The value of research funding for knowledge creation and dissemination: A study of SNSF Research Grants

Rachel Heyard,Hanna Hottenrott

doi:10.1057/s41599-021-00891-x

Abstract

This study investigates the effect of competitive project funding on researchers’ publication outputs. Using detailed information on applicants at the Swiss National Science Foundation and their proposal evaluations, we employ a case-control design that accounts for individual heterogeneity of researchers and selection into treatment (e.g. funding). We estimate the impact of the grant award on a set of output indicators measuring the creation of new research results (the number of peer-reviewed articles), its relevance (number of citations and relative citation ratios), as well as its accessibility and dissemination as measured by the publication of preprints and by altmetrics. The results show that the funding program facilitates the publication and dissemination of additional research amounting to about one additional article in each of the three years following the funding. The higher citation metrics and altmetrics by funded researchers suggest that impact goes beyond quantity and that funding fosters dissemination and quality.

Highlights

Scientific research generated at universities and research organizations plays an important role in knowledge-based societies (Fleming et al, 2019; Poege et al, 2019)
The incidence rate ratios (IRR) inform us on the multiplicative change of the baseline count depending on funding status
The model for the publication count was fitted on the whole data set, while the model for the preprint count is fitted on data since 2010, because the number of preprints was rather small in general before

Summary

Introduction

Scientific research generated at universities and research organizations plays an important role in knowledge-based societies (Fleming et al, 2019; Poege et al, 2019). The growing importance of science-based industries puts additional emphasis on the question of how scientific knowledge is generated and whether public funding can accelerate knowledge creation and its diffusion. The goal is to incentivize the generation of ideas and to allocate funding such that it is most likely to deliver scientific progress and eventually economic and social returns. The goal is to incentivize the generation of ideas and to allocate funding such that it is most likely to deliver scientific progress and eventually economic and social returns1 In light of these developments, it is important to understand whether research grants facilitate additional, relevant research outputs and whether these are accessible to the public

Objectives

Results

Conclusion