Research Collaboration and Team Science

WITNESSING THE REVOLUTION

Introduction

The scientific myth of the brilliant solitary scientist has long held sway, the image of the scientist emerging reluctantly from his (yes, it is a masculine myth) laboratory to communicate breakthrough results that will push knowledge ahead in great leaps and bounds. However, in recent decades the myth, one that previously held at least a kernel of truth (Lightman 2008), has become more and more difficult to sustain. While there may somewhere be some future Einstein laboring anonymously while developing potentially earthshaking thought experiments, it is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore the fact that almost all contemporary science is team science. In today's science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (hereafter STEM) research, more than 90 percent of publications are coauthored (Bozeman and Boardman 2014). Convincing evidence (Wuchty et al. 2007) shows that coauthored research, as compared to single-researcher work, more often leads to high knowledge impacts as well as to commercial uses of research as reflected in patents. Further, the success of collaborative teams attracts more collaborators, thus accelerating the growth of research teams (Parker and Hackett 2012).

Based on years of research on research collaboration and team science, our book aims to increase the probabilities that research teams will succeed in their collaborative efforts. We are certainly not the first students of research collaboration. For decades, others have studied research collaboration, and much can be learned from these earlier studies (for reviews, see Katz and Martin 1997; Beaver 2001; Bozeman and Boardman 2014). So why this book and why now? The succinct answer is that research collaboration and team science are no longer evolving slowly; in the past few years, researchers have seen and actively participated in a research collaboration and team science revolution. The revolution has many aspects, including the growth in the sheer number of collaborators, but also entails a greater mix in the number and disciplinary diversity of collaborators. We are witnessing a new "collaboration cosmopolitanism" (Bozeman and Corley 2004; Ynalvez and Shrum 2011), as researchers from industry collaborate with those in universities, as researchers from one discipline collaborate with those from other disciplines, and as globalization trends and communications technology facilitate increased cross-national collaborations.

While the research collaboration revolution has, in our view, advanced the technological and human resources brought to bear on research projects and problems, it has also created formidable challenges. The revolution presents challenges with crediting and scientific reputation. Historically, processes for assigning credit for research work were reasonably straightforward: a researcher was or was not the author of a scientific paper and was or was not included on a patent. But the traditional norms for recognition break down when the number of authors proliferates. When there are more than a hundred authors listed for a five-page journal article, what does this signify? Related, new ethical problems have begun to emerge. With one or two or a handful of authors, credit attribution presents fewer challenges, but with expanding research teams the likelihood increases that any particular individual contributed literally nothing. The size and diversity of research teams increases the likelihood of conflict. All things being equal, the more persons involved in a team, the more likely that some team members will not play well with others. Research collaboration is no longer about working with friends at the end of the hall or at the other bench in the lab. With the globalization of teams and increased disciplinary, cultural, and gender diversity, we can see that the challenges for research teams differ greatly from the challenges researchers faced pre-revolution.

While almost all researchers are participating in the revolution, some are barely aware of it (most younger researchers take the current research collaboration regime for granted) and others are so busy with their day-to-day work that they have little time, energy, or inclination to spend much time reflecting on the revolution's implications, much less to develop strategies for steering it in the directions they wish. We feel we can help. Our research is on the social and managerial aspects of research teams and the factors affecting research collaboration.

We provide "front lines" reporting on the research collaboration revolution, as well as evidence-based suggestions about how to improve the effectiveness of modern research collaboration. We employ multiple data sources and multiple research methods, including evidence from survey data, data from Web posts, and archival data, but the core evidence presented in our book is from extensive interviews with active, collaborating academic researchers (those interested in detailed information about our data and methods should consult appendix 1). Our book documents and comments on the research collaboration revolution, even as it transpires, and we suggest how research teams confronting a new and radically changed collaboration environment can work more effectively. A necessary first step in coping with revolution is self-conscious awareness — understanding that it is happening, understanding why it is happening, and understanding its components.

Components of the Research Collaboration Revolution

Twentieth-century research collaboration has much in common with twenty-first-century collaboration, many of same advantages, disadvantages, and problems. But there are several elements of contemporary research collaboration that are quite distinct and important enough to characterize a revolution. Revolutionary changes in research collaboration and team science include changes in (1) the sheer number of collaborations and team members per collaboration; (2) commercialization of academic research; (3) gender diversity; (4) multiculturalism and the global conduct of research; (5) increased multidisciplinary (and interdisciplinary) collaboration; (6) contributorship and ethical issues; (7) a self-consciousness about "team science," including new policies and approaches to understanding and managing research collaboration.

THE STRENGTH IN NUMBERS REVOLUTION

Research collaboration is so ubiquitous that it is not possible to understand the dynamics of contemporary STEM research absent some knowledge of collaborative...