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  • Item type:Publication,
    Identifying gender disparities in research performance: the importance of comparing apples with apples Open PDF 
    (2022)
    Nygaard, L.P.
    ;
    Aksnes, D.W.
    ;
    Piro, F.N.
    Many studies on research productivity and performance suggest that men consistently outperform women. However, women and men are spread unevenly throughout the academy both horizontally (e.g., by scientific field) and vertically (e.g., by academic position), suggesting that aggregate numbers (comparing all men with all women) may reflect the different publication practices in different corners of the academy rather than gender per se. We use Norwegian bibliometric data to examine how the “what” (which publication practices are measured) and the “who” (how the population sample is disaggregated) matter in assessing apparent gender differences among academics in Norway. We investigate four clusters of indicators related to publication volume, publication type, authorship, and impact or quality (12 indicators in total) and explore how disaggregating the population by scientific field, institutional affiliation, academic position, and age changes the gender gaps that appear at the aggregate level. For most (but not all) indicators, we find that gender differences disappear or are strongly reduced after disaggregation. This suggests a composition effect, whereby apparent gender differences in productivity can to a considerable degree be ascribed to the composition of the group examined and the different publication practices common to specific groups. We argue that aggregate figures can exaggerate some gender disparities while obscuring others. Our study illustrates the situated nature of research productivity and the importance of comparing men and women within similar academic positions or scientific fields—of comparing apples with apples—when using bibliometric indicators to identify gender disparities in research productivity. © 2022, The Author(s).
  • Item type:Publication,
    What's in a number? How (and why) measuring research productivity in different ways changes the gender gap Open PDF 
    (2018)
    Nygaard, L.P.
    ;
    Bahgat, K.
    A persistent finding in studies of research productivity is the ‘gender gap’ where men seem to publish more academic research than women. However, this gap varies widely from study to study, and little has been done to explore how these claims might be sensitive to what is being measured and how. Using a dataset of publications statistics spanning five years for a Norwegian social science research institute, this paper looks at how (and why) measuring productivity in different ways provides different pictures of the gender gap. Based on the situated context of the institute, we also disaggregate the data by staff category, methodological orientation, and language background, and consider the impact of leaves of absence. We find widely varying measures of the gender gap depending on how we measure and disaggregate, and argue that different bibliometric indicators capture different aspects of research performance, including diversity of output and collaboration, which reflect different publication practices that are both gendered and situated. We suggest that looking at academic writing as a situated - and gendered - social practice offers a potential for deriving more theoretically consistent explanations for both the seeming persistence of the gender gap and the wide contextual variations. © 2018 Elsevier Ltd
  • Item type:Publication,
    Scientific Performance Assessments Through a Gender Lens: a Case Study on Evaluation and Selection Practices in Academia
    (2018)
    Nielsen, Matthias Wullum
    The focus on excellence and quality assurance in the academy has spawned a significant increase in the use of bibliometric measures in performance assessments of individual researchers. This article investigates the organizational consequences of this development through a gender lens. Based on a qualitative case study of evaluation and selection practices at a Danish university, a number of potential gender biases related to the use of bibliometric performance measures are identified. By taking as default the research preferences, approaches and career paths of a succesful group of predominantly male scholars, evaluators using bibliometrics risk disadvantaging candidates diverging from the norm with implications for gender stratification. Despite these potential biases, bibliometric measures come to function as technologies supporting a managerial narrative of the gender-blind organization. They adhere to the prevailing ethos of the academic meritocracy by standardizing the criteria for organizational advancement and ensuring transparency and accountability in the selection process. While bibliometric tools in this sense may lead to the recruitment of scientists with a strong CV and track record, they may at the same time prevent many talented researchers diverging from the norm from being recognized and succeed as academics.
  • Item type:Publication,
    Gender Disparities in International Research Collaboration: A Study of 25,000 University Professors Open PDF 
    (2021)
    Kwiek, M.
    ;
    Roszka, W.
    In this large-scale research based on bibliometric, biographical and administrative data, we examine how gender disparities in international research collaboration differ by collaboration intensity, academic position, age, and academic discipline. The following are the major findings: (1) While female scientists exhibit a higher rate of general, national, and institutional collaboration, male scientists exhibit a higher rate of international collaboration. (2) An aggregated picture of gender disparities hides a more nuanced cross-disciplinary picture of them. (3) An analysis of international research collaboration at three separate intensity levels (low, medium, and high) reveals that male scientists dominate in international collaboration at each level. However, at each level, there are specific disciplines in which females collaborate internationally more than males. Furthermore (4), gender disparities in international research collaboration are clearly linked with age: they are the lowest and statistically insignificant for young scientists and the highest and statistically significant for the oldest scientists. Finally, we estimate the odds ratios of being involved in international research collaboration using an analytical linear logistic model. The examined sample includes 25,463 internationally visible Polish university professors from 85 universities, grouped into 24 disciplines, and 158,743 Scopus-indexed articles. © 2020 The Authors. Journal of Economic Surveys published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd
  • Item type:Publication,
    International mobility and gender balance in academia. The case of Norway.
    (2021)
    Wendt, K.
    ;
    Gunnes, H.
    Female representation among students and graduates in higher education is growing internationally. This is a promising trend for achieving gender balance in top positions in academia. But there is still a long way to go, as women accounted for 24 per cent in top positions at European higher education institutions in 2016. In this article, we examine the influence of international recruitment on gender balance in Norwegian academia. We draw on data from the Norwegian Register of Research personnel, linked with population statistics from Statistics Norway. These data show that 32 per cent of the researchers at Norwegian higher education institutions in 2018 were born abroad. The share of foreign full professors has increased from 16 per cent in 2001 to 27 per cent in 2018, while for postdocs there has been an increase from 31 to 69 per cent. In terms of gender composition, a higher percentage of the foreign-born researchers are male. The incidence of international recruitment differs significantly across academic fields and positions. These dimensions are further analysed from a gender perspective in this paper. © 2021 18th International Conference on Scientometrics and Informetrics, ISSI 2021. All rights reserved.
  • Item type:Publication,
    Gender gaps in international research collaboration: a bibliometric approach Open PDF 
    (2019)
    Aksnes, Dag W.
    ;
    Piro, Fredrik Niclas
    ;
    Rørstad, Kristoffer
    This paper addresses gender differences in international research collaboration measured through international co-authorship. The study is based on a dataset consisting of 5600 Norwegian researchers and their publication output during a 3-year period (44,000 publications). Two different indicators are calculated. First, the share of researchers that have been involved in international collaboration as measured by co-authorship, and second, the share of their publications with international co-authorship. The study shows that the field of research is by far the most important factor influencing the propensity to collaborate internationally. There are large differences from humanities on the one hand, where international collaboration in terms of co-authorship is less common, to the natural sciences on the other, where such collaboration is very frequent. On an overall level, we find distinct gender differences in international research collaboration in Norway in the favour of men. However, men and women are not equally distributed across fields and there are relatively more female researchers in fields where the international collaboration rates generally are lower. When the data are analysed by scientific field, academic position, and publication productivity of the researchers, the gender differences in the propensity to collaborate with colleagues in other countries are minor only, and not statistically significant. Concerning gender inequality in science, the main challenge seems to be the lower productivity level of female researchers, which obviously hinders their academic career development. Differences in international collaboration are unlikely to be an important factor in this respect, at least not in the Norwegian research context analysed in this study.
  • Item type:Publication,
    Gender differences in research performance within and between countries: Italy vs Norway Open PDF 
    (2021)
    Abramo, G.
    ;
    Aksnes, D.W.
    ;
    D'Angelo, C.A.
    In this study, the scientific performance of Italian and Norwegian university professors is analysed using bibliometric indicators. The study is based on over 36,000 individuals and their publication output during the period 2011-2015. Applying a multidimensional indicator in which several aspects of the research performance are captured, we find large differences in the performance of men and women. These gender differences are evident across all analysed levels, such as country, field, and academic position. However, most of the gender differences can be explained by the tails of the distributions - in particular, there is a much higher proportion of men among the top 10 % performing scientists. For the remaining 90 % of the population, the gender differences are practically non-existent. The results of the two countries, which differ in terms of the societal role of women, are contrasting. Further, we discuss possible biases that are intrinsic in quantitative performance indicators, which might disfavour female researchers. © 2021 Elsevier Ltd.