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Publications
Publications
  • 2020
  • Working Paper

Scientific Production: An Exploration into Organization, Resource Allocation, and Funding

By: Jerry Thursby, Marie Thursby, Karim R. Lakhani, Kyle R. Myers, Nina Cohodes, Sarah Bratt, Dennis Byrski, Hannah Cohoon and Maria Roche
  • Format:Print
  • | Language:English
  • | Pages:27
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Abstract

Production of scientific knowledge is core to civilizational advancement in economic and material wellbeing of societies. Despite its fundamental importance, however, a systematic effort to quantitatively study the factors underlying scientific production, particularly at the micro-organizational level has not taken place in either the social or natural sciences. As a first step, we report on intensive interviews with academic principal investigators on how they organize their research. Our interviews examine composition, structure and management of research groups, topic selection and resource allocation. Our purpose was not only to document the many facets of the organization of academic science, but also to uncover potential directions for research into science policy. We provide new insights on the relation between funding and resource allocation (to include research group composition) and between funding and topic selection (to include novelty of projects). In fact, what comprises “research groups” themselves emerges as a potentially new important direction.

Keywords

Funding; Science; Knowledge; Research; Information Management; Resource Allocation

Citation

Thursby, Jerry, Marie Thursby, Karim R. Lakhani, Kyle R. Myers, Nina Cohodes, Sarah Bratt, Dennis Byrski, Hannah Cohoon, and Maria Roche. "Scientific Production: An Exploration into Organization, Resource Allocation, and Funding." Working Paper, May 2020.

About The Authors

Karim R. Lakhani

Technology and Operations Management
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Kyle R. Myers

Technology and Operations Management
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Maria P. Roche

Strategy
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More from the Authors

    • 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Navigating the Jagged Technological Frontier: Field Experimental Evidence of the Effects of AI on Knowledge Worker Productivity and Quality

    By: Frabrizio Dell'Acqua, Edward McFowland III, Ethan Mollick, Hila Lifshitz-Assaf, Katherine C. Kellogg, Saran Rajendran, Lisa Krayer, François Candelon and Karim R. Lakhani
    • 2023
    • Faculty Research

    Incentivizing Innovation in Open Source: Evidence from the GitHub Sponsors Program

    By: Annamaria Conti, Vansh Gupta, Jorge Guzman and Maria P. Roche
    • 2023
    • Faculty Research

    The Crowdless Future? How Generative AI Is Shaping the Future of Human Crowdsourcing

    By: Léonard Boussioux, Jacqueline N. Lane, Miaomiao Zhang, Vladimir Jacimovic and Karim R. Lakhani
More from the Authors
  • Navigating the Jagged Technological Frontier: Field Experimental Evidence of the Effects of AI on Knowledge Worker Productivity and Quality By: Frabrizio Dell'Acqua, Edward McFowland III, Ethan Mollick, Hila Lifshitz-Assaf, Katherine C. Kellogg, Saran Rajendran, Lisa Krayer, François Candelon and Karim R. Lakhani
  • Incentivizing Innovation in Open Source: Evidence from the GitHub Sponsors Program By: Annamaria Conti, Vansh Gupta, Jorge Guzman and Maria P. Roche
  • The Crowdless Future? How Generative AI Is Shaping the Future of Human Crowdsourcing By: Léonard Boussioux, Jacqueline N. Lane, Miaomiao Zhang, Vladimir Jacimovic and Karim R. Lakhani
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