Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), NTNU Dragvoll, 7491, Trondheim, Norway.
Med Health Care Philos. 2020 Dec;23(4):549-563. doi: 10.1007/s11019-020-09966-z.
Both a significant body of literature and the case study presented here show that digital knowledge repositories struggle to attract the needed level of data and knowledge contribution that they need to be successful. This happens also to high profile and prestigious initiatives. The paper argues that the reluctance of researchers to contribute can only be understood in light of the highly competitive context in which research careers need to be built nowadays and how this affects researchers' quality of life. Competition and managerialism limit the discretion of researchers in sharing their results and in donating their working time. A growing corpus of research shows that academic researchers are increasingly overworked and highly stressed. This corroborates the point that the room for undertaking additional tasks with future and uncertain benefits is very limited. The paper thus recommends that promoters of digital knowledge repositories focus on the needs of the researchers who are expected to contribute their knowledge. In order to treat them fairly and to ensure the success of the repositories, knowledge sharing needs to be rewarded so as to improve the working conditions of contributors. In order to help implementing this researcher-centred approach, the paper proposes the idea of expediential trust: rewards for contributing should be such that rational, self-interested researchers would freely decide to contribute their knowledge and effort trusting that this would make them better off.
大量文献和案例研究都表明，数字知识存储库难以吸引到成功所需的足够的数据和知识贡献。即使是备受瞩目的知名倡议也存在这种情况。本文认为，研究人员不愿意做出贡献，这只能从当今研究职业需要建立的高度竞争环境以及这如何影响研究人员的生活质量的角度来理解。竞争和管理主义限制了研究人员在分享研究成果和捐赠工作时间方面的酌处权。越来越多的研究表明，学术研究人员的工作负担越来越重，压力也越来越大。这证实了这样一个观点，即承担未来和不确定收益的额外任务的空间非常有限。因此，本文建议数字知识存储库的推动者关注预计将贡献其知识的研究人员的需求。为了公平对待他们，并确保存储库的成功，需要对知识共享进行奖励，以改善贡献者的工作条件。为了帮助实施这种以研究人员为中心的方法，本文提出了 Expediential 信任的概念：贡献奖励应该使理性的、自利的研究人员能够自由决定贡献他们的知识和努力，相信这会使他们受益。
