Impact in the REF: issues and obstacles

Watermeyer, Richard

doi:10.1080/03075079.2014.915303

Cited by 136 publications

(95 citation statements)

References 19 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Chubb and Watermeyer, 2017;Gunn and Mintrom, 2017;Smith et al, 2011;Watermeyer, 2016). This article concurs with a number of these critiques, and draws on them in a systematization of five principal 'perils' of the impact agenda.…”

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 48%

“…Instrumentalization, when tied to specific and externally defined goals, reduces institutional autonomy and academic freedom, as highlighted by a number of commentators (Smith et al, 2011;Watermeyer, 2016). A further concern is that the instrumental is often conceptualized in narrow terms, focusing mainly on the economic (according to Upton et al (2014), this tendency is more common among government than academics).…”

Section: Instrumentalizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some of these points have been broadly acknowledged in public debate and in the moderate number of publications on the topic, particularly the threat to blue-skies research, short-termism, economization and difficulties of evaluation (e.g. Fielding, 2003;Gunn and Mintrom, 2016;Watermeyer, 2016 (Fielding, 2003: 289).…”

Section: Five Perilsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Five perils of the impact agenda in higher education

McCowan¹

2018

London Review of Education

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The impact of higher education institutions on society has become the focus of significant policy attention in recent years, most prominently as part of research evaluation. This paper presents a theoretical exploration of the notion, identifying the key dimensions as source, form, trajectory, intensity, timescale and destination. While acknowledging the importance of porosity between universities and society, and the need to address critical contemporary challenges, five dangers of the impact agenda are highlighted: the normative dimension; the linear relationship; unpredictability; measurement; and instrumentalization. As a response to dominant conceptualizations, the paper proposes the notion of the generative intrinsic as a more robust basis on which to base the work of universities.

show abstract

Section: Introductionsupporting

confidence: 48%

Section: Instrumentalizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Five perils of the impact agenda in higher education

McCowan¹

2018

London Review of Education

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…It was found that in many instances, academics are not prepared, trained or provided with the support required to document non-academic impact [12]. However, alternative measures of research excellence such as citation metrics while perhaps easier to compile and compare, are deemed unreliable, particularly in the Arts and Humanities [16]. For example, publication in high ranking journals does not necessarily equate to a high number of citations [17], and the impact factor of journals is now less strongly tied to citation counts [18].…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

The effects of the research excellence framework research impact agenda on early- and mid-career researchers in library and information science

Marcella

Lockerbie

Bloice

et al. 2017

Journal of Information Science

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Early- and mid-career researchers will shape the future of library and information science (LIS) research and it is crucial they be well placed to engage with the research impact agenda. Their understanding of research impact may influence their capacity to be returned to research excellence framework (REF), the UK’s research quality assessment tool, as well as their ability to access research funding. This article reports the findings of a qualitative study exploring how the research impact agenda is influencing early- and mid-career researcher behaviour. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 14 early- and mid-career researchers. While enthusiastic about creating lasting impact, participants lack effective institutional support to maximise their own research impact. Participants demonstrate uncertainty about what REF impact is. The authors conclude that while there is evidence LIS academics engage with practice to maximise impact, they lack support in building impact and the discipline needs to do more to create opportunities for the academy and the profession to coalesce to identify objects for and deliver impactful research.

show abstract

“…Although, the introduction of impact assessment was not without controversy (Watermeyer, 2014), the key conclusion from the evaluation of impact assessment in the REF is that it was, by-and-large, successful (Manville et al, 2015b). Many of the inherent challenges of societal impact were identified, and remain key issues, but the use of case studies, combined with expert assessment (including experts from research user communities) allowed robust judgements about societal impact to be made.…”

Section: History and Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing (for) impact: future assessment of the societal impact of research

Hill¹

2016

Palgrave Commun

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

National research assessments play a role in providing accountability-to funders, government and civil society-for the activities of largely autonomous research systems. Increasingly, an element of such assessments is the assessment of societal impact. In this article, I review the development of impact assessment, with a focus on the UK's Research Excellence Framework, and consider implications and challenges for the future. Notwithstanding these challenges, I further argue that the assessment of societal impact needs to become a more central aspect of research evaluation. This article is published as part of a collection on the future of research assessment.

show abstract

Impact in the REF: issues and obstacles

Cited by 136 publications

References 19 publications

Five perils of the impact agenda in higher education

Five perils of the impact agenda in higher education

The effects of the research excellence framework research impact agenda on early- and mid-career researchers in library and information science

Assessing (for) impact: future assessment of the societal impact of research

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About