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Research impact: a narrative review
Impact occurs when research generates benefits (health, economic, cultural) in addition to building the academic knowledge base. Its mechanisms are complex and reflect the multiple ways in which knowledge is generated and utilised. Much progress has been made in measuring both the outcomes of resear...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BioMed Central
2016
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4876557/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27211576 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12916-016-0620-8 |
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author | Greenhalgh, Trisha Raftery, James Hanney, Steve Glover, Matthew |
author_facet | Greenhalgh, Trisha Raftery, James Hanney, Steve Glover, Matthew |
author_sort | Greenhalgh, Trisha |
collection | PubMed |
description | Impact occurs when research generates benefits (health, economic, cultural) in addition to building the academic knowledge base. Its mechanisms are complex and reflect the multiple ways in which knowledge is generated and utilised. Much progress has been made in measuring both the outcomes of research and the processes and activities through which these are achieved, though the measurement of impact is not without its critics. We review the strengths and limitations of six established approaches (Payback, Research Impact Framework, Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, monetisation, societal impact assessment, UK Research Excellence Framework) plus recently developed and largely untested ones (including metrics and electronic databases). We conclude that (1) different approaches to impact assessment are appropriate in different circumstances; (2) the most robust and sophisticated approaches are labour-intensive and not always feasible or affordable; (3) whilst most metrics tend to capture direct and proximate impacts, more indirect and diffuse elements of the research-impact link can and should be measured; and (4) research on research impact is a rapidly developing field with new methodologies on the horizon. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-4876557 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2016 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-48765572016-05-24 Research impact: a narrative review Greenhalgh, Trisha Raftery, James Hanney, Steve Glover, Matthew BMC Med Review Impact occurs when research generates benefits (health, economic, cultural) in addition to building the academic knowledge base. Its mechanisms are complex and reflect the multiple ways in which knowledge is generated and utilised. Much progress has been made in measuring both the outcomes of research and the processes and activities through which these are achieved, though the measurement of impact is not without its critics. We review the strengths and limitations of six established approaches (Payback, Research Impact Framework, Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, monetisation, societal impact assessment, UK Research Excellence Framework) plus recently developed and largely untested ones (including metrics and electronic databases). We conclude that (1) different approaches to impact assessment are appropriate in different circumstances; (2) the most robust and sophisticated approaches are labour-intensive and not always feasible or affordable; (3) whilst most metrics tend to capture direct and proximate impacts, more indirect and diffuse elements of the research-impact link can and should be measured; and (4) research on research impact is a rapidly developing field with new methodologies on the horizon. BioMed Central 2016-05-23 /pmc/articles/PMC4876557/ /pubmed/27211576 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12916-016-0620-8 Text en © Greenhalgh et al. 2016 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. |
spellingShingle | Review Greenhalgh, Trisha Raftery, James Hanney, Steve Glover, Matthew Research impact: a narrative review |
title | Research impact: a narrative review |
title_full | Research impact: a narrative review |
title_fullStr | Research impact: a narrative review |
title_full_unstemmed | Research impact: a narrative review |
title_short | Research impact: a narrative review |
title_sort | research impact: a narrative review |
topic | Review |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4876557/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27211576 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12916-016-0620-8 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT greenhalghtrisha researchimpactanarrativereview AT rafteryjames researchimpactanarrativereview AT hanneysteve researchimpactanarrativereview AT glovermatthew researchimpactanarrativereview |