High research productivity in vertically undifferentiated higher education systems: Who are the top performers?

Marek Kwiek ()
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Marek Kwiek: University of Poznan

Scientometrics, 2018, vol. 115, issue 1, No 22, 415-462

Abstract: Abstract The growing scholarly interest in research top performers comes from the growing policy interest in research top performance itself. A question emerges: what makes someone a top performer? In this paper, the upper 10% of Polish academics in terms of research productivity are studied, and predictors of entering this class are sought. In the science system (and Poland follows global patterns), a small number of scholars produce most of the works and attract huge numbers of citations. Performance determines rewards, and small differences in talent translate into a disproportionate level of success, leading to inequalities in resources, research outcomes, and rewards. Top performers are studied here through a bivariate analysis of their working time distribution and their academic role orientation, as well as through a model approach. Odds ratio estimates with logistic regression of being highly productive Polish academics are presented. Consistently across major clusters of academic disciplines, the tiny minority of 10% of academics produces about half (44.7%) of all Polish publications (48.0% of publications in English and 57.2% of internationally co-authored publications). The mean research productivity of top performers across major clusters is on average 7.3 times higher than that of the other academics, and in terms of internationally co-authored publications, 12.07 times higher. High inequality was observed: the average research productivity distribution is highly skewed with a long tail on the right not only for all Polish academics but also for top performers. The class of top performers is as internally stratified as that of their lower-performing colleagues. Separate regression models for all academics, science, technology, engineering and mathematics academics, and social sciences and humanities academics are built based on a large national sample (2525 usable observations), and implications are discussed.

Keywords: Inequality in science; Publication productivity; Lotka’s square law; Stratification in science; Reward structure; Skewed distribution; Stars; Cumulative advantage; Poland (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (15)

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DOI: 10.1007/s11192-018-2644-7

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