Rethinking the effect of inter-gender collaboration on research performance for scholars

Abstract

• Inter-gender collaboration decreased research performance for female scholars. • Inter-gender collaboration increased research performance for male scholars. • The effect of inter-gender collaboration with star partners was stronger for female scholars. As scientific collaboration has become more common with increased representation of female scholars, the effects of inter-gender collaboration have attracted more attention. However, scholars have not reached a consensus on the relationship between inter-gender collaboration and research performance. Empirical evidence at the scholar level has also been rare. Therefore, based on the ratio of the opposite sex in collaboration partners, this study reveals the influence of participating in inter-gender collaborations on research performance for scholars. Grouped regression was employed to test gender differences in this effect. The effect of partners’ academic levels was also investigated to account for potential gender differences. The results indicated that inter-gender collaboration had a positive effect on research performance for scholars. Grouped regressions also showed that collaborating with more inter-gender partners exerted a significantly negative effect on the research performance of female scholars, while it had a positive effect for male scholars. The negative effect on female scholars were found to be strengthened if the partners were at a high academic level. This study is helpful to understand inter-gender collaboration in depth, and further reveals the gender differences in scientific collaboration.