surviving species are threatened by competition and predation from a range of introduced mammal species, and receive low levels of conservation‐oriented funding compared with species in many other countries. We investigated research foci on this unique fauna by using species h‐indices (SHI), and identified both taxonomic bias and subject bias in research effort and research impact for 331 Australian terrestrial mammal species. Species broadly fell into categories we labelled as the ‘good’, the ‘bad’, and the ‘ugly’. The majority of studies on monotremes and marsupials (the ‘good’) are directed towards their physiology and anatomy, with a smaller ecological focus. By contrast, introduced eutherians (the ‘bad’) have attracted greater attention in terms of ecological research, with greater emphasis on methods and technique studies for population control. Despite making up 45% of the 331 species studied, native rodents and bats (the ‘ugly’) have attracted disproportionately little study. While research on invasive species is directed towards problem solving, many Australian native species of conservation significance have attracted little research effort, little recognition, and little funding. Current global and national conservation funding largely overlooks non‐charismatic species, and yet these species may arguably be most in need of scientific and management research effort.

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“…Limited research on these topics in the field of biological conservation identified poor coverage of relevant regional or non-journal literature in some databases (Stergiou and Tsikliras, 2006;Calver et al, 2011Calver et al, , 2013a, and incomplete research profiles for individual researchers if only one database is used for assessment (Calver et al, 2013c).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why discrepancies in searching the conservation biology literature matter

Calver

Goldman

Hutchings

et al. 2017

Biological Conservation

Self Cite

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Conservation biologists seek as much information as possible for evidence-based conservation actions, so they have a special concern for variations in literature retrieval. We assessed the significance for biological conservation of differences in literature retrieval across databases by comparing five simple subject searches in Scopus, Web of Science (WoS) (comparing two different subscriptions), Web of Science (Core Collection) (WosCC) (comparing two different subscriptions) and Google Scholar (GS). The efficiency of a search (the number of references retrieved by a database as a percentage of the total number retrieved across all databases) ranged from 5% to 92%. Different subscriptions to WoS and WoSCC returned different numbers of references. Additionally, we asked 114 conservation biologists which databases they used, their awareness of differing search options within databases and their awareness of different subscription options. The four most widely used databases were GS (88%), WoS (59%), WoSCC (58%) and Scopus (27%). Most respondents (≥65%) were unsure about specific features in databases, although 66% knew of the service GS Citations, and 76% agreed that GS retrieved grey literature effectively. Respondents' publication history did not influence their responses. Researchers seeking comprehensive literature reviews should consult multiple databases, with online searches using GS important for locating books, book chapters and grey literature. Comparative evaluations of publication outputs of researchers or departments are susceptible to variations in content between databases and different subscriptions of the same database, so researchers should justify the databases used and, if applicable, the subscriptions. Students value convenience over thoroughness in literature searches, so relevant education is needed.

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A ‘perverse incentive’ from bibliometrics: could National Research Assessment Exercises (NRAEs) restrict literature availability for nature conservation?

Cited by 19 publications

References 51 publications

Conservation, mismatch and the research–implementation gap

Conservation, mismatch and the research–implementation gap

The good, the bad, and the ugly: which Australian terrestrial mammal species attract most research?

Why discrepancies in searching the conservation biology literature matter

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