How do we define the policy impact of public health research? A systematic review

Alla, Kristel; Hall, Wayne; Whiteford, Harvey; Head, Brian; Meurk, Carla

doi:10.1186/s12961-017-0247-z

Cited by 57 publications

(48 citation statements)

References 58 publications

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“…However, there remains a tendency for studies to define impact imprecisely (Alla et al 2017). Therefore, at this moment, we describe evidence impact evaluation as a key skill for researchers seeking to monitor their effectiveness, but we recognise that each research organisation needs to develop its own methodology, which can be based on principles that must be adapted to specific objectives and institutional contexts.…”

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confidence: 99%

Knowledge management for policy impact: the case of the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre

et al. 2018

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The European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) employs over 2000 scientists and seeks to maximise the value and impact of research in the EU policy process. To that end, its Knowledge management for policy (KMP) initiative synthesised the insights of a large amount of interdisciplinary work on the 'evidence-policy interface' to promote a new skills and training agenda. It developed this training initially for Commission staff, but many of its insights are relevant to organisations which try to combine research, policymaking, management, and communication skills to improve the value and use of research in policy. We recommend that such organisations should develop teams of researchers, policymakers, and 'knowledge brokers' to produce eight key practices: (1) research synthesis, to generate 'state of the art' knowledge on a policy problem; (2) management of expert communities, to maximise collaboration; (3) understanding policymaking, to know when and how to present evidence; (4) interpersonal skills, to focus on relationships and interaction; (5) engagement, to include citizens and stakeholders; (6) effective communication of knowledge; (7) monitoring and evaluation, to identify the impact of evidence on policy; and (8) policy advice, to know how to present knowledge effectively and ethically. No one possesses all skills relevant to all these practices. Rather, we recommend that organisations at the evidence-policy interface produce teams of people with different backgrounds, perspectives, and complementary skills.

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confidence: 99%

Knowledge management for policy impact: the case of the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre

et al. 2018

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“…Today, there is increasing demand from governments and funders of research that "researchers track the impact of their research to justify research expenditure by showing economic benefits, policy uptake, improved health and community outcomes, industry application and/or positive environmental effects" (Alla, Hall, Whiteford, Head, & Meurk, 2017). According to Derrick and Samuel (2016) the movement to societal impact can be described as a Kuhnian revolution for evaluation criteria (see also Bornmann, 2014aBornmann, , 2016.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Do altmetrics assess societal impact in a comparable way to case studies? An empirical test of the convergent validity of altmetrics based on data from the UK research excellence framework (REF)

Bornmann

Haunschild

Adams

2019

Journal of Informetrics

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Altmetrics have been proposed as a way to assess the societal impact of research. Although altmetrics are already in use as impact or attention metrics in different contexts, it is still not clear whether they really capture or reflect societal impact. This study is based on altmetrics, citation counts, research output and case study data from the UK Research Excellence Framework (REF), and peers' REF assessments of research output and societal impact. We investigated the convergent validity of altmetrics by using two REF datasets: publications submitted as research output (PRO) to the REF and publications referenced in case studies (PCS). Case studies, which are intended to demonstrate societal impact, should cite the most relevant research papers. We used the MHq' indicator for assessing impactan indicator which has been introduced for count data with many zeros. The results of the first part of the analysis show that news media as well as mentions on Facebook, in blogs, in Wikipedia, and in policy-related documents have higher MHq' values for PCS than for PRO. Thus, the altmetric indicators seem to have convergent validity for these data. In the second part of the analysis, altmetrics have been correlated with REF reviewers' average scores on PCS. The negative or close to zero correlations question the convergent validity of altmetrics in thatcontext. We suggest that they may capture a different aspect of societal impact (which can be called unknown attention) to that seen by reviewers (who are interested in the causal link between research and action in society).

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“…Therefore, two-pronged strategies combining interventions to target individual risk behaviour as well as population-wide risk groups should be used to guide future care and policy development [32]. However, the successful translation of health research into policy is hampered by heterogeneity in measures and definitions of its impact [33]. Furthermore, policy makers infrequently use systematic reviews to guide decision making, because many systematic reviews tend to focus on documenting methodological rigour, without providing recommendations on the design of policy initiatives [34,35].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What should governments be doing to prevent diabetes throughout the life course?

et al. 2019

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Health systems and governments are increasingly required to implement measures that target at-risk populations to prevent noncommunicable diseases. In this review we lay out what governments should be doing to prevent diabetes throughout the life course. The following four target groups were used to structure the specific recommendations: (1) pregnant women and young families, (2) children and adolescents, (3) working age population, and (4) the elderly. The evidence to date supports the effectiveness of some known government policy measures, such as sugar taxes and regulatory measures in the (pre-)school setting for children and adolescents. Many of these appear to be more effective if they are part of a bundle of strategies and if they are supplemented by communication strategies. Although there is a current focus on strategies that target the individual, governments can make use of evidence-based population-level prevention strategies. More research and continuous evaluation of the overall and subgroup-specific effectiveness of policy strategies using high-quality longitudinal studies are needed.

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How do we define the policy impact of public health research? A systematic review

Cited by 57 publications

References 58 publications

Knowledge management for policy impact: the case of the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre

Knowledge management for policy impact: the case of the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre

Do altmetrics assess societal impact in a comparable way to case studies? An empirical test of the convergent validity of altmetrics based on data from the UK research excellence framework (REF)

What should governments be doing to prevent diabetes throughout the life course?

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