Exchanges: The Interdisciplinary Research Journal

Research Culture Readiness

2024-05-30T16:55:21+01:00

This editorial provides an overview of the special issue’s contents, along with the editor’s insights into the progress towards the special issue. It celebrates the contributions by the associate editor team, as well as highlighting current calls for papers the journal has in place. Finally, it also highlights the various opportunities to engage, debate and discuss matters with Exchanges editorial team in the social sphere.

Why Do We Need an International Research Culture Conference?

2024-01-26T13:07:10+00:00

The summer of 2023 saw shifts in the priorities of UK higher education institutions (HEIs). Research funders, learned societies, and early decision documents for the upcoming Research Excellence Framework (REF) cycle advocated for greater emphasis on research culture. This echoed ongoing concerns within the sector regarding leaky pipelines, unhealthy competition, a pervasive reproducibility crisis and an exclusionary research environment, all of which posed threats to the sustainability of research excellence. While many HEIs were individually addressing these shared issues, there was limited consensus on definitions, scope, frameworks, or validated measures for enhancing research culture. Recognising a need for collaboration and coordination, the University of Warwick hosted the inaugural International Research Culture Conference (IRCC23) in September 2023. This reflection delves into the contextual backdrop that prompted the organisation of IRCC23, outlines its objectives, discusses the conference proceedings, and explores potential future directions.

Reimagining Peer Review Needs Publishers and Institutions to Collaborate More

2024-01-12T13:38:43+00:00

Collaboration between academic institutions and publishers is essential for advancing ongoing peer review reform. Despite being an important process in scientific publishing, the flaws of the current models of peer review used by most publishers are increasingly recognised, and include inefficiency, inconsistency, bias and a lack of transparency. Fortuitously, numerous journals and related organisations have leveraged the transformative potential of preprints to already initiate positive changes. However, active support from academic institutions, influential in shaping researchers’ careers and cultures, is crucial too. This potential collaboration would offer mutual benefits, foster more responsible research assessment, help reimagine peer review, and ultimately promote a healthier research culture.

Reduced to a Number

2024-01-19T04:26:03+00:00

In a recent study carried out by library professionals at the University of Waikato, a small university situated in Aotearoa New Zealand, researchers across a range of disciplines were interviewed to better understand their views on researcher assessment, metrics, and research impact. Beyond discussions about the limitations of bibliometrics, many of the participants also drew attention to structural factors that affect their decision making, attitudes, and the way they work. These included satisfying research assessment, ensuring job security and career progression, cultural labour and tensions for Indigenous scholars, and dealings with reviewers and publishers.

Developing a Research Culture with Trainee Teachers on International Initial Teacher Training Programmes

2024-01-21T16:15:11+00:00

Postgraduate initial teacher training from the UK perspective is a fast-paced 36-week full time programme. In parallel with assessed teaching and subject studies, trainees carry out classroom-based research. To do this, they draw on approaches to evidence-informed teaching that include taking the best available evidence from research and practical experience to answer context-specific research questions. This paper looks at the case of trainees who undertake their PGCE programme internationally i.e. they remain based in their international schools for the practical elements but engage in the wider programme via distance learning. One of the greatest regrets of university staff working with these trainees was that the research knowledge gained was contained only within the assessment system and that the trainees would leave, taking this wealth of knowledge with them. The fear was that these emerging practitioner researchers would see their research work as being completed solely for the purpose of certification, without recognising themselves as beginning a career-long process of reflective research in their schools.

From this, the Sunderland Reflective Action in Education project (SunRAE) was developed in response to the challenge of building a community of research-informed practice when working remotely and a/synchronously across different international time zones. It is a student research conference, journal and podcast initiative integrated into the PGCE (Distance Learning) programmes. Linking this initiative to the wider research of the contribution of initial teacher education to the professional learning of teachers in schools, this critical reflection paper connects with the wider debates around developing research culture and makes links between the importance of both for creating better school-based practitioner researchers. The paper reflects that the same themes of widening participation, raising awareness, and reducing silo working that are important for all researcher development are relevant for school-based teacher researchers.

Key Features of a Positive Research Culture

2024-01-23T18:17:40+00:00

The Research Culture Awards were introduced as a way of celebrating people and groups who positively contribute towards enhancing the research environment at the University of Stirling. Colleagues can be nominated anonymously across multiple categories (including leadership, collaboration, mentoring), with nominees receiving their full nomination feedback: both this aspect, and the celebratory awards ceremony, seek to recognise the often-hidden contributions and efforts and create a shared understanding of what good research culture looks like for Stirling. First introduced in 2020, the awards have been held annually and have grown in popularity year on year. Exploring these nominations has allowed for an analysis of the key features of a positive research culture from a person-centric perspective, as felt at local level. The analysis was carried out using a manual frequency analysis of related words and phrases. The overarching results showed that teamwork/collegiality; sharing expertise; good role modelling and good listening skills were the attributes which were most appreciated in colleagues.

Foregrounding Positive Research Culture

2024-01-24T09:32:50+00:00

A key theme emerging across the International Research Culture Conference 2023 (IRCC 2023) was the detrimental effect of excessive competition. Funders, institutions, and individual researchers from across the research landscape recognised that some actions intended to promote collaboration, and some measures of research culture, may contribute to an overly competitive research context that is detrimental to the research endeavour.

This article reviews key findings from the conference that could combat too much competition. We highlight work on learning across the research landscape, and continuing developments in measurement and evaluation of research culture that are inclusive and adaptable across contexts. We suggest that these are key elements of progressing positive research cultures and that these should be prioritised for discussion at future conferences.

The Burden of Research in Architecture

2024-01-25T10:01:30+00:00

Architecture can be called a domain of infinite intangible equations. Advancement and innovative technologies in architecture are owed to the researchers who work behind the scenes and bring about these impactful changes. Nevertheless, there seems to be a significant disparity between research practitioners and practitioners in architecture, even with these notable advancements.

Architectural researchers follow a meticulous process that includes understanding the background of field visits and documentation. These steps form a creative journey and involve skills similar to design in terms of generating visuals. Researchers in architecture face the added difficulty of the age-old research methodology clash: quantitative or qualitative? Overcoming these barriers and succeeding as a researcher who contributes to society while maintaining one's individual researcher characteristics is a considerable task.

However, the question arises of why, despite these struggles, researchers in architecture do not have the same recognition that practitioners have and are often classified as second-class citizens in the architectural fraternity. The hypothesis framed in this reflection hopes to show that the field of architecture needs researchers. Especially with the advancement of artificial intelligence, their role becomes primary in contributing to the data pool.

Therefore, the way forward is to give due diligence to architecture researchers and provide ample opportunities and funding while also holistically respecting their role in their community and society.

Developing Fundamental Research Practice Training at the University of Oxford

2024-01-25T16:58:47+00:00

The adoption of up-to-date research practices is the foundation of reliable and trusted academic research. Yet researchers are often left to piece together increasingly more complex and ever-evolving guidance on how to design, plan, execute, and report their research findings or sources. Higher educational institutions have a responsibility to develop more coherent ways to assist researchers to access the latest policies, guidance, and tools, e.g. for establishing equitable partnerships, managing research data, ensuring information security, choosing open and reproducible publication models.

At the University of Oxford, enabling and promoting good research practice is one of three key pillars in our research culture strategy. To deliver on the institutional ambitions for Research Practice, we are designing and implementing a comprehensive training and support programme, which includes running digital transformation projects and defining organisational guidance and policies.

This paper focuses on the training component and the creation of a set of short, e-learning modules on topics which include: Research Integrity and Governance; Open Research Practices; Research Design; Collaboration; Data; Authorship, Publication and Peer Review; and Research Impact and Public Engagement.

We share the criteria we have developed to help us map, assess and integrate pre-existing training and resources. The central aim is to deliver researcher-centred educational material that is applicable to any discipline and career stage. We also discuss how we are engaging key domain experts across the university through membership of small working groups for each of the modules. Once the core modules have been finalised, the materials will be publicly released under an open licence.

Funding Acknowledgement

The Research Practice Programme is funded by the University of Oxford with support from the Enhancing Research Culture Fund from Research England.

The More the Merrier

2024-01-25T17:06:05+00:00

Researcher developers today are expected to be able to support researchers at a variety of different career stages, all of whom have increasingly varying needs and identities. Some postgraduate researchers identify more as staff than as students, postdocs may struggle with transitioning to independence when they hold no independent position, while established researchers face the ‘muddle in the middle’. For both researcher developers and for universities, this raises the question: is it better to develop provision, which is as inclusive as possible, or should we focus on tailoring provision to more specific needs and communities?

In this paper, we will reflect upon our own experiences developing provision for specific audiences (e.g., Research Fellows) as well as more general ones. We advocate for a ‘more the merrier’ approach, forging cross-institutional collaborations and networks to provide a breadth of opportunities including those for broad and specific groups.

Enhancing Research Culture at Warwick Medical School (WMS)

2024-01-25T17:58:49+00:00

Understanding ‘what’ research culture means to members of Warwick Medical School’s (WMS) diverse community and how it can be enhanced is important to ensuring that all can flourish and deliver the best quality, world-leading research. Through active consultation and engagement with staff and students, we coproduced an action-focused WMS Enhancing Research Culture (ERC) Roadmap.

We hosted three (three-hour) semi-structured café-style conversations open to students and staff (both researchers and research enablers – that is, non-academic colleagues involved in the development and delivery of research). In Café 1, participants explored what ‘research culture’ meant to them. Cafés 2 and 3 built on these findings, exploring what could change, how, and when. A thematic analysis of findings was undertaken after each event, with findings shared and built on at each café. A five-year plan was crafted. The roadmap represents a community-driven, co-produced and values-driven understanding of the importance of a positive and inclusive research culture, which builds on existing initiatives and describes associated actions for change.

Funding Acknowledgement

The Rresearch Culture Cafés were funded by a University of Warwick Enhancing Research Culture Grant awarded 2022/2023.

Research Culture’s Role in Contributing to Research Waste

2024-01-26T10:26:23+00:00

Systematic reviews are the gold standard of evidence syntheses and underpin decision making which affects outcomes for patients globally. A research integrity project funded by the UK Research and Innovation Medical Research Council, entitled ‘Systematic Reviewlution’ aimed to understand and document problems with these highly cited and influential articles, which are often being published at a rate that outpaces primary clinical research. This living systematic review found 485 articles in the first iteration, documenting 67 discrete problems relating to the conduct and reporting of published systematic reviews. These problems potentially jeopardise the reliability or validity of systematic reviews. A variety of institutional factors are likely fuelling the publication of substandard systematic reviews and these factors are representative of issues affecting the entire evidence ecosystem. These factors are discussed in reference to themes identified through this meta-meta-meta-research initiative. The publish or perish perverse academic reward system is fuelling a lack of reproducible research. Paradoxically, the reputation of systematic reviews as a high-quality form of evidence is leading to an overproduction as they are likely seen as a certainty for publication. Wider issues of the influences of research culture generally, the fallibility of peer review and the importance of diversity and representation in research teams are emphasised.

Global Perspectives on Open Research Culture

2024-01-26T16:14:02+00:00

This critical reflection explores the role academic libraries play in enhancing the research culture of their institutions, specifically in relation to Open Research, through two contrasting case studies of the work undertaken by the University of Waikato Library, Aotearoa, New Zealand, and Lancaster University Library, UK. A prevalent theme within the paper is the contrasting level of maturity and engagement with Open Research at national, governmental, and institutional levels and the impact this has on the approaches of both institutions. The paper demonstrates how libraries proactively work in partnership with their communities to act as a catalyst for initiatives that facilitate culture change.

Funding Acknowledgement

This work is supported by the Research England Enhancing Research Culture Fund, 2023–24.

Engaging Academics With Outreach

2024-01-26T16:00:20+00:00

STEM Connections was a funded project designed to position academics at the forefront of outreach activities. It drew on the experience of outreach-focussed professional services staff to bridge the gap between the public and the academy, to train and support academics in the skills of engagement, and to support the design of the activities. Two cohorts (11 in 2022 and 12 in 2023) of academics were trained through this project, creating 20 interactive activities linked to active research and teaching at the University of Warwick. Four academic departments were represented across the two cohorts.

This paper explores the background literature of outreach: why do institutions feel a duty to engage the public? Who delivers the outreach? What are the benefits on the institution? Most importantly, how can outreach projects be designed to complement academics’ skills, rather than over-burden their already burgeoning workloads? Can outreach projects create tangible benefits for the academics who take part? The paper concludes with reflective statements from the involved academics.

Funding Acknowledgement

STEM Connections was funded by the Enhancing Research Culture Fund through Research England.

Jose Ortiz Gonzalez, Xinkai Tian, Umair Paracha, and Robin T. George were additionally supported by the WELD (Warwick Electrification Deployment) project. The WELD programme is funded by Driving the Electric Revolution, an ICSF Challenged delivered by UK Research and Innovation. Project Number: 10033186.

The Moral Dimension to Developing Research Culture

2024-01-26T16:44:21+00:00

The paper seeks to justify a moral dimension to research culture, both in terms of the moral commitment to pursuing a shared sense of purpose by researchers, and a moral obligation to provide a positive environment for researchers to flourish in by the employer. The paper draws on synergies and comparisons with work on character education, in schools and professions, and which has found prominence in education policy and practice since 2012. Where work on character education in higher Education Institutions (HEIs) is in its infancy in the UK, there are both examples from overseas (USA, Singapore) and transferable elements from work in schools that can help to demonstrate that focussing on moral development is beneficial to all. This paper views the cultivation of research culture not as a ‘fix’ for negative experiences that researchers encounter, nor as a means to correct perceptions that see culture as inherently bad. By viewing research culture through a moral lens, it is possible to approach its development and cultivation in holistic and encompassing ways which seek to allow researchers to become the best versions of themselves.

In establishing what the moral dimension to research culture is, I suggest that we can learn from work on character education to further explore frameworks for embedding provision within HEIs for morally focussed research culture initiatives. The paper draws insights from successes in how character education has been embedded in schools and professional education, with a particular focus on a framework for character and constitutive of four categories of virtue, embracing individual moral development with collective, communal citizenship. Further, I present three approaches for a framework for how it can be developed; where culture is ‘caught’ through a positive and collegial ethos, ‘taught’ through a combination of discrete teaching and learning activities, which, in combination, can encourage researchers and those supporting research to ‘seek’ out their own opportunities to develop research culture more actively.

The paper concludes with two main recommendations to view culture as more than a ‘nice to have’, but as means to facilitate positive, impactful research; and to actively cultivate culture through caught and taught approaches that will lead to researchers seeking opportunities to do so themselves.

Disrupting Academia’s Care-Free Narrative

2024-01-31T12:01:23+00:00

With its emphasis on countable outcomes and rewards, the conventional academic CV struggles to capture the essential but unquantifiable influences in the knowledge construction process. Mirroring the masculine rationalities on which academic traditions are built, the academic CV is particularly hostile to the disclosure of care-giving experiences, even though care plays an undeniable and integral role in academic work. A development of the academic CV, the narrative CV, is fast becoming a standard requirement in funding applications across Europe and beyond. In principle, the narrative CV encourages recognition of a range of contributions and skillsets beyond bibliometric indicators and funding awards. However, and with specific reference to UK Research and Innovation’s Résumé for Research and Innovation, we examine the types of ‘care obfuscations’ and confessions supported by the CV in both its traditional and narrative form. While the narrative CV appears to offer an experimental space for pushing against the care-less presentation of academic work, funders still need to explicitly consider the influence of care and care inequalities in the academic system. Without demonstrating that they have done so, and without sufficient evaluation systems in place, applicants will continue to rely on quantifiable accomplishments, reinforcing the same culture which initially inspired funders’ concern for gaining a ‘holistic’ overview on individual applicants.

Employability Schemes for Young People in STEM

2024-01-30T22:27:28+00:00

The researchers were awarded an Enhanced Research Culture Fund to improve the Research Culture within WMG (Warwick Manufacturing Group, University of Warwick). The aim was to encourage diversity and inclusion, enable career development and provide open access resources and research to facilitate collaboration, through the creation and development of a new Work Experience strategy. The project was committed to reaffirming young people's interest in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics), and hopefully inspiring them to pursue a career in the field. To begin such a programme, the researchers conducted a literature review, to highlight the importance of employability interventions that can provide young people with aspirations and role models. Conclusions of the study found that young people are prone to losing their STEM interest before they reach the age of fifteen due to negative perceptions of STEM as well as a lack of access to information, advice and guidance. Using the gaps in the research culture, the project aimed to establish and train a work experience team, with an emphasis on early-stage career staff; develop a strategy document with clear guidelines for hosting employability programmes; implement said programme. The strategy document identified three core Work experience models; Guided, Blended and Independent. The fund empowered a team of early career academics and professional staff to develop and deliver such a programme. The guide allows for better resource management and student timetabling, to enhance the overall experience.

Funding Acknowledgement

The project ‘Addressing social mobility issues in STEM’ was funded by the Enhancing Research Culture Fund through Research England.

Time Poverty and its Impact on Research Culture

2024-02-02T16:25:42+00:00

This article, based on our experience carrying out research culture surveys at our respective universities, discusses how ‘time poverty’ represents a significant challenge to the creation of positive research cultures. Time poverty is a term used to capture the fact that people persistently report having too many things to do and not enough time to do them, and is linked to poorer mental and physical health, as well as low productivity.

We argue that frameworks for defining and discussing research culture tend to be structured around tangible and easily categorised attributes. This can fragment and compartmentalise discussion and action toward discrete issues relating to research, and risks missing deeper structural and systemic issues that underlie them. To tackle time poverty, we will need a more systemic approach, requiring a broad range of solutions relating to the delivery of both research and education, and spanning from sector-wide level responses to individual behaviours. Without tackling time poverty, there is a risk that efforts to improve research culture will be stifled, because underlying issues still pervade and erode the culture, or simply because people don’t have time to engage with or contribute to change. We discuss these issues in relation to some of the findings from our institutional research culture surveys and work we’ve already started in our institutions and suggest some further actions to take.

Funding Acknowledgment
The work at Newcastle University was supported by Research England funding.

An (Research) Enabler? ‘A Person Who Encourages or Enables Negative or Self-Destructive Behaviour in Another’

2024-02-06T12:50:31+00:00

A brief critical reflection on the term ‘Research Enabler’ within the context of the developing UK national agenda to broaden and deepen the collective understanding of research communities and cultures within higher education and whether that is a helpful term to support the development of healthy research cultures. The term ‘Research Enabler’ refers to a broader set of occupational groups beyond research administrators to include academic librarians, IT staff, knowledge exchange professionals, technicians, and estates staff. This paper will reflect on the term from the perspective of a research administrator.

An enabler is a person or thing that makes something possible. However, within taxonomies of addiction the term ‘Enabler’ has more negative connotations as someone who encourages or enables negative or self-destructive behaviour in another. This is not to characterise researchers as addicts and research administrators as negative enablers but to draw attention to the language being used having potential negative and dualistic interpretations for an occupational group who often self-report ambiguity and duality as inherent in their complex roles.

Research Culture Challenges among Early Career Researchers

2024-02-06T16:32:47+00:00

Early career researchers (ECR) experience challenges particular to their career stage. Defining ECR as those with up to 10 years post-PhD experience, which includes postdoctoral research associates (PDRA) and graduate research students (GRS), this paper identifies some of the key issues that impact ECR based on qualitative research findings. The method used was a questionnaire in which 79 PDRA and 272 GRS from University College Dublin (UCD) responded to open-ended survey questions about research culture improvement, university acknowledgments, and promoting a positive research culture. Additional feedback was obtained from 23 PDRA and 57 GRS through post-survey focus group discussions. The challenges for ECR that were raised most consistently were: precarity, mentoring, and acknowledgement.

A Decolonising Approach to Policy Impact in the Global South

2024-02-06T20:18:52+00:00

Efforts to decolonise Higher Education are a key element of work to develop a more inclusive and equitable research culture, but what this means in the context of research impact has seldom been explored in depth. In particular, the pursuit of policy impact in Global South countries throws up particular potential challenges around the reproduction of postcolonial power structures and inequitable partnerships that academic staff need to be prepared to navigate. The University of Nottingham Institute for Policy and Engagement, along with international partners, has begun to explore what decolonisation means in the policy impact context, and what researchers, universities and the sector as a whole might do to ensure this growing area of work takes proper account of the cultural and historical contexts in which it takes place.

Breaking Barriers

2024-02-06T22:26:04+00:00

The academic community increasingly advocates for a more inclusive research culture, prompting universities to actively foster diversity, equity, and accessibility. This inclusivity is crucial for meaningful participation and recognising diverse perspectives in academia. In response, we organised an interactive seminar and developed a board game for engineering postgraduate research (PGR) students to grasp the concept of inclusive research culture. The seminar facilitated open discussions, allowing students to share experiences and comprehend the significance of a supportive environment. Emphasising inclusivity's role in generating innovative outcomes, the seminar showcased its potential through interdisciplinary collaborations. Based on and modified from ‘Snakes and Ladders,’ the accompanying board game enhanced understanding by providing an immersive experience that encouraged teamwork and creative problem-solving. This approach effectively promotes an inclusive research culture among engineering PGR students, imparting insights into the importance of a diverse and supportive research environment. By embracing inclusivity, universities unlock the research community's full potential, inspiring future generations to contribute significantly to diverse research endeavours.

Supporting Early-Career Researchers

2024-02-07T10:20:51+00:00

This paper explores the pivotal role of recognition in the career progression of emerging researchers in Higher Education. In an ever-competitive academic landscape, early career researchers (ECRs) face numerous challenges, including availability of resources and the struggle to establish themselves. This reflection highlights how ECRs can benefit from support and recognition, both within their academic institutions and the broader scholarly community. It delves into the various forms of recognition, such as awards, grants, publication acknowledgements and promotional progression as well as support mechanisms such as mentorship, training and their impact on researchers’ motivation, professional development, and contributions to their field. Additionally, the paper offers insights into practical strategies and policies that can be employed to better support and empower ECRs on their journey towards academic success. In supporting the ECR community, our future mid-career researchers will be well placed to face future challenges. Recognition, it argues, is not merely a form of validation but a powerful catalyst that fosters innovation, collaboration, and cultivation of a new generation of leaders in research.

Addressing Ethnic Health Inequities by Improving the Inclusiveness of Digital Health Research for South Asians

2024-02-07T14:14:58+00:00

South Asians are one of the largest ethnic minority groups in the United Kingdom. They face the multi-faceted burden of higher prevalence of long-term health conditions, worse access to health services, and poorer health outcomes. With the increase in digitally enabled health services, it is important to ensure that digital health apps are helping to address existing ethnic health inequities instead of creating new or exacerbating existing ones. Therefore, we need to engage with South Asians (SAs) early on and widen their participation in digital health research. However, there are several barriers to doing this effectively. Based on their experience of engaging with South Asians for developing and evaluating four health apps, the authors recommend technology developers and health researchers to understand the cultural context of common health behaviours of South Asians, and then consider the accessibility features of digital health apps and inclusivity of research procedures. This will contribute to making digital health research more inclusive for South Asians, and ultimately to reducing ethnic health inequities.

Developing Researchers’ Writing Skills

2024-02-07T22:20:33+00:00

Although belief in the ‘sage on the stage’ (the teacher as an expert standing at the front, delivering information) and tabula rasa (the student as a blank slate, ready to be written on) belongs to the distant past of outdated pedagogical theory, writing skills, especially grammar, are often treated as exceptions. This is especially the case when learners are also researchers; with pressure to produce high-quality work within tight deadlines, researchers are often expected to receive grammatical knowledge passively and replicate it promptly. This is what we sought to change. At the end of 2021, I created a series of academic writing workshops, which I have subsequently delivered to postgraduate students at Warwick University. This article provides a critical reflection of what I did, what challenges I faced, and what lessons I learned. It is hoped that this reflection will empower other academics and instructors to approach academic writing for postgraduates with confidence and integrity.

Five Adjectives to Convey What Good Research Culture Looks Like

2024-02-08T11:04:54+00:00

Research culture has become a growing concern for higher education institutions (HEIs) and the broader UK research community in recent years, highlighting the need for a shared language to cultivate a communal understanding essential for collective approaches to complex challenges. With this in mind, at the University of Warwick, we have devised a concise formulation – the five-adjective summary - 'happy', 'productive', 'creative', 'sound', 'open’ - to encapsulate our goals for a positive research culture. This summary can be delivered in one to two minutes to describe what good research looks like, and to introduce most topics covered by research culture. It can also act as a starting point for strategic and deeper discussion, by unpacking each adjective as required. This reflection discusses our streamlined definition of research culture based on the Royal Society's definition, our five-adjective summary of good research culture, the rationale behind its development and underlines the importance of adaptability to navigate changing perceptions of research culture.

Unleashing the Power of Postdocs

2024-02-08T22:11:46+00:00

Postdoctoral researchers are at the heart of university research. This highly motivated and talented group are ambitious and passionate about research and keen to develop an academic career. Very few achieve this call and far too many end up suffering with mental health issues, feeling used by a system where others benefit most from their efforts and that by not becoming an academic they have somehow failed.

For the academy to thrive and diversify this culture has to change, and evidence is clear that investing in the training, culture and opportunities for postdoctoral researchers will yield extraordinary rewards, not only for those researchers, but for their academic managers, departments and institutions. Training, inclusion and the opportunity to develop independence are all highly valued by postdoctoral researchers but there is also a need for research funders to look at how they can be major facilitators of change.

Research Culture

2024-02-11T12:03:38+00:00

Subjective formulation of research culture drives momentum for positive person-centred change. A common articulation is one, which emphasises cultural problems arising from overemphasis of the ‘lone academic’, exploitation of ‘lesser-academics’ and invisibility of enabling roles. This article considers systemic implications of this dominant narrative for research leaders and research leadership, giving specific attention to the nature, status and visibility of knowledge and its accompanying dynamics.

Two contrasting cultural formulations are considered respectively as ‘People, Process and Impact’ and ‘The Knowledge View’ with corresponding conceptual models proposed as ‘Social Benefit Factory’ and ‘Knowledge Cooperative’. Concern is raised at the apparent dominance of the factory model within research culture discourse, and a vision is presented for the development of a balancing knowledge conversation: both to engage interdisciplinary thinking on research culture, and to contribute directly to cultural discourse. Opportunities for the latter are considered briefly in relation to research leadership, objectivity and collegiality. The author attended the International Research Cultures Conference to gain a sense of the agenda and to co-locate his professional interests. This reflective response to the event is grounded in personal academic practice rather than academic specialism. It aims to invite connections and conversation. It is at the same time a preliminary conceptual inquiry into the nature and flux of academic boundaries, whether subjective, objective, practical or institutional.

Funding Acknowledgement

The author thanks funding for the activities and experiences, which have informed this article from the EPSRC (EP/P006892/1, EP/R025983/1 and EP/V051458/1) and the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering (University of Sheffield).

From ‘Whiteness’ to the Privilege Continuum

2024-02-11T15:32:30+00:00

This paper makes a case for a significantly different approach to EDI (Equality, Diversity and Inclusion) interventions in the Higher Education research space, focusing on institutional, systemic unconscious biases and supporting an affirmative approach to reaching various diversity targets and aspirations. The challenge here lies in mainstream EDI interventions being generally built around a deficit model, e.g., with a focus on groups or individuals who 'need to be supported' instead of focusing on adapting institutional processes and 'ways of working' to support more equitable and inclusive cultures built into institutional processes.

Identifying Metrics for Measuring Research Culture at the University of Leeds

2024-02-19T10:16:31+00:00

Evaluating research quality, environment, and impact has become standard in Higher Education (HE) and is largely based on quantitative data and expert assessments. Data-driven evaluations that focus on high-level statistics or conventional outputs can compromise the recognition of a wider range of research outputs and outcomes by a more diverse range of contributors. Hence, the mechanisms for evaluating research must be applicable and inclusive of a wide range of research activities. In contrast, research culture covers a vast breadth of areas, from career development, career pathways, reward, and recognition, to research integrity and equality. Most of these areas are not easily measurable, with capacity and capability limitations compounding the challenge. Clearly, there is a wealth of measurement options, which many research institutions are currently grappling with to best suit their local context. However, there are concerns as to whether it is appropriate or even possible to measure research cultural change. Concentrating too heavily on metrics rather than the changes themselves may pose additional barriers to the cultural change we desire. Thus, we argue that the adopted measures must be nuanced for context and for success relative to where we started and what we collectively understand as being measured.

Here we discuss the University of Leeds’ process of selecting metrics to measure research culture change over the next five years. We share how we engaged with the SCOPE framework to identify, shortlist, and probe potential metrics across the four strategic objectives we have identified are best placed to enhance our research culture. From an initial list of more than 80 metrics we have been able to narrow down to just five robust metrics that we feel, with regular monitoring, will maintain adaptability, resilience, and rigour.

This paper aims to provide open and transparent insight into how we have chosen to measure our change in research culture, in order to: benefit the wider sector; foster the sharing of best practices and avoid duplication of efforts. Thus, capturing the true essence of what we at the University of Leeds think it means to change culture.

Working Towards an Inclusive Research Culture Through EDI Education, Engagement and Empowerment of the Research Community

2024-02-21T14:48:18+00:00

This paper provides critical reflection on work and progress to embed EDI in our research and innovation workforce, practice and culture at the University of Manchester. Our university aim is to take an intersectional and holistic approach to educate, engage, empower and support our staff and student community at all levels to prioritise EDI. To embed EDI in research and promote collective responsibility to help shape a fairer, inclusive research culture the University launched the ‘Inclusive Research Transformation Programme’. This programme included developing inclusive research mindsets and building inclusive leadership capacity (from UG to senior research leader); a University EDI award scheme which catalysed innovative local and national researcher led EDI initiatives; and targeted funding schemes to help address gender, ethnicity, and disability inequities within our research career pipeline. Three schemes were developed, an UG EDI summer placement scheme, an early career research staff EDI fellowship underpinned by inclusive advocacy and an established academic returners scheme.

Funding Acknowledgement
This work was funded by University of Manchester and Wellcome Institutional Strategic Support Fund (204796/Z/16/Z ISSF - Wellcome ISSF 3 – EDI).

Empowering a Global Community Through Co-Production of a Connected University Research Culture

2024-03-20T10:28:35+00:00

Heriot-Watt University (HWU) is a global university with five academic Schools connected across five campuses. To foster a vibrant and inclusive research culture across the global research community, HWU has invested time and resource to strategically improve research culture, building on current strengths, while addressing cultural challenges faced by the research community. We have engaged all members of the community through a lengthy consultation and co-design process to co-produce a global action plan. The global community has a forward looking, unconstrained and ambitious future vision of what an ideal research culture at HWU should look like, and there are gaps between that vision and the diagnostic of perceptions of the ‘as-is’ culture. The action plan will drive forward an active strategy for supporting the research community. This paper gives an overview of the action plan development process using Lippitt and Knoster’s Model of Complex Change as a framework, sharing the key themes that emerged from consultations, plans for moving ahead, reflections on the successes and challenges, with a focus on how to foster research culture and connect a global university.