The future of research assessment in the humanities: bottom-up assessment procedures

Abstract

Research assessment in the social sciences and humanities (SSH) is delicate. Assessment procedures meet strong criticisms from SSH scholars and bibliometric research shows that the methods that are usually applied are ill-adapted to SSH research. While until recently research on assessment in the SSH disciplines focused on the deficiencies of the current assessment methods, we present some European initiatives that take a bottom-up approach. They focus on research practices in SSH and reflect on how to assess SSH research with its own approaches instead of applying and adjusting the methods developed for and in the natural and life sciences. This is an important development because we can learn from previous evaluation exercises that whenever scholars felt that assessment procedures were imposed in a top-down manner without proper adjustments to SSH research, it resulted in boycotts or resistance. Applying adequate evaluation methods not only helps foster a better valorization of SSH research within the research community, among policymakers and colleagues from the natural sciences, but it will also help society to better understand SSH's contributions to solving major societal challenges. Therefore, taking the time to encourage bottom-up evaluation initiatives should result in being able to better confront the main challenges facing modern society. This article is published as part of a collection on the future of research assessment.

Science and its significant other: Representing the humanities in bibliometric scholarship

“…We do not expect that we have missed entirely different types of bibliometric research. The important research on notions of quality in the humanities (for example, Hug, Ochsner, & Daniel, ; Ochsner, Hug, & Daniel, , ) does not employ bibliometric methods, and is, therefore, also omitted from this study.…”

Approaches to creating ‘humane’ research evaluation metrics for the humanities

“…The use of bibliometrics in humanities research evaluation has been problematized by a number of studies that reflect differences in citation patterns, self-citation and collaboration practices, and regional orientations across the humanities. 18,19,20 Though improved in recent years, there still remains a lack of coverage for humanities research in popular scholarly databases. However, some humanists question the pursuit of measurable outcomes (i.e.…”

The deliverance of open access books : Examining usage and dissemination

“…Bibliometric methods such as citation counts can be seen as a form of assessment. For the humanities and social sciences, this is not without problems (Nederhof, 2006;Ochsner et al, 2017). For instance, each scholarly discipline has different citation practices; which is visible in section 10.5.2.…”