The impact of impact: How research value is created and assessed in the UK, US and Australia

Context and aims

As universities become bound up in a public role as drivers of economic prosperity, there has been a global policy shift towards measuring the value and benefit of publicly funded research. Governments have invested substantial resources in assessing research impact despite contestation around definitions, methodologies and processes. The rapid channelling of resources into impact has resulted in an under-theorised field that is largely dominated by pragmatic research policy concerns (i.e. focused on procedures and mechanisms). What is missing is a more nuanced conceptualisation of the societal value of research impact, which is essential in ensuring that research investment leads to meaningful societal outcomes. To capture this value, theoretically informed empirical insights into impact and the effects of its assessment on research cultures are needed. This, in turn, can inform the responsible evaluation of publicly funded research.

This will be the first large-scale comparative study examining research impact across countries. The project will compare academic cultures in three countries involved in the international push for the assessment of research impact; the UK, US and Australia, which utilise substantially different assessment models. The project will develop a theoretical understanding of research impact and its measurement. It will identify the effects of national research impact assessment policies and practices, and ascertain how they shape the ways research is done and their consequences for knowledge.

Potential applications and benefits

There is a pressing need for in-depth studies of the institutional and individual effects of research evaluation to interrogate frequently uncritical acceptance of dominant forms of valuation. This study will be novel in its examination of the powerful rhetoric of value that dominates discussions of research impact, and in its articulation of the challenges involved in the audit and commodification of academic research. This research will advance sociological and political understandings of research value, and will contribute theoretically informed knowledge to the applied fields of research evaluation and public policy. It will examine the emerging cultural patterns that surround research impact, and shed light on the political processes of decision-making and authority around impact policies. The study will shape the academic debate on the impact cultures of the UK, US and Australia, and contribute to a larger debate on the value of publicly funded research.

The study has strong potential to influence the policies that determine how impact is measured and how publicly funded research is governed in the UK, US, Australia and globally. By working directly with stakeholders including science policymakers, research funders and researchers, it will inform debate on the role of universities and research in society and facilitate more robust, reflexive and ethical research systems. It will provide recommendations on the structures and resources that policymakers, funders and higher education leaders could make available to researchers to support them in achieving high-quality research that makes a meaningful contribution to society. Understanding research impact and its assessment is of critical importance, not only strategically for UK, US and Australian governments, but also for countries with similar or emerging evaluation and funding models. It will allow countries to be intentional about creating responsive, equitable research systems that promote core values, such as a dual focus on research excellence and societal benefit.

Outputs from the study will include dissemination to policymakers, practitioners and the wider public through events for stakeholders, a working paper, a policy brief, blogs and media articles and a project website. Academic dissemination will occur through conference participation and open access articles in top journals.