AmsterdamUMC, Department of Ethics, Health and Humanities, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
Department of Philosophy, VU University, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
PLoS One. 2024 Sep 4;19(9):e0307814. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0307814. eCollection 2024.
The focus on quantitative indicators-number of publications and grants, journal impact factors, Hirsch-index-has become pervasive in research management, funding systems, and research and publication practices (SES). Accountability through performance measurement has become the gold standard to increase productivity and (cost-) efficiency in academia. Scientific careers are strongly shaped by the push to produce more in a veritable 'publish or perish' culture. To this end, we investigated the perspectives of biomedical researchers on responsible assessment criteria that foster responsible conduct of research.
We performed a qualitative focus group study among 3 University medical centers in the Netherlands. In these centers, we performed 2 randomly selected groups of early career researchers (PhD and postdoc level & senior researchers (associate and full professors) from these 3 institutions and explored how relational responsibilities relate to responsible conduct of research and inquired how potential (formal) assessment criteria could correspond with these responsibilities.
In this study we highlighted what is considered responsible research among junior and senior researchers in the Netherlands and how this can be assessed in formal assessment criteria. The participants reflected on responsible research and highlighted several academic responsibilities (such as supervision, collaboration and teaching) that are often overlooked and that are considered a crucial prerequisite for responsible research. As these responsibilities pertain to intercollegiate relations, we henceforth refer to them as relational. After our systematic analysis of these relational responsibilities, participants suggested some ideas to improve current assessment criteria. We focused on how these duties can be reflected in multidimensional, concrete and sustainable assessment criteria. Focus group participants emphasized the importance of assessing team science (both individual as collective), suggested the use of a narrative in researcher assessment and valued the use of 360 degrees assessment of researchers. Participants believed that these alternative assessments, centered on relational responsibilities, could help in fostering responsible research practices. However, participants stressed that unclarity about the new assessment criteria would only cause more publication stress and insecurity about evaluation of their performance.
Our study suggests that relational responsibilities should ideally play a more prominent role in future assessment criteria as they correspond with and aspire the practice of responsible research. Our participants gave several suggestions how to make these skills quantifiable and assessable in future assessment criteria. However, the development of these criteria is still in its infancy, implementation can cause uncertainties among those assessed and consequently, future research should focus on how to make these criteria more tangible, concrete and applicable in daily practice to make them applicable to measure and assess responsible research practices in institutions.
Open Science Framework https://osf.io/9tjda/.
在科研管理、资助体系以及研究和出版实践中，定量指标（出版物和资助的数量、期刊影响因子、Hirsch 指数）的关注已变得无处不在。通过绩效衡量进行问责制已成为提高学术界生产力和（成本）效率的黄金标准。科研生涯深受在名副其实的“要么发表，要么灭亡”文化中产出更多成果的推动。为此，我们调查了生物医学研究人员对促进负责任研究行为的负责任评估标准的看法。
我们在荷兰的 3 所大学医学中心进行了一项定性焦点小组研究。在这些中心，我们从这 3 个机构中随机选择了两组早期职业研究人员（博士和博士后水平以及资深研究人员（副教授和正教授），并探讨了关系责任与负责任的研究行为的关系，并询问了潜在的（正式）评估标准如何与这些责任相对应。
在这项研究中，我们强调了荷兰初级和高级研究人员认为负责任的研究是什么，以及如何在正式评估标准中对其进行评估。参与者反思了负责任的研究，并强调了一些经常被忽视的学术责任（如监督、合作和教学），这些责任被认为是负责任研究的关键前提。由于这些责任涉及到院校间的关系，因此我们以后将它们称为关系责任。在对这些关系责任进行系统分析后，参与者提出了一些改进当前评估标准的想法。我们专注于如何将这些职责反映在多维、具体和可持续的评估标准中。焦点小组参与者强调了评估团队科学（个人和集体）的重要性，建议在研究人员评估中使用叙述，并重视对研究人员进行 360 度评估。参与者认为，这些以关系责任为中心的替代评估可以帮助培养负责任的研究实践。然而，参与者强调，新评估标准的不明确只会导致更多的发表压力和对其绩效评估的不安全感。
我们的研究表明，关系责任应在未来的评估标准中发挥更突出的作用，因为它们与负责任的研究实践相对应并期望其实践。我们的参与者提出了一些如何使这些技能在未来的评估标准中量化和可评估的建议。然而，这些标准的制定仍处于起步阶段，实施可能会在被评估者中引起不确定性，因此未来的研究应侧重于如何使这些标准在日常实践中更加具体、具体和适用，以便将其应用于衡量和评估机构中的负责任的研究实践。
开放科学框架 https://osf.io/9tjda/。
